ridges Idiom

burn your bridges

resign without notice, leave no way to return He can't return to the company. He's burned his bridges.

bridges

pants, trousers

burn one's bridges in front of one

Idiom(s): burn one's bridges in front of one

Theme: LIMITATION

to create future problems for oneself.
• I made a mistake again. I always seem to burn my bridges in front of me.
• I accidently insulted a math teacher whom I will have to take a course from next semester. I am burning my bridges in front of me.

burn one's bridges behind one

Idiom(s): burn one's bridges (behind one)

Theme: LIMITATION

to make decisions that cannot be changed in the future.
• If you drop out of school now, you'll be burning your bridges behind you.
• You're too young to burn your bridges that way.

burn one's bridges|boat|boats|bridge|bridges|burn|

v. phr. To make a decision that you cannot change; remove or destroy all the ways you can get back out of a place you have got into on purpose; leave yourself no way to escape a position. Bob was a good wrestler but a poor boxer. He burned his boats by letting Mickey choose how they would fight. When Dorothy became a nun, she burned her bridges behind her.

burn one's bridges

burn one's bridges
Also, burn one's boats. Commit oneself to an irreversible course. For example, Denouncing one's boss in a written resignation means one has burned one's bridges, or Turning down one job before you have another amounts to burning your boats. Both versions of this idiom allude to ancient military tactics, when troops would cross a body of water and then burn the bridge or boats they had used both to prevent retreat and to foil a pursuing enemy. [Late 1800s] Also see cross the Rubicon.