How to Use at cross-purposes in a Sentence

at cross-purposes

idiom

• There’s no good way to balance those things that are at cross-purposes.
  — Star Tribune, 2 Oct. 2020
• Keep your thoughts on your breathing so your mind doesn't work at cross-purposes.
  — Jelena Kecmanovic, CNN, 19 Dec. 2021
• Plot and character work at cross-purposes in a story like this one.
  — Willing Davidson, The New Yorker, 30 May 2022
• The groups, which appear to be unconnected, seem to have been at cross-purposes.
  — Lily Hay Newman, Wired, 21 Apr. 2021
• Over the last year, the Fed’s duties as an inflation fighter and a bank regulator have been at cross-purposes.
  — Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 21 Mar. 2023
• And in many states agriculture and wildlife agencies appear to work at cross-purposes and have poor collaboration.
  — Paul A. Smith, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 3 Oct. 2021
• Added difficulty stems from the fact that typical solutions for them can work at cross-purposes.
  — Erika Page, The Christian Science Monitor, 16 Mar. 2023
• And for that there may need to be a cultivation of traits, tendencies, and dispositions, which are at cross-purposes which our selfish natures.
  — Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 25 July 2012
• Israel’s vow to resume the war is at cross-purposes with Arab countries who negotiated the hostage release and want the temporary truce to evolve into a more lasting cease-fire.
  — Nabih Bulos, Los Angeles Times, 24 Nov. 2023
• Shree sets out to explore how Ma’s muteness brings out the best and worst in her kin, among whom there are constant exchanges at cross-purposes but few scenes of direct, meaningful conversation.
  — Anjum Hasan, The New York Review of Books, 2 Mar. 2023
• Yet the state treasury is working at cross-purposes with over $1 billion invested in the coal industry alone, Divest Oregon said in its report.
  — From Usa Today Network and Wire Reports, USA TODAY, 21 Apr. 2022
• Trump, who is often at cross-purposes with McConnell, has appeared especially engaged in the Arizona and Georgia races, largely because of his own narrow losses there.
  — BostonGlobe.com, 18 July 2021
• That will keep inflation high which, in turn, will cause the Bank of England to keep working at cross-purposes with the new prime minister by jacking up interest rates to tame inflation by slowing the same economy that Liz Truss is trying to grow.
  — WSJ, 25 Sep. 2022
• The alliance of Yemeni forces the Saudis helped to assemble was unified in theory, but in practice its members acted independently, and often at cross-purposes.
  — April Longley Alley, Foreign Affairs, 11 Nov. 2019
• But over the past four years, the White House never delineated clear, cohesive goals for economic policy in Asia, often taking measures at cross-purposes with each other.
  — The Editors, National Review, 18 Nov. 2020
• As a result, teams occasionally worked at cross-purposes.
  — Lila MacLellan, Fortune, 1 Nov. 2022
• Sometimes government agencies have worked at cross-purposes.
  — al, 6 Sep. 2022
• That leaves Trump at cross-purposes with the Republican Governors Association, which backs its incumbents and is being forced to spend millions to shore up some of them against intraparty attacks.
  — Jonathan Karl, ABC News, 8 Apr. 2022
• But even if such 'cultural group selection' is possible, that does not negate the power of kin, as well as other 'lower level' dynamics which may operate at cross-purposes with organismic social units.
  — Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 14 June 2011
• Unlike the book, in which all the assassins who find themselves at cross-purposes on the Tokyo-to-Kyoto bullet train are Japanese, most of the principal characters have had an international makeover, raising online objections to whitewashing.
  — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 2 Aug. 2022
• The religious network sometimes acted independently or even at cross-purposes with the government.
  — Tim Golden, ProPublica, 27 Apr. 2023
• The religious network sometimes acted independently or even at cross-purposes with the government.
  — Tim Golden, ProPublica, 27 Apr. 2023
• Working at cross-purposes sometimes yields surprising delights.
  — Christian MacDonald, Vogue, 29 Apr. 2022
• Fierce competitors before Signet acquired Zales in 2014, these two brands have largely operated at cross-purposes until recently.
  — Pamela N. Danziger, Forbes, 20 June 2021
• Most Americans don’t think about how different levels of the government — local, state, federal — are at cross-purposes with each other, and that these various levels often turn the other way or even encourage vigilante violence.
  — Stuart Miller, Los Angeles Times, 30 Oct. 2023
• That tension sometimes puts people like Burke at cross-purposes with scientists like Katherine Holmes, who believes figs should be eradicated from vulnerable riparian corridors.
  — Jacob Roberts, Smithsonian Magazine, 25 Feb. 2022
• In a movie that ultimately centers on a trinity of female kin at cross-purposes — visiting Lilja, her formidable grandmother and moderately rebellious aunt — the 18-year-old outsider is the catalyst for the revelations and unraveling to come.
  — Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Sep. 2019