freely

To relax. To be free from worry. I can finally breathe freely now that I'm done my term paper—I had been working on that thing all day every day for weeks!

to assume a relaxed state after a stressful period. After this crisis is over, I'll be able to breathe easy again. He won't be able to breathe easy until he pays off his debts.

Prov. People will give you advice more willingly than they give you anything else. Although no one in my family was willing to give me a loan, they all had suggestions about how I could get the money from elsewhere. Nothing is given so freely as advice. Don't hesitate to ask people what they think you ought to do. Nothing is given so freely as advice.

to relax Baseball fans can breathe easy now that the players' strike is over.

Also, breathe easily or freely . Relax, feel relieved from anxiety, stress, or tension. For example, Now that exams are over with, I can breathe easy, or Whenever I'm back in the mountains, I can breathe freely again. This idiom originally (late 1500s) was put as breathe again, implying that one had stopped breathing (or held one's breath) while feeling anxious or nervous. Shakespeare had it in King John (4:2): "Now I breathe again aloft the flood." The variant dates from the first half of the 1800s.