25 Words to Impress Your Readers
Start using them in your articles now
Between style and substance, it is always prudent to choose the latter.
And yes, you will always pick an article offering valuable tips etched in ordinary language ahead of a piece that offers useless tips in flowery language; We clicked that link for a reason!
But that doesn’t mean that you should turn a blind eye to improving your vocabulary and style. Using the right set of words at the right place will make your work look professional and classy. Also, sprinkling your essay with a few sophisticated words will be educating for your audience, a bonus take-away.
Now, here are 25 words you should seriously consider adding to your repertoire (if you haven’t already added it). Having them in your piece is going to elevate its quality.
There are over a million words in the English language and to pick a useful set of 25 from it is quite the task. So I have tried to add those, which serve as a fitting replacement to commonly used words.
1. Brood
Brood( as a verb) means to think about something that makes one unhappy or distressed.
Example: I used to brood over my low earnings at Medium.
Next time you talk about worrying over something, instead of using ordinary words like worried, sad, ponder, etc., you can use brood.
2. Burgeon
Burgeon is an interesting word that means to grow and expand quickly. Flourish is another option that can be used in contexts that speaks of rapid growth.
Example: My Medium earnings have burgeoned in the last month.
3. Conundrum
Anything that causes confusion or makes you puzzled is a conundrum. It’s a sophisticated alternative for mundane words like ‘confusion’.
Example: It was an absolute conundrum to find the right publication on Medium to send my articles.
4. Cynosure
A person or thing that catches a lot of attention, because it is good to look at can be called cynosure. I bet you often come across situations where you need a perfect word to describe such persons or things.
Example: When I made 10000 dollars on Medium, I instantly became the cynosure of the platform.
5. Dalliance
Dalliance signifies a brief involvement with something. It can be a casual romantic relationship too. An interesting word that I reckon should be found more in your essays. Forget ordinary words like affair, relationship, etc.
Example: My dalliance with YouTube wasn’t fruitful, and I moved on to Medium.
6. Dissemble
Dissemble means to pretend; that it is to hide one’s genuine emotions and motives.
It works well in places where you use words like pretend, deceive, etc.
Example: I had to dissemble my interest in a 9–5 job before I moved to Medium.
7. Ebullience
Ebullience is the quality of being happy and full of energy. How often in your writing do you have situations to describe a happy state of affairs? Frequently, I believe. Start using ebullience more.
Example: After starting to write on Medium, my wife noticed that I had become more ebullient.
8. Engenders
According to the Cambridge dictionary, engenders means to make people have a particular feeling or make a situation start to exist.
Example: My decision to spend more time on Medium did not engender confidence in my parents.
9. Egregious
Egregious means something which is seriously bad or shocking. Poor, worse, bad, etc. have become a little too common; you need ‘egregious.’
Example: I caused egregious errors in my article because I didn’t check it after writing it.
10. Entrenched
Entrench means to establish something solidly. It could be a habit or attitude that’s not easy to change. I wish a habit of checking my articles would be entrenched in your mind!
Example: I had thought of moving back to a desk job, but my mind was firmly entrenched on freelance writing.
11. Evocative
Anything that brings strong feelings or memories to the mind can be called evocative.
Example: I wish I could write an evocative poem on Medium.
12. Exacerbate
Exacerbate is another word for aggravate. It means to make a problem worse than it already is.
Example: Sitting idle would have only exacerbated my situation, so I decided to write an article a day.
13. Felicity
Felicity is intense joy.
Example: I couldn’t express my felicity when the article was curated on Medium
14. Galvanize
One of my favorite words, Galvanize, means to stimulate or excite someone to do something.
Example: Whenever I felt like quitting, my wife inspired me with her words and galvanized me into action.
15. Imbroglio
Imbroglio is an embarrassing misunderstanding or an intricate or complicated situation.
Example: The minister’s term in office was tainted by one imbroglio after another.
16. Myriad
Coming from the ancient Greek word myrios (meaning countless) and myrioi (meaning ten thousand), Myriad stands for a significant number or numerous.
Example: There are myriad options on the internet for budding writers.
17. Perfunctory
Perfunctory is an action carried out with no real enthusiasm.
The word is derived from the Latin word prefunctorious(which means something done carelessly).
Example: If you are writing your articles in a perfunctory manner, Medium will not be very rewarding.
18. Preposterous
Preposterous is a word you can use in the place of foolishness or for anything done in a ridiculous manner.
Example: Writing just one article in a month and expecting to score big on Medium is preposterous.
19. Stigmatize
As per the Cambridge dictionary, Stigmatize means to mistreat someone or something by disapproving of him, her, or it.
Example: You need not feel stigmatized in Medium simply because there are many top-notch writers around, and you are not one among them.
20. Salacious
Someone or something sexually suggestive can be called salacious. It involves everything that is appealing to sexual desire.
Example: Do salacious gossips sell well on Medium?
21. Tenuous
Tenuous means something fragile. The word is often used to describe certain situations, which are very unlikely.
Example: There is only a tenuous chance for you to be a billionaire through Medium.
22. Underpinning
Underpinning means Ideas or motives that form the basis of something.
Example: The ideas I scribbled in my notepad later provided the underpinnings for my Medium articles.
23. Ubiquitous
Ubiquitous is another word for omnipresent, i.e., something that is present everywhere.
Example: Mobile phones have become ubiquitous in our lives.
24. Untoward
Untoward(as an adjective) stands for something unexpected and not favorable.
Example: An untoward injury ended his whole career.
25.Watershed
Watershed as a noun stands for a specific geographical feature, but it also means an event or period that marks a turning point in a particular situation.
Example: Having my first article, curated, was a watershed moment for me.
Do you have more words to add to the list? Drop them in the comments.
