mixed blessing
Noun
Meaning
mixed blessing (plural mixed blessings)
(idiomatic) Something that has both good and bad features.
Moving house has been a mixed blessing: we're closer to the shops, but the railway is noisy.
Examples
It was a mixed blessing to have famous parents. It was tough to go to auditions and be bad, since I couldn't be anonymous.
It is a very mixed blessing to be brought back from the dead.
I think it's good to be your own person. But individuality is a mixed blessing. People who are 'different' are isolated.
Being the offspring of English teachers is a mixed blessing. When the film star says to you, on the air, 'It was a perfect script for she and I,' inside your head you hear, in the sarcastic voice of your late father, 'Perfect for she, eh? And perfect for I, also?'
To have the recognition of your colleagues is great. The public attention is a mixed blessing.
It's sort of the mixed blessing of being on television for so long in one thing; sometimes that backfires, in that you're not able to continue on.