Words We Breathe By

Do you ever think of two similar but seemingly unrelated words and wonder if they share a common root?

I found myself wondering about aspirate and aspire. It turns out that aspirate (to breathe something in) and aspire (striving for a goal) share the Latin root spirare, meaning “to breathe”. Aspiring is ambition or “breathing towards a goal” and aspiration is the physical action of inhaling or breathing in a substance.

Other words that feature spirare as a root include:

• Inspire: To fill with breath; to breathe life into; to motivate.
• Inspiration: The act of breathing in; a divine influence or creative urge.
• Expire: To breathe out; to come to an end.
• Expiration: The act of exhaling; the end of a time limit.
• Respire: To breathe again; to breathe.
• Respiration: The act of breathing.
• Conspire: Literally “to breathe together”; to plot secretly.