phrasal verb · neutral

take to heart

UK/teɪk tə hɑːt/US/teɪk tə hɑrt/take·to·HEART

speakingtask2

to be emotionally affected by something such as criticism or advice

Examples

Don't take the negative comments to heart; they are not a fair reflection of your work.

She took his advice to heart and worked harder.

We should take to heart the lessons learned from last year's failures.

Band 8 sentence

Policymakers should take public feedback to heart when designing effective interventions.

Collocations

  • take criticism to heart
  • take advice to heart

Word family

heart (n) nountake to heart (phr. v) verb

Common mistakes

take hearttake to heart

take to heartedtook to heart / take to heart

Say it for a higher band

5be affected by6internalize7+take to heart

Synonyms

internalize

be affected by

Easily confused

take heart

I took her criticism to heart and made major changes to my proposal.

Related words

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In take …

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