Imaginings are the mental pictures, ideas, or scenarios that you create in your mind, especially those that aren't real or haven't happened yet. When you daydream about becoming an astronaut, or picture what it would be like to have a pet dragon, or wonder what your town looked like 200 years ago, these are all imaginings.

The word often refers to things conjured up by your imagination that might be fanciful, unlikely, or purely fictional. If you're lying in bed and start to worry that there's a monster under it, those fears are just imaginings: your mind creating something that isn't actually there. When an inventor sketches out a flying car that doesn't exist yet, those drawings begin as imaginings.

Writers fill entire novels with their imaginings. Scientists use their imaginings to picture how the universe works before they test their theories. Architects turn their imaginings into buildings. The word suggests something more vivid and detailed than a passing thought: imaginings are the stories, scenes, and possibilities that play out in your mind's eye, whether they're dreams of the future, creative inventions, or fears that fade when you turn on the light.