consuming
Americanadjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of consuming
Explanation
If you have a passion for art, and making it is all you can think about or do, your passion for art is consuming. It is intense and almost overwhelming. Picture a fire burning in a fireplace. The fire consumes the logs you have put in it. It completely devours them in order to burn. When something, a passion or a drive, is consuming, it dominates a person's life like that fire, and in a sense, it devours their energy and attention. Your consuming desire to travel might cause you to study abroad for a semester or even move to Europe.
Vocabulary lists containing consuming
"The Scholarship Jacket" by Marta Salinas
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Clap When You Land
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NYTimes Summer Reading Contest Winners' Words
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Consuming more protein than you need—which is easy to do if you’re not strength training—leads to it turning into fat, he said.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 7, 2026
Consuming toxic shellfish can lead to death as there are no known antidotes, according to public health officials.
From Los Angeles Times • May 9, 2025
Consuming art with other people makes you not feel alone.
From Salon • Aug. 12, 2024
Consuming them in fully cooked fish poses little danger, because the worms are dead.
From Science Daily • Apr. 4, 2024
Light vanity, insatiate cormorant Consuming means, soon preys upon itself.
From Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
