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As a youngster, I devoured books until my vision blurred. Once my exams arrived, I exercised the endurance of a monk, studying for lengthy periods without a break. But in lately, I’ve watched that ability for deep concentration fade into endless browsing on my phone. My attention span now contracts like a slug at the touch of a thumb. Engaging with books for pleasure seems less like nourishment and more like endurance training. And for someone who writes for a profession, this is a professional hazard as well as something that left me disheartened. I wanted to regain that mental elasticity, to halt the brain rot.

So, about a twelve months back, I made a modest vow: every time I came across a word I didn’t understand – whether in a novel, an article, or an casual discussion – I would look it up and write it down. Not a thing elaborate, no elegant notebook or stylish pen. Just a ongoing record maintained, amusingly, on my phone. Each week, I’d spend a few minutes reading the list back in an effort to imprint the vocabulary into my recall.

The list now covers almost twenty sheets, and this small ritual has been quietly transformative. The benefit is less about peacocking with uncommon adjectives – which, let’s face it, can make you appear unbearable – and more about the mental calisthenics of the practice. 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 use “phantom” in conversation, the very process of spotting, logging and revising it interrupts the slide into inactive, superficial attention.

There is also a journalling element to it – it functions as something of a diary, a record of where I’ve been engaging, what I’ve been pondering and who I’ve been listening to.

Not that it’s an simple habit to maintain. It is frequently very impractical. If I’m reading on the subway, I have to stop in the middle, take out my phone and enter “millenarianism” into my Google doc while trying not to elbow the person squeezed against me. It can reduce my reading to a maddening speed. (The Kindle, with its integrated dictionary, 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 vocabulary test.

Realistically, I integrate maybe 5% of these terms into my daily speech. “Incorrigible” was adopted. “mournful” as well. But most of them remain like museum pieces – appreciated and listed but rarely handled.

Still, it’s rendered my thinking much keener. I find myself reaching less frequently for the same overused handful of adjectives, and more often for something exact and strong. Few things are more gratifying than unearthing the perfect word you were searching for – like locating the lost component that locks the image into place.

At a time when our gadgets drain our attention with merciless effectiveness, it feels subversive to use mine as a instrument for slow thinking. And it has restored to me something I worried I’d lost – the pleasure of engaging a intellect that, after a long time of slack browsing, is finally waking up again.