惊慌失措 (jīng huāng shī cuò)

Character breakdown

• 惊 (jīng) · 11 strokes

  Phonosemantic compound. 忄 represents the meaning and 京 represents the sound. Simplified form of 驚.

• 慌 (huāng) · 12 strokes

  Phonosemantic compound. 忄 represents the meaning and 荒 represents the sound.

• 失 (shī) · 5 strokes

  Depicts a person with their hair loose. Based on the original meaning "leisure; carefree", now written as 佚. The meaning later shifted to "lose" and "fail".

• 措 (cuò) · 11 strokes

  Phonosemantic compound. 扌 represents the meaning and 昔 represents the sound.

Usage

听到坏消息，他惊慌失措。

to lose one's head out of fear (idiom)

tīng dào huài xiāo xī ， tā jīng huāng shī cuò 。