stepping back

Verb

step back (third-person singular simple present steps back, present participle stepping back, simple past and past participle stepped back)

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see step, back.
   • Entering Avebury from any direction is like stepping back into the past. Before the centre of the village is reached, the road passes through an immense circle of brooding stones which stand like petrified ghosts of an age about which little is known.1980, AA Book of British Villages, Drive Publications Ltd, page 40
2. (idiomatic) To stop what one is doing and evaluate the current situation.
   • Perhaps we should step back for a second and think about solving this problem a different way.
3. (idiomatic) To prevent oneself from becoming emotionally involved in a certain situation.
   • As a therapist sometimes you have to step back from your clients' lives.
4. to depart driving the train following the train they arrived into the station driving, so as to decrease service turnaround time.
5. (idiomatic) To retreat from one's duties in a job; to reduce one's duties, often as a prelude to leaving a position; to take a back seat.
   • He's stepping back from the role to let you start in it.
6. (idiomatic) To quietly abandon a belief.
   • You need to step back from the threat you made.

See all 8 meanings of step back