I've been working on "listening" to my pre-thoughts. It's interesting - once you catch it you automatically start translating it into words, or rethinking a thought "audibly"; it's very hard not to. Then I usually make fun of myself by pre-thinking "echo." On the downside, if you don't translate it into words it's vague and harder to remember - thinking with words is awesome.
For more concrete things you can also think about it with some sense - a touch, smell, sound, taste or sight that doesn't need words.
Before language, people must have thought without words. I often have the impression that I have a thought fully-formed in my head, yet I wait to listen to it unfold in words before moving on to the next thought. Perhaps I could think much faster if I weren't addicted to words.
Has anyone developed techniques for thinking without words?
This would have a little in common with Buddhist practices of emptying your mind, but wouldn't be the same thing. For one thing, Buddhists also try to empty their minds of images. More importantly, they are trying not to think, while I'm trying to think - just not unpack everything into words.