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As a child, I consumed books until my vision grew hazy. When my GCSEs arrived, I exercised the stamina of a ascetic, revising for hours without pause. But in lately, I’ve watched that capacity for deep concentration dissolve into endless browsing on my phone. My attention span now contracts like a slug at the touch of a thumb. Reading for pleasure feels less like nourishment and more like a marathon. And for someone who creates content for a profession, this is a occupational risk as well as something that left me disheartened. I aimed to restore that cognitive flexibility, to stop the brain rot.

So, about a year ago, I made a modest vow: every time I encountered a word I didn’t understand – whether in a novel, an article, 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 kept, ironically, on my phone. Each seven days, I’d spend a few minutes reading the collection back in an attempt to imprint the vocabulary into my recall.

The list now covers almost 20 pages, and this tiny ritual has been quietly transformative. The benefit is less about showing off with obscure descriptors – which, let’s face it, can make you appear unbearable – and more about the cognitive exercise of the ritual. Each time I look up and record a term, I feel a faint expansion, as though some underused part of my mind is stirring again. Even if I never use “phantom” in dialogue, the very process of noticing, documenting and revising it breaks the drift into passive, superficial attention.

Additionally, there's a diary-keeping aspect to it – it acts as something of a journal, a record of where I’ve been reading, what I’ve been pondering and who I’ve been listening to.

It's not as if it’s an easy habit to maintain. It is often extremely inconvenient. If I’m reading on the subway, I have to pause in the middle, take out my phone and enter “millennialism” into my digital document while trying not to bump the person pressed against me. It can reduce my reading to a frustrating crawl. (The Kindle, with its integrated lexicon, is much easier). And then there’s the revising (which I often neglect to do), dutifully scrolling through my expanding word-hoard like I’m studying for a word test.

Realistically, I integrate maybe 5% of these terms into my everyday conversation. “unreformable” was adopted. “mournful” as well. But the majority of them stay like exhibits – appreciated and catalogued but rarely used.

Nevertheless, it’s rendered my mind much sharper. I notice I'm turning less often for the same tired selection of descriptors, and more frequently for something exact and strong. Few things are more satisfying than unearthing the perfect term you were seeking – like finding the missing puzzle piece that snaps the picture into position.

At a time when our gadgets siphon off our attention with merciless effectiveness, it feels subversive to use mine as a instrument for slow thinking. And it has given me back something I worried I’d forfeited – the pleasure of engaging a intellect that, after years of lazy scrolling, is at last stirring again.