relaxed

From relax +‎ -ed, originally after Latin relaxātus.

• IPA^(key): /ɹɪˈlækst/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ækst

relaxed (comparative more relaxed, superlative most relaxed)

1. (obsolete, physiology) Made slack or feeble; weak, soft. [from 15th c.]
   • 1790, James Boswell, edited by Marlies K. Danziger and Frank Brady, Boswell: The Great Biographer, Yale, published 1989, page 54:

     It was a very wet morning. I woke relaxed and melancholy as in the country, and walked about an hour under cover, in the middle of the town […] .

2. Made more lenient; less strict; lax. [from 17th c.]

   The relaxed rules were greatly tightened after the lawsuit.

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

     I corralled the judge, and we started off across the fields, in no very mild state of fear of that gentleman's wife, whose vigilance was seldom relaxed.

3. Free from tension or anxiety; at ease; leisurely. [from 18th c.]

   He's a relaxed kind of guy, he never lets himself get upset.

   • 2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, →DOI, page 4:

     Students and faculty members lunch at the cafeteria and naturally communicate freely with one another in a relaxed and informal setting.

   • 2022 January 12, Paul Bigland, “Fab Four: the nation's finest stations: Grange-over-Sands”, in RAIL, number 948, page 28:

     Even so, this delightful station is well worth a visit, - either to admire the architecture, sip a coffee from the shop, or just soak up the relaxed atmosphere of the area and watch the birds and other wildlife on the shores right outside the station.

4. (chiefly physics) Without physical tension; in a state of equilibrium. [from 19th c.]
5. (physiology) Of a muscle: soft, not tensed. [from 19th c.]

• calm

• stressed, nervous, anxious

relaxed

1. simple past and past participle of relax