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navel-gazing
[ ney-vuhl-gey-zing ]
/ ˈneɪ vəlˌgeɪ zɪŋ /
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noun Slang.
excessive absorption in self-analysis or focus on a single issue.
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In the UK, COTTON CANDY is more commonly known as…
Origin of navel-gazing
First recorded in 1955–60; navel + gaz(e) + -ing1; perhaps from Hours With the Mystics (1856) by Robert Alfred Vaughan, English Congregationalist minister and author (1823–57), “...if a man shut himself up… turning his thoughts inward, gazing towards his navel..., he would at length behold a divine glory….”
Words nearby navel-gazing
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
How to use navel-gazing in a sentence
Genuinely funny and intelligent and navel-gazing and strange, these parts might eventually add up to something truly big.
Lars Iyer’s ‘Wittgenstein Jr.’ Plumbs the Deep Fun of Philosophical Fiction|Drew Smith|October 1, 2014|DAILY BEASTBut it's also kind of fun to make fun of the navel-gazing-ness of some of it.
British Dictionary definitions for navel-gazing
navel-gazing
noun
informal self-absorbed behaviour
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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