Definition

Verb: 1. To take on too many tasks or responsibilities: To voluntarily assume or become involved in many matters, often including those unrelated to oneself, leading to worry and preoccupation. 2. To become emotionally entangled or attached: To let one's heart or mind become involved with multiple people, matters, or sentimental attachments, resulting in lingering feelings, pursuit, or inner turmoil that is hard to let go of.

Usage Examples

• Verb (Sense 1):
  • Anh ấy đa mang quá nhiều việc nên lúc nào cũng thấy mệt mỏi. (He takes on too many jobs so he always feels tired.)
  • Đừng có đa mang chuyện của người khác. (Don't get involved in other people's business.)
• Verb (Sense 2):
  • Cô ấy là người đa mang, nên chuyện tình cảm lúc nào cũng phức tạp. (She is a person who gets emotionally entangled easily, so her love life is always complicated.)
  • Anh ta đa mang với quá khứ nên không thể sống cho hiện tại. (He is sentimentally attached to the past, so he cannot live in the present.)

Advanced Usage

• The word đa mang often carries a slightly negative or pitying connotation, implying that the person is causing unnecessary trouble or suffering for themselves by being unable to refuse or detach.
• It can describe a personality trait of someone who is prone to taking on burdens or emotional attachments.

Variants and Related Words

• Ôm đồm (verb): To take on a heap of tasks (more focused on the physical/ practical overload than the mental worry of đa mang).
• Vướng bận (verb): To be preoccupied or entangled with something (can be used for both tasks and emotions).
• Vấn vương (verb): To be sentimentally attached, to linger on thoughts or feelings (closer to the second sense of đa mang).

Synonyms

• To overcommit: Cam kết quá nhiều.
• To be burdened with: Bị đè nặng bởi.
• To be entangled in: Vướng vào, mắc vào (thường là cảm xúc).

Related Idioms

• Lòng đa mang: A "đa mang heart" – describing a person whose nature is to take on many cares or attachments.
  • Với lòng đa mang, bà ấy lúc nào cũng lo cho hết người này đến người khác. (With a heart that takes on all burdens, she is always worrying about one person after another.)

verb

1. to take on many jobs at the same time, to set one's mind on