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As a child, I consumed novels until my vision grew hazy. When my exams arrived, I demonstrated the endurance of a ascetic, studying for hours without pause. But in lately, I’ve observed that ability for intense concentration dissolve into endless scrolling on my device. My attention span now contracts like a slug at the touch of a finger. Engaging with books for pleasure feels less like sustenance and more like endurance training. And for a person who writes for a profession, this is a occupational risk as well as something that made me sad. I wanted to regain that cognitive flexibility, to halt the mental decline.

So, about a twelve months back, I made a modest promise: every time I came across a word I didn’t know – whether in a novel, an article, or an casual conversation – I would research it and write it down. Not a thing fancy, no leather-bound journal or fountain pen. Just a ongoing record kept, ironically, on my smartphone. Each week, I’d spend a few moments reviewing the collection back in an attempt to imprint the word into my memory.

The list now spans almost 20 pages, and this tiny ritual has been subtly life-changing. The payoff is less about showing off with uncommon adjectives – which, to be honest, can make you sound insufferable – and more about the mental calisthenics of the practice. Each time I search for and record a word, I feel a faint stretch, as though some underused part of my mind is flexing again. Even if I never use “phantom” in conversation, the very process of noticing, documenting and revising it interrupts the slide into inactive, superficial focus.

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

It's not as if it’s an easy habit to maintain. It is frequently very inconvenient. If I’m reading on the tube, I have to pause mid-paragraph, pull out my device and type “millennialism” into my digital document while trying not to bump the person squeezed against me. It can reduce my pace to a frustrating crawl. (The e-reader, with its integrated dictionary, is much kinder). And then there’s the reviewing (which I often forget to do), conscientiously scrolling through my growing vocabulary collection like I’m preparing for a word test.

In practice, I integrate maybe five percent of these words into my daily speech. “Incorrigible” made the cut. “mournful” too. But most of them remain like museum pieces – appreciated and catalogued but seldom handled.

Nevertheless, it’s made my mind much sharper. I find myself reaching less often for the same tired handful of descriptors, and more often for something precise and strong. Rarely are more satisfying than unearthing the exact term you were searching for – like finding the lost puzzle piece that snaps the picture into position.

At a time when our gadgets siphon off our focus with merciless effectiveness, it feels rebellious to use my own as a instrument for deliberate thinking. And it has restored to me something I worried I’d forfeited – the pleasure of exercising a intellect that, after years of slack browsing, is finally waking up again.