Visualizing

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The technique of generating images in one's mind from ideas or data involves both interpretation and creativity in understanding various concepts
2. The act of creating mental pictures to understand or recall information
3. Generating imagery in the mind to grasp or communicate ideas more clearly

Etymology: "Visualizing" is an inflected form of "visualize", so its history is the history of that verb. "Visualize" was formed in English from "visual" plus the suffix "-ize", which turns adjectives and nouns into verbs meaning to make or do what they describe. "Visual" itself comes from the Latin "visualis", built on "visus", the past participle of "videre", "to see". The suffix "-ize" traces back through Latin and Greek, where it was used to form verbs such as "baptizein" and "civilizare", and English adopted it in large numbers. The verb's sense is literal in its construction: to visualize is to make something visible, first in the mind. The mental-picture meaning developed from there, so the word describes forming an image that is not physically present, rather than the making of an actual picture.

Synonyms: imagining, envisioning