what does take it with a grain of salt mean

Some people add a grain of salt to coffee to reduce the perception of bitterness.

So if you balance the current issue on one side of some scales, and a grain of salt on the either, you get a feeling for how important this issue is in the big picture I've asked several people around the office what they understand this to mean - and each person got to this answer via a different means:Ī grain of salt doesn't weigh very much. Salt was said to have healing properties, so to eat a meal 'with a pinch of salt' meant that you suspected the meal of being poisoned.Frequently in my workplace, when some bad news comes in, the advice take this with a grain of salt is used in such a context to mean choose for yourselves how to interpret this but don't consider it very important. The saying came from the old cure for poison - a pinch of salt. AnswerTo take 'with a grain of salt' means to take with a heavy dose of skepticism, caution and suspicion. says that the expression is a translation of the Latin cum grano salis, which Pliny used in describing Pompey's discovery of an antidote for poison (to be taken with a grain of salt). For example, if someone has a tendency to exaggerate, you'll want to take what they have said with a grain or pinch of salt. Basically, it means to be skeptical or to question something that someone has told you.

AnswerMy grandmother used to say this to me all the time. It is a warning that what that person has said, or may say, is not necessarily correct and accurate. The phrase is usually used when a person it giving you the 'low down' on what another person has told you. With a Grain of SaltYou should take what you hear and evaluate it on your own, don't take it for being the truth or correct.

What does take it with a grain of salt mean