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When I was a child, I devoured novels until my eyes blurred. Once my GCSEs came around, I demonstrated the stamina of a monk, revising for lengthy periods without pause. But in recent years, I’ve observed that capacity for deep concentration fade into endless scrolling on my phone. My attention span now contracts like a slug at the tap of a thumb. Engaging with books for pleasure seems less like nourishment and more like a marathon. And for someone who writes for a living, this is a professional hazard as well as something that made me sad. I wanted to restore that cognitive flexibility, to halt the mental decline.

So, about a twelve months back, I made a small vow: every time I encountered a word I didn’t know – whether in a novel, an article, or an overheard conversation – I would research it and record it. Nothing elaborate, no elegant notebook or fountain pen. Just a running list kept, amusingly, on my smartphone. Each week, I’d devote a few minutes reading the collection back in an attempt to imprint the word into my memory.

The record now covers almost 20 pages, and this small habit has been quietly 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 note a word, I feel a faint 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 reviewing it interrupts the slide into inactive, superficial focus.

Additionally, there's a journalling element to it – it acts as something of a diary, a record 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 routine to keep up. It is often extremely inconvenient. If I’m engaged on the subway, I have to pause in the middle, pull out my device and type “millenarianism” into my digital document while trying not to bump the stranger squeezed against me. It can reduce my pace to a maddening crawl. (The e-reader, with its integrated dictionary, is much easier). And then there’s the revising (which I frequently forget to do), conscientiously scrolling through my growing word-hoard like I’m preparing for a word test.

Realistically, I integrate maybe five percent of these words into my daily speech. “unreformable” made the cut. “mournful” as well. But the majority of them remain like exhibits – admired and catalogued but seldom handled.

Nevertheless, it’s rendered my thinking much sharper. I find myself turning less frequently for the same tired selection of descriptors, and more frequently for something precise and muscular. Few things are more gratifying than unearthing the perfect term you were searching for – like locating the missing component that snaps the picture into place.

At a time when our devices drain our focus with merciless effectiveness, it feels rebellious to use mine as a tool for slow thought. And it has restored to me something I worried I’d lost – the pleasure of engaging a mind that, after years of lazy scrolling, is at last waking up again.