🔗 Share this article

As a youngster, I consumed books until my eyes grew hazy. Once my exams arrived, I exercised the endurance of a monk, studying for hours without a break. But in lately, I’ve observed that ability for intense concentration dissolve into endless scrolling on my device. My focus now contracts like a snail at the tap of a finger. Engaging with books for pleasure feels less like nourishment and more like endurance training. And for a person who writes for a profession, this is a occupational risk as well as something that left me disheartened. I aimed to regain that cognitive flexibility, to stop the brain rot.

So, about a twelve months back, I made a small vow: every time I encountered a word I didn’t understand – whether in a novel, an piece, or an overheard discussion – I would look it up and record it. Not a thing elaborate, no leather-bound journal or fountain pen. Just a running list kept, ironically, on my phone. Each week, I’d spend a few minutes reading the list back in an effort to imprint the vocabulary into my memory.

The record now covers almost twenty sheets, and this small habit has been quietly transformative. The payoff is less about peacocking with obscure descriptors – which, let’s face it, can make you sound insufferable – and more about the cognitive exercise of the ritual. Each time I search for and note a term, I feel a slight stretch, as though some neglected part of my brain is stirring again. Even if I never deploy “phantom” in conversation, the very act of spotting, logging and revising it interrupts the drift into inactive, superficial focus.

Additionally, there's a journalling aspect to it – it functions as something of a diary, a record of where I’ve been reading, what I’ve been thinking about and who I’ve been listening to.

Not that it’s an easy habit to maintain. It is frequently extremely inconvenient. If I’m engaged on the subway, I have to pause mid-paragraph, pull out my device and type “millennialism” into my Google doc while trying not to elbow the stranger pressed against me. It can slow my reading to a frustrating crawl. (The Kindle, with its built-in dictionary, is much kinder). And then there’s the reviewing (which I frequently forget to do), conscientiously browsing through my growing word-hoard like I’m studying for a vocabulary test.

Realistically, I incorporate maybe 5% of these terms into my everyday conversation. “unreformable” was adopted. “Lugubrious” as well. But most of them stay like exhibits – admired and listed but rarely handled.

Nevertheless, it’s rendered my mind much keener. I notice I'm reaching less frequently for the same tired handful of descriptors, and more frequently for something precise and muscular. Few things are more satisfying than unearthing the exact term you were seeking – like finding the lost component that snaps the image into place.

At a time when our gadgets siphon off our attention with relentless efficiency, it feels rebellious to use mine as a instrument for deliberate thinking. And it has given me back something I worried I’d forfeited – the joy of engaging a intellect that, after a long time of slack browsing, is at last waking up again.