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Whenever someone gets up in the morning and buckles their belt, they're securing their pants to make sure everything stays sturdy and nothing will fall down. But if that same someone ends up carrying something that's a bit too heavy and they collapse, one could say they buckled under the weight, no matter how well they buckled their belt.

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"Dust" might be the prime example of a contranym, as the exact same word can be used in the exact same way and still mean something entirely different. If you dust your coffee table, you're removing tons of tiny particles from the surface. If, however, you're dusting a cake with powdered sugar, you are adding tons of tiny particles to the surface.

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If you consult a consultant, they will consult you right back. Consult can mean to either seek advice, or to give advice, making it quite the efficient, albeit sometimes confusing, word.

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If you bolt something down, you're making sure it stays in one place. In fact, you could say you're making sure it doesn't bolt away, or run off!

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In games like golf, a handicap is a numerical tool used to level the playing field and grant equal advantage to all players. In most other situations, a handicap is something that expressly inhibits an equal opportunity.

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In a classic example of give-and-take, "garnish" most often means to add an extra flourish on top of something, like a rosemary branch on a steak or an orange rind on a fancy cocktail. When it comes to the court of law, however, garnishing wages doesn't mean the worker gets a little something extra on the top, but instead means that most if not all of their wages are confiscated by the government, usually to pay off a debt.

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While both meanings of "finished" imply the end of something, those endings can be completely different. When you finish a work project, it means you have completed it and brought it to full fruition. You, on the other hand, might feel absolutely "finished" afterwards, completely drained and falling apart.

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The word "enjoin" can send some mixed messages. In layman's terms, enjoin is a verb that means to urge someone to do something. In contrast, in a court of law, someone being enjoined means they are prohibited from doing something.

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Both meanings of the word "fast" are fairly common, but we rarely think about how incompatible they are. Of course, fast is a synonym for quick, which implies movement and action. However, forms of the word like "fasten" or "hold fast" necessarily prohibit movement.

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Model can be a tricky one, because although the alternate definitions of the word may sound very similar, they are, in essence, perfect opposites of each other. On one hand, a model citizen is the perfect citizen, the epitome of an upstanding member of society, the truest form of a citizen. On the other hand, a model train is necessarily a fake, an imposter, made to look like the real thing but is lacking in key elements, namely size, that will always keep it from being a real train.

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The word "left" can imply two opposite sides of the same action. If someone has left their job, it is that person who is taking the action of leaving. If, later that afternoon, they're left behind by the bus, the action of leaving was done to them, instead.

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Off can either mean, well, for something to not be on, but it can also mean for something to be too "on." When you turn the lights off at bedtime, the room goes dark. But when, in the middle of the night, the smoke alarm starts "going off," it is more "on" than it has been all day, and you scramble to do what you can to make it stop going off and turn off.

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If you are screening a film or an art project, it means you're presenting it to the world, and making it visible. Of course, to screen something can also mean to hide and protect it.

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Why using the exact same word in the exact same sentence can mean such different things is a question better left to the linguists, but the evidence is right there. You can peruse a document and hang on to every detail, reading with intense concentration, or you can peruse that same document and only casually scan over the general gist of its contents.

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The worst thing an overseer can do is make an oversight. When one is tasked with oversight, their job is to keep a close eye on everything and make sure everything runs smoothly. But if that same overseer makes an oversight, it means they were slacking in their duties and let something go unnoticed.

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Similar to "enjoin," "sanction" can give off some seriously conflicting messages. If, for example, a government is sanctioned by another government, it means the government doing the sanctioning is effectively boycotting the sanctioned nation and refusing to do business with them, usually in protest of that country's actions. On the other hand, a sanctioned action can be something expressly approved by an authority.

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To strike something can, of course, mean to hit it with great force. In baseball, however, a strike means that the player failed to do precisely that, and didn't actually "strike" the ball at all.

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When a gardener seeds their garden with watermelon seeds, it means they're placing seeds into the earth so that their watermelon patch can grow and flourish. Once those watermelons are ripe for picking and cut into slices for everyone's enjoyment, that farmer will once again seed the watermelons, this time by taking the seeds out.

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To hold something up can either inhibit it or promote it. Context is everything here. If you're holding someone up, you can either be preventing them from doing what they need to do, or you can be helping them to rise to their potential, by holding them up with your support.

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Rocks, mountains, boulders, etc. have always been used to represent sturdiness, stability, and immovability. That makes it quite curious, then, that to "rock" something is to compromise its sturdiness, laugh in the face of its supposed stability, and make it move quite a lot. If a boat was a rock, it'd be impossible to "rock the boat."

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A sturdy, resilient person might be able to weather a storm, or make their way through it relatively no worse for wear. On the other hand, millions of years of similar storms can weather down even the strongest rocks, or cause them to wear away.

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Refrain, in one sense, can mean to avoid doing something. If you refrain from saying something nasty to someone, for example, you're choosing to hold your tongue. But let's say, for whatever reason, you have a change of heart and want to really let them have it. You could then let out a refrain of insults and expletives, repeating the same hurtful words over and over again.

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Similar to model, the different uses of the word "variety" can seem extremely similar, but give it a little more thought, and it'll become clear just how at odds they really are. If someone prefers a particular variety of chips, that means they know exactly which brand and which flavor they want. Conversely, if they ask for "a variety" of chips, they want a multitude of options to choose from and nothing specific.

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To throw something out can mean to either dismiss and get rid of it, or, in the case of ideas, it actually means to bring it into consideration. If someone were to "throw out" the idea that their friend "throw out" their old clothes, no one could blame the friends for being at least a little confused.

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This definition of transparent is surely the most common: anything that's transparent can be looked straight through. However, seeing straight through something can imply wildly different things. For example, a superhero turning transparent would make them invisible, totally hidden from sight. On the other hand, if someone's feelings are transparent, that means everyone knows exactly what they are, and there's no hiding them.

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We hope it doesn't wind anyone up to say that this introduction to Janus words is about to wind up. The first use of this word relates to excitement, gearing up, and getting ready for something. The second use indicates that something is wrapping up and coming to a close.

Sources: (ThoughtCo.) (Daily Writing Tips)

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Contranyms, or Janus words, are words with two opposite meanings, depending on the context in which they're used. Also known as antagonyms or auto-antonyms, these interesting words, of which there are at least more than a hundred, are nicknamed "Janus words" after the two-faced Roman god Janus, who was, among other things, the patron deity of transition and duality. Just like Janus, these words represent the beautiful duality and fluidity of language, where simple words can be used to express such a variety of ideas depending on their usage.

Not only can knowing about contranyms help you with your vocabulary and word usage, it can also be a fun mind game figuring out all the different ways you can use everyday words. Curious? Read on to learn about some of the coolest contranyms in the English language.

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Something in the "first degree" can either be the most intense version of something, or the least important. First degree murder, for example, is the most criminal, intentional, and premeditated version of the act. A first degree burn, on the other hand, is the burn you need to worry the least about.

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Discursive can either indicate an amateurish, disorganized way of speaking, or it can refer to quite the opposite: an organized and coherent method of conversation, a true and proper "discourse."

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The word "bound" presents a similar conundrum: if someone is bound for a certain destination, then they're on the move in that direction. However, if someone is, for example, bound to a chair, they won't be able to move in the direction of very much anything at all.