1. The act of relaxing or the state of being relaxed.

2. Refreshment of body or mind; recreation: played golf for relaxation.

3. A loosening or slackening.

4. A reduction in strictness or severity.

5. Physiology The lengthening of inactive muscle or muscle fibers.

6. Physics The return or adjustment of a system to equilibrium following displacement or abrupt change.

7. Mathematics A method of solving equations in which the errors resulting from an initial approximation are reduced by succeeding approximations until all errors are within specified limits.