English in everyday life
Proverbs
Explore English sayings from most to least frequent in a published American English corpus. Alternate forms are collected together.
About these frequency groups
Groups use full-form occurrence counts in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), recorded in 2016–2017. For a proverb with several forms, we use the highest individual count, since adding overlapping forms could count the same occurrence twice.
These are historical American English corpus counts, not estimates of how often everyone uses a saying today. A zero means no full-form match was recorded. The source’s separate familiarity ratings are retained in the data but do not determine this ordering.
We grouped variants, merged reviewed duplicate entries, and preserved existing editorial wording. The source includes historical and dated sayings; inclusion is not an endorsement.
Expressions containing mind, including its inflections. Clear word filter
17 entries
Most common
100 or more recorded occurrences
Common
10–99 recorded occurrences
Less common
1–9 recorded occurrences
The heart has a mind of its own
You can do anything you put your mind to
An idle mind is the devil's workshop
The brain is the biggest erogenous zone
Matching variant: The mind is the biggest erogenous zone
Travel broadens the mind
Not observed in this corpus
No full-form matches recorded; this does not mean the proverb is never used
A cluttered desk is a sign of a cluttered mind
A neat desk is a sign of a sick mind
Big mouth, small brain
Matching variant: Big mouth, small mind