LEAVE WELL ENOUGH ALONE Definition & Meaning

Leave well enough alone

If things are going tolerably well, leave them alone; your efforts to improve the situation may make things worse.

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Idioms and Phrases

Also, let well enough alone . Do not try to change something lest you make it worse. For example, This recipe has turned out fine in the past, so leave well enough alone . The idea behind this expression dates from ancient Greek times, specifically Aesop's fable about a fox who refused a hedgehog's offer to take out its ticks lest, by removing those that are full, other hungry ones will replace them. Put as let well alone from the early 1700s, it was first recorded as let well enough alone in 1827. Also see let sleeping dogs lie .

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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

He shrugged as if to say, “We just leave well enough alone.”

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I understand why you’re thinking you should leave well enough alone now that there’s no immediate conflict to resolve.

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Then again, the creative mind that finds it difficult to leave well enough alone is the same one that engineered the mushroom “scallop,” a vegetarian entree in which the meaty stems of royal trumpet mushrooms are seared, scored and steamed until their texture resembles that of the prized bivalves.

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But of course, I can never leave well enough alone so I added several twists of my own.

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Even as she knew that she should just leave well enough alone, get out of the conversation and avoid Clara and the rest of the Daffodil Manor ghosts from then on like Aunt Rose had advised...well, she couldn’t help but feel the prickle of curiosity.

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

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