realize

Etymology

Attested since 1610, from French réaliser, from Middle French real (“actual”), from Old French reel, from Latin reālis, from rēs (“thing, event, deed, fact”); as if real + -ize.

verb

1. (slightly formal, transitive) To make real; to convert from the imaginary or fictitious into reality; to bring into real existence
   Coordinate term: reify
   We realize what Archimedes had only in hypothesis, weighting a single grain against the globe of earth. 1665, Joseph Glanvill, Scepsis Scientifica
   The objectives of the project were never fully realized.
2. (transitive) To become aware of (a fact or situation, especially of something that has been true for a long time).
   2002, The Flaming Lips, Do You Realize?? Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die?
   He realized that he had left his umbrella on the train.
   The defendant desperately yelled at her young daughter, frantic to make her realize what she had done.
3. (transitive) To cause to seem real to other people.
   Many coincidences […] soon begin to appear in them [Greek inscriptions] which realize ancient history to us. 1881, Benjamin Jowett, Thucydides Translated into English
4. (transitive) To sense vividly or strongly; to make one's own in thought or experience.
   Over the mind of the tourist, visiting the Old World for the first time,—countries where have transpired thrilling events recorded in history, what an immensity of thought and feeling sweeps! It was thus with Natalie; she could not realize that she was treading in the footsteps of royalty, who living in long past days, had held sway over this land, had looked upon this land of "merrie England" as their home. 1859, Ferna Vale, Natalie; or, A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds
   That any civilized human being in this nineteenth century should not be aware that the earth travelled round the sun appeared to be to me such an extraordinary fact that I could hardly realize it. 1887, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet, section II
   Drawings appear fully realized in his mind's eye at a furious rate, before he even picks up his pencil. 1996, Alan Brown, Audrey Hepburn's Neck
5. (transitive, business) To acquire as an actual possession; to obtain as the result of plans and efforts; to gain; to get
   to realize large profits from a speculation
6. (transitive, business, finance) To convert any kind of property into money, especially property representing investments, such as shares, bonds, etc.
   Profits from the investment can be realized at any time by selling the shares.
   By realizing the company's assets, the liquidator was able to return most of the shareholders’ investments.
7. (transitive, business, obsolete) To convert into real property; to make real estate of.
8. (transitive, linguistics) To turn an abstract linguistic object into actual language, especially said of a phoneme's conversion into speech sound.
   The southern /v/ is realized as the voiced approximant [ʋ].
   Many (probably most) speakers realize it as [ø] or [œ] in other contexts as well. In Midi French, schwa is realized more frequently than in northern varieties, including in word-final position, where it generally (but not always) corresponds to […] 2016, Martin Maiden, The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages, Oxford University Press, page 297