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When I was a youngster, I consumed books until my vision blurred. Once my exams arrived, I demonstrated the endurance of a monk, studying for hours without pause. But in lately, I’ve watched that capacity for intense focus dissolve into endless scrolling on my device. My attention span now shrinks like a slug at the touch of a finger. Reading for enjoyment feels less like nourishment and more like endurance training. And for a person who creates content for a living, this is a professional hazard as well as something that made me sad. I aimed to restore that mental elasticity, to halt the brain rot.

So, about a twelve months back, I made a small vow: every time I encountered a term I didn’t know – whether in a novel, an piece, or an casual discussion – I would research it and write it down. Not a thing fancy, no leather-bound journal or fountain pen. Just a ongoing record maintained, amusingly, on my phone. Each week, I’d devote a few minutes reading the collection back in an attempt to imprint the vocabulary into my memory.

The list now spans almost 20 pages, and this tiny habit has been subtly transformative. The benefit is less about showing off with uncommon descriptors – which, let’s face it, can make you sound insufferable – and more about the mental calisthenics of the ritual. Each time I look up and record a word, I feel a slight expansion, as though some underused part of my mind is stirring again. Even if I never deploy “eidolon” in conversation, the very process of noticing, documenting and reviewing it breaks the drift into inactive, semi-skimmed attention.

Additionally, there's a diary-keeping aspect to it – it functions as something of a journal, 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 simple routine to maintain. It is frequently extremely inconvenient. If I’m engaged on the tube, I have to pause mid-paragraph, take out my device and enter “millenarianism” into my Google doc while trying not to bump the stranger pressed against me. It can reduce my pace to a maddening crawl. (The e-reader, with its integrated lexicon, is much kinder). And then there’s the revising (which I frequently forget to do), dutifully scrolling through my growing vocabulary collection like I’m studying for a word test.

Realistically, I incorporate perhaps five percent of these terms into my daily speech. “unreformable” was adopted. “mournful” too. But the majority of them stay like exhibits – appreciated and catalogued but rarely used.

Still, it’s made my thinking much keener. I notice I'm reaching less frequently for the same overused selection of descriptors, and more frequently for something precise and muscular. Few things are more gratifying than unearthing the exact term you were searching for – like locating the lost component that locks the picture into place.

In an era when our devices drain our focus with relentless efficiency, it feels rebellious to use my own as a tool for deliberate thinking. And it has given me back something I worried I’d lost – the joy of engaging a mind that, after a long time of lazy browsing, is at last waking up again.