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When I was a child, I consumed novels until my eyes grew hazy. When my GCSEs arrived, I demonstrated the stamina of a monk, studying for lengthy periods without a break. But in lately, I’ve observed that ability for intense focus fade into infinite scrolling on my phone. My focus now shrinks like a slug at the tap of a finger. Engaging with books for enjoyment feels less like nourishment and more like endurance training. And for a person who creates content for a living, this is a occupational risk as well as something that left me disheartened. I aimed 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 term I didn’t know – whether in a book, an article, or an overheard conversation – I would research it and write it down. Nothing elaborate, no elegant notebook or fountain pen. Just a ongoing record kept, amusingly, on my phone. Each seven days, I’d spend a few moments reviewing the collection back in an effort to imprint the word into my recall.

The list now spans almost twenty sheets, and this small ritual has been subtly life-changing. The benefit is less about showing off with uncommon adjectives – which, let’s face it, can make you sound insufferable – and more about the cognitive exercise of the ritual. Each time I look up and record a word, I feel a slight expansion, as though some neglected part of my brain is flexing again. Even if I never deploy “phantom” in conversation, the very act of spotting, documenting and revising it breaks the slide into passive, semi-skimmed focus.

There is also a journalling element to it – it acts as something of a diary, a log 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 routine to maintain. It is frequently very inconvenient. If I’m engaged on the subway, I have to pause in the middle, 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 pace to a maddening speed. (The Kindle, with its integrated dictionary, is much easier). And then there’s the reviewing (which I often neglect to do), dutifully browsing through my expanding word-hoard like I’m studying for a vocabulary test.

Realistically, I integrate maybe 5% of these words into my everyday conversation. “Incorrigible” made the cut. “mournful” as well. But the majority of them remain like museum pieces – appreciated and listed but rarely handled.

Nevertheless, it’s rendered my mind much keener. I notice I'm reaching less often for the same overused handful of adjectives, and more often for something precise and strong. Few things are more satisfying than unearthing the perfect word you were seeking – like finding the missing component that snaps the picture into position.

In an era when our gadgets drain our focus with relentless efficiency, it feels subversive to use my own as a instrument for deliberate thinking. And it has given me back something I worried I’d forfeited – the joy of exercising a mind that, after years of slack scrolling, is at last waking up again.