Chinese idiom: “一心一意yì xīn yí yì” and “三心二意sān xīn èr yì”

In the Chinese language, there are a lot of idioms formed with some numbers. These idioms are powerful, vivid and widely-used. “one, two, three” in Chinese is “一, 二, 三” , here “心” means “heart” while “意” is “intention or meaning”. When you put them together, “心意” means “intention, mind, regard”.

When a Chinese present their friends a gift, they will say, “it is just our心意”. So you can guess the meaning of “一心一意”, that is “undivided attention of a mind”. The boyfriend should be “一心一意” to his girlfriend, and only when you are “一心一意”, you can really do something. “三心二意” means “be of two minds, not serious and concentrated”, if you are “三心二意”, you can’t achieve what you want. The two usually appear as a pair of antonym.