English Idiom: All downhill
Depending on the situation, all downhill can have a positive or a negative meaning.
Let’s make a positive start here. Today’s idiom in a positive sense is usually used when a situation is difficult at the beginning, but once a certain point is passed, the situation becomes easier.
For example, imagine that you have just joined a new company and the training period is both long and extremely challenging. Once you get through the hard part, however, the job will become much easier.
In a situation such as this, you can say, “I need to survive the training period, and it’ll be all downhill from there.” Going downhill is easy.
Next, we’ll move along to the negative meaning of all downhill.
You’ve probably heard about the ongoing public relations disaster that a particular airline in the United States is experiencing.
Police violently removed a paying passenger from a plane for no understandable reason.
People have started to boycott that airline. Also, the stock has dropped in value, and at least one person is suffering from physical trauma.
Until the moment that person was removed from the plane, it was business as usual for the airline.
However, it’s been all downhill since the forcible removal of the individual from the aircraft.
When a company goes downhill, it loses money and customers, which are never positive things for a company.
Unless, of course, they are a ski manufacturer. Then going downhill is what they do best.