This kind of thing happens in language literally all the time. It is not a bug, or even a feature: it is the fundamental mechanism that makes language possible. All higher meaning in language is based on more concrete forms of knowing, which become abstracted via a process of metaphor. The problem for a translator is that “words” map in fuzzy and blotchy ways on to each other, so you’re constantly dealing with these issues, and trying to find an elegant solution for them.
This is true, but it doesn’t mean that there aren’t synonyms. Again, this happens all the time.
These terms have been mistranslated, and rather than “directed” have the sense of “extended”. For abhininnameti, see my earlier remarks. For abhiniharati, see the basic dictionary sense of nīharati, “takes out; drives away; stretches out”.
Yes, here the meaning of “directed” or “applied” is clear. Not quite the same, but interesting nonetheless, is AN 7.49, where we find the verb anusandahati. This is the verb form of anusandhanatā, which is given in the Dhammasangani and Vibhanga as a synonym of vicāra.
Have you ever used a meditation word? To me the process from one to the other is obvious.