take a beat
take a beat verb: to pause and take a moment to collect your thoughts, calm down, or regain composure before reacting.
Verb
take a beat (third-person singular simple present takes a beat, present participle taking a beat, simple past took a beat, past participle taken a beat)
- To pause and take a moment to collect your thoughts, calm down, or regain composure before reacting.
- “Breathe a minute. Relax. Say the magic words: you need to take a beat, and then you'll circle back.”2020, Samantha Jayne, “Surviving the Office” (1:20 from the start), in Quarter Life Poetry, season 1, episode 3, spoken by Samantha Jayne (Samantha Jayne)
- “You're suspended.” “With pay?” “Technically, yeah. Yes.” “Thanks. This is a win.” “Wait. What.. what just happened?” “What just happened?” “We just got a paid day off to plan a revenge prank. Shred... what's your size in a bomb vest?” “Probably a medium.” “You know what, guys? I think... I think...2025 February 13, Emily Towers, “Buffalo and Beavers” (6:25 from the start), in Animal Control, season 3, episode 6, spoken by Amit Patel (Ravi V. Patel)
Forms of take a beat
| third-person singular present | takes a beat |
|---|---|
| present participle | taking a beat |
| past | took a beat |
| past participle | taken a beat |
Questions about take a beat
- What does take a beat mean?
- Take a beat means to pause and take a moment to collect your thoughts, calm down, or regain composure before reacting.
- What part of speech is take a beat?
- Take a beat is a verb.
- What is the past tense of take a beat?
- The past tense of take a beat is took a beat.
Words near take a beat in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: take a beat (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this entry: “take a beat.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/take_a_beat. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.