When it comes to difficulties, we usually don’t say big/large difficulties; instead, you can say

great difficulties
enormous difficulties
major difficulties
serious difficulties

If the difficulties are so big that they can’t be overcome, those are insurmountable difficulties. The word ‘insurmountable’ means it can’t be overcome

If a situation is fraught with difficulties, it means it is completely full of difficulties. Politics is often fraught with

There are a number of verbs we can use when difficulties happen to you. Don’t say “meet difficulties” say

encounter difficulties
face difficulties
run into difficulties (more informal)

For the action you take in response to difficulties, you can use two phrasal verbs: cope with difficulties or deal with difficulties. And, if you take action that helps you succeed and get past the difficulties, then you have overcome the difficulties

You can say, “He finds it hard to express his feelings.” If you express your feelings, that means you talk about your emotions and you share them with other people

Another very common expression is to say, “She hurt my feelings.” If someone hurts your feelings, it means that they made you sad or they made you upset. That person made you experience negative emotions

Another expression is mixed feelings. You can say, “I have mixed feelings about the situation.” This means you have some good emotions and some bad emotions. It’s not clear exactly how you feel

Can you figure out what this collocation means? “He has strong feelings for her.” If one person has strong feelings for another person, that means he is in love with her. This implies strong romantic feelings. Again, that’s when you have “strong feelings for” another person

Let’s see what collocations we have with “feeling” (singular). As I mentioned, we usually use adjectives

a positive emotion could be a good, great, wonderful, amazing, or terrific feeling
a negative emotion could be a bad, horrible, terrible, or awful feeling

And finally, we have the expression “I have a feeling.” What on earth does this mean? “I have a feeling” is another way to say “I suspect.” Let me give you an example to make it clearer

Let’s say you have a friend who never comes on time for everything. He’s always late; late to meetings, late to parties, late to events. Let’s say you plan to meet up with this friend and some other friends, and when you arrive all the other friends are there, but this particular friend is not. You can say, “I have a feeling he’s going to be late.” This means, “I suspect he’s going to be late

When we’re in a place where we don’t know anyone, we can try to strike up a conversation (start a conversation) with someone new. This will probably be polite conversation – friendly and civilized

We can have an animated conversation, one that is full of energy, emotion, and often gestures. The opposite would be a hushed conversation, one that is done in quiet voices, often because we don’t want other people to overhear our conversation – accidentally listen to it

Unfortunately, sometimes the speaker is long-winded, meaning he or she talks too long, and the speech seems interminable – like it will never end

Those expressions were referring to more formal speeches, but the word speech is also used to describe someone’s manner of speaking in general. If someone’s speech is slurred, it means they’re not pronouncing things clearly and it’s hard to understand. Drunk people often have slurred speech

There are a lot of adjectives that can describe comments or remarks. Here are some positive ones

speak authoritatively, meaning to speak in a powerful, reliable way, with authority. My friend is an experienced lawyer, so she can speak authoritatively about the law
speak hesitantly, meaning you speak with hesitation, maybe because you are reluctant to share your opinion, or you’re worried about the other person’s reaction
speak earnestly, meaning you’re sincere, honest, and serious about the topic

constructive comments/remarks are ones that have a positive effect or help show how to make things better. We often see this in the expression “constructive criticism,” meaning criticism that’s presented in a kind way in order to help improve
incisive comments/remarks are ones that are clear and sharp, that directly communicate the reality of the situation
perceptive comments/remarks are ones that show good insight and understanding
witty comments/remarks are clever and funny

If you have an advantage, it means you are in a better position when compared to someone else. If one job candidate has 7 years of work experience and another candidate has only 2 years, the one with more experience has an advantage, he is more likely to be hired

To take advantage means to take action so that you profit or benefit from a situation. This can be a good thing – if you get a scholarship to study abroad, you should take advantage of the opportunity, accept the opportunity for your benefit

Make an appointment refers to the action of setting or scheduling the appointment. If I need a checkup, I’d call my doctor’s office and make an appointment for next week; I’m establishing the time and date of the future appointment

After the appointment is made, now I can say I have an appointment – meaning there is an appointment already scheduled. So when I walk into the doctor’s office I might say “I have an appointment for 10:30”

To have a chance (or sometimes have the chance) simply means to have some time available to do something. If I call my sister and she’s busy, I might leave a message saying “Call me back when you have a chance” – when you have time available

To take a chance means to try something risky or dangerous, or something that might not succeed. When a guy asks a girl out on a date, he’s taking a chance – she might agree to go out, or she might reject him. There’s a risk of failure

get a chance:  I didn’t get a chance to speak to her

miss your chance:  He left and I missed my chance to say goodbye to him

given half a chance:  I’d go now given half a chance (= if I had the slightest opportunity)

To give rise to something means to cause it to happen, or to create the situation in which something is more likely to happen. The economic crisis gave rise to protests across the country. The crisis was what caused or led to the protests. The invention of the internet gave rise to the online course industry. Because we have the internet, that created the situation in which online courses can exist

When you hear someone say “I don’t give a fig / I don’t give a damn / I don’t give a shit” and other expressions like that, they are saying “I COMPLETELY don’t care

This is very informal and a little bit rude, so be careful what you say this about or who you say it to. A simple example for me would be I don’t give a fig about celebrities – I really don’t care, I have absolutely no interest, about what movie stars or famous singers are doing