Idiom
burn the candle at both ends
Meaning
To work hard night and day; to sleep late and wake up early; to overwork or overexert oneself.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“You will get sick if you burn the candle at both ends.”
“I burn the candle at both ends during the busy holiday season.”
“He has been burning the candle at both ends to finish his degree while working full-time.”
“Parents often burn the candle at both ends when they try to balance a demanding career with caring for a newborn baby at night.”
“By burning the candle at both ends for months, she eventually reached a state of total exhaustion that forced her to reconsider her priorities.”
Examples
simple
“You will get sick if you burn the candle at both ends.”
“I burn the candle at both ends during the busy holiday season.”
contextual
“He has been burning the candle at both ends to finish his degree while working full-time.”
“Parents often burn the candle at both ends when they try to balance a demanding career with caring for a newborn baby at night.”
complex
“By burning the candle at both ends for months, she eventually reached a state of total exhaustion that forced her to reconsider her priorities.”
Origin
Attested in the 18th century, the phrase is a calque of the French expression brûler la chandelle par les deux bouts. Its original sense described a state of being doubly profligate, a condition of wastefulness regarding one’s resources that preceded the modern association with a lack of sleep. To consume a candle from both ends is to exhaust the light twice as quickly as necessary, a logistical inefficiency that became a metaphor for the rapid depletion of one's wealth or health.
Key words
Related idioms
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