disillusionment
Americannoun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of disillusionment
Explanation
Feeling disillusionment means you're bummed out because you no longer believe in something — usually because you find out it isn't as amazing as you thought. The definition of disillusionment doesn't sound so bad: being freed from false beliefs or illusions. Well, sorry to disillusion you, but it's not so great. Disillusionment is when the hard truth of reality makes you lose faith in your dreams and ideals. Like you might have thought your internship at the movie studio would be super glamorous, but you quickly suffered some disillusionment when you realized it involved 14-hour days and lots of coffee runs.
Vocabulary lists containing disillusionment
Siddhartha
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A Thousand Splendid Suns
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"Marionettes, Inc." by Ray Bradbury
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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.
The first half of Communion, on Vance’s journey from evangelical Christianity to atheism to Catholicism, takes the reader through his disillusionment with the conservative evangelical churches of his youth.
From Slate • Jun. 18, 2026
Egan's assessment is that the disillusionment with Labour is now being expressed in a different way.
From BBC • Jun. 15, 2026
China in recent years has struggled with youth disillusionment, with millions of college graduates competing for a limited number of desirable white-collar jobs.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 27, 2026
A: It's a novel about the relationship between a mother and a daughter, but it's also a novel about disillusionment.
From Barron's • May 21, 2026
He spent many hours in the hot room watching how the hard sheets of metal, worked by the colonel with the inconceivable patience of disillusionment, were slowly being converted into golden scales.
From "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
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.
