7 Empowering Phrases To Tell Yourself When Life Doesn’t Go Your Way

This one is pretty easy to figure out, it alludes to the uncontrolled way a loose axe-head flies off from its handle. It is first found in print in Thomas C. Haliburton's The Attaché; or, Sam Slick in England, 1843/4: "He flies right off the handle for nothing." Haliburton was an inventive writer and had a hand in the coining of several commonly used phrases: Ginger up Won't take no for an answer Today it means the same thing except in a figurative way - it means to lose control.