healing

[ hee-ling ]

adjective

1. curing or curative; prescribed or helping to heal.
2. growing sound; getting well; mending.

noun

1. the act or process of regaining health:

   a new drug to accelerate healing.

Other Words From

• healing·ly adverb
• self-healing adjective
• un·healing adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of healing¹

First recorded before 1000; Middle English heelyng (adjective), helynge (noun); Old English hǣlinge (noun); equivalent to heal + -ing ² for the adjective, heal + -ing ¹ for the noun

Example Sentences

He said safety is the result of a commitment to rehabilitation, healing and accountability in the justice system.

From Washington Post

The first episode features a dozen different narratives about sex outside, including one about healing from sexual trauma and a few about sexual encounters on the road.

From Outside Online

Boss emphasized the importance of cultivating resilience and tolerance for uncertainty as part of your healing.

From Washington Post

The church, which offers salvation for the soul, is also offering protection and healing for the physical body.

From Washington Post

Despite the healing sound of his voice, Springsteen is ultimately preaching reconciliation without reckoning — which after January’s Capitol siege is no longer an acceptable path toward progress.

From Washington Post

But we also live with healing, with love, with activism, with a voice.

From The Daily Beast

He thinks as much as he is healing his callers they are healing him.

From The Daily Beast

“Raising the Turkish flag was very healing for me, and I think a little for Turkey as well,” says Hayes, choking up a bit.

From The Daily Beast

He considered music to be a healing art, an “uplifting” art.

From The Daily Beast

Healing After Loss: Daily Meditations for Working Through Griefby Martha Whitmore Hickman.

From The Daily Beast

There is none to judge thy judgment to bind it up: thou hast no healing medicines.

From Project Gutenberg

But this is not the usual sense; it commonly means healing, cure, or remedy; see Guarison in Cotgrave.

From Project Gutenberg

He left the hall, and went out on the lawn where the sun shone, and where the pure spring air came to him like some healing balm.

From Project Gutenberg

The healing of the paralytic has been regarded as a type of the restoration of the soul paralyzed by sin.

From Project Gutenberg

Thanks to the solitude where this house was ensconced in, the period necessary for the healing of the child ran peacefully by.

From Project Gutenberg