Easing

How to spell easing

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce easing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does easing mean?

1. verbThe act of making or becoming less intense, tight, or restrictive.
2. nounA loosening of monetary conditions, such as cutting interest rates or expanding money supply.

Easing in a sentence

• verb

  The gradual easing of travel restrictions let families reunite.

• noun

  Quantitative easing pumped fresh money into the banking system.

• verb

  She felt a slow easing of the tension in her shoulders after the massage.

• noun

  The central bank signalled further easing to support growth.

Where does easing come from?

Language of origin: French

This word is the present participle and gerund of the verb 'ease', which came into English in the early 1300s from the Old French 'aise', meaning comfort, convenience, or elbow room. The ultimate source of 'aise' is debated, but it is widely traced to the Latin 'adiacens', meaning 'lying nearby', the same word that gave us 'adjacent'; the idea of having space close at hand shaded into the sense of comfort and freedom from constraint. From the noun 'ease' English built the verb 'to ease', meaning to make less difficult or less tight, and adding '-ing' produced 'easing' for the ongoing act of loosening or relieving. The spelling trap is small but real: because the final 'e' of 'ease' is dropped before '-ing', writers must resist the urge to keep it and write 'easeing'. The same family of comfort survives in 'easy' and 'disease', the latter literally meaning a lack of ease.

How the word is built

• eas- (from ease: comfort, freedom from difficulty)
• -ing (present participle / gerund suffix)