The Collaborative International Dictionary
Distract \Dis*tract"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Distracted, old p. p. Distraught; p. pr. & vb. n. Distracting.]
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To draw apart or away; to divide; to disjoin.
A city . . . distracted from itself.
--Fuller. -
To draw (the sight, mind, or attention) in different directions; to perplex; to confuse; as, to distract the eye; to distract the attention.
Mixed metaphors . . . distract the imagination.
--Goldsmith. -
To agitate by conflicting passions, or by a variety of motives or of cares; to confound; to harass.
Horror and doubt distract His troubled thoughts.
--Milton. -
To unsettle the reason of; to render insane; to craze; to madden; -- most frequently used in the participle, distracted.
A poor mad soul; . . . poverty hath distracted her.
--Shak.
Distracting \Dis*tract"ing\, a. Tending or serving to distract.
Wiktionary
vb. (present participle of distract English)
Usage examples of "distracting".
He launched the stone the archer's way, not to hit the man that would have been above the skill even of Artemis Entreri but in the hopes of distracting him.
I don’t know if he heard me or figured out on his own that he was distracting me, but he stopped.
Touching just his hand was more distracting than touching so much more on most men.
A moment later, Orlando was surrounded by a distracting cloud of yellow—the Wicked Tribe, swarming like bees.
Orlando did not want to lose them, did not want to miss what they were saying, but the squirming of the peanut was distracting him.
She knew that she was going in the right direction—knew it the way a sunburned woman would know the direction of the sun—but the voices had become irregular and indistinct, as though something was frightening or distracting them.
What right did she have to hitch a ride on his dream, distracting him with her foolish questions and clumsiness underground and .
It didn’t feel like something brief and mildly distracting, a pleasant way to kill time until the main event started.
He was much less distracting when she wasn't caught like a foolish, fluttering insect in their cool amber depths.
Sam looked away from the distracting sway and shine of her unbound hair.
The friction of his bare skin against her was too distracting, too dangerous.
The kitchen light was shining directly down on her head, turning her hair to a silvery halo and distracting him with its glitter.
It wasn't his fault that she was falling in love with him, and even if he returned the sentiment, she wouldn't tell him she was afraid, because she wouldn't risk the possibility of distracting him when he needed to concentrate wholly on his job.
She scowled a little, annoyed at how the physical intimacy of the situation kept distracting her from the business at hand.
By standing her ground, talking rings around him, and distracting him with sex, and by choosing her battles and sometimes actually letting him have his way.