The word "go" has lots of meanings besides physically moving to a place. It also means to change state ("the milk went bad", "he'll go crazy when he finds out") and to indicate immediate future tense ("I'm going to read this book now"). Not to mention some other less relevant uses.
this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:
- Both “200” and “160” are 2 minutes in microwave math
- When you’re a kid, you don’t realize you’re also watching your mom and dad grow up.
- More dreams have been destroyed by alarm clocks than anything else
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"It's time to achieve unconsciousness, kiddo."
The void calls ceaselessly, child.
Yeah I think it's going to make me go insane
In Dutch “go” means to go do a thing as well and I use it English in a similar fashion. Never thought of it weird before
Edit-preface: I am not a grammarian. I don’t know what the technical names for the different types of “to” are or if they are even recognized as distinct by experts in the field.
English is does indeed use “go” to mean “go do a thing”, but not with directional “to” (as in “go to the library”).
“Go run!”, “Go running”, “I’m going running”, and “I’m going to run” are all valid uses. (In that last case, the “to” is not a directional “to”, but is actually part of the infinitive verb “to run”, as in “I want to run”). However, you wouldn’t say “Go to run!” to tell someone to run.
"Go to run" could make sense with a causal “to” (“Go, in order that you might run”) but that separates “go” and “run” in to separate actions. Causal “to” is the “to” in “push to open” and “press F to pay respects” this is not the “to” in “go to sleep”
“Go to sleep” feels like it is in the directional sense, like "go to bed"
Edit: Now you’ve got me thinking. “Go to sleep” and “go to bed” are a little unusual . “Go to [location]“ without an article is usually reserved for proper nouns or pronouns (“Go to France”, “go to Curicó”, “go to Walmart”, “go to John“ “go to her”). When the location is a general noun, you usually use an article or a proper/pro-noun in the possessive form (“go to a restaurant”, “go to the party”, “go to Bob’s house”, “go to your room”). So what makes “bed” and “sleep” so special? The only other case I can think of at the moment is “go to ground” and that is different because it is an idiom, and the rule for idioms is “they mean what they mean”
Edit-edit: meals don’t use an article either: “to lunch”, “to dinner”, “to breakfast”.
Edit-edit-edit: AAAAAH! It applies to some other prepositions too: “in bed”, “at lunch”; but not “under the bed”. What is going on‽
Edit-edit-edit-edit: Causal “to” might be a use of the infinitive case?
Edit-edit-edit-edit-edit: “go to work” does not use an article either.
I think it's because the "to" in those phrases are part of "to sleep" not part of "go to". The "to" modifies the verb "sleep" to be an infinitive and the "go" is an imperative verb.
Damn that’s a good write up!
Another thing we say often in Dutch is I go to bed. Which works in English too! “Ik ga naar bed”
We "go" to lots of things that aren't places. Im going to prove it with this sentence.
Can you do it after we go to lunch?
...into space. go figure
I think I'm going to vomit.
Different usage. You wouldn't tell someone "Go to prove." Are there any examples of "Go to [word]." where the [word] is not a physical place?
Yes. We regularly say "go to [verb]".
Go to eat
Go to learn
Go to exercise
Saying "go to sleep" is exectly the same.
Not exactly. Compare being told "Go to sleep!" with "Go to eat!" "Go to learn!" "Go to exercise!" It makes sense grammatically, but nobody says it like that. They sound like something a non-native speaker would say.
It is grammatically correct to use them. It's the same rule. We're just used to using/hearing one but not the others.
Yes, I said it was grammatically correct. However, one phrase is actually used by native speakers of the language, the others are not. So there is a difference.
Not many.. Heres what i came up with though:
Go to great lengths
Go to extremes
Go to bat for something
Go to town on something
Still different usages because they require more words to make sense. "Go to sleep" is a weird figure of speech.
Now you're moving the goalposts :p
I agree it is a rare structure.
No, I'm not. Notice the period. That was very deliberate.
Are there any examples of “Go to [word].”
I edited my original post, but what about "go to extremes" ?
That one's better!
Planning to go into detail, or was that it?
In English, ‘go to’ can be used as the future subjunctive tense of the verb being conjugated.
Sounds fancy. I hope it's not expensive to use.
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In Spanish, they talk about hunger and thirst as if they are physical objects.
Feelings are things we have.
I think that's more that tener (to have) doesn't always mean a physical thing.
As an example in spanish they use tener for age. As in tengo 20 años literally is "I have 20 years" but it means "I am 20"
Or ten cuidado means "take care" or "be careful" but literally is more like "have care". Both phrases use tener in a nonphysical sense in the same way as in english we use "to have". Like to have compassion or to have doubts.
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German too. Ich habe Hunger. Sie haben Durst.
You can have feelings too.
Aw, thanks! I feel like you're a lovely person.
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The Dreaming
Tel'aran'rhiod
Instructions unclear, summoned Cthulhu.
I'm 90% sure that it was originally in the form of "to go <there/place> and " and has just been shortened over time. A refined colloquialism, if you go for that sort of thing
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