Always blanking on words? Try these tips

Imagine: you are in the middle of a conversation and you have an important comment to make. Right when you are about to blurt out your point, you forget a key part of the statement! Terrible!

If this situation brings up memories, you probably experience forgetting words often.

Why do you forget words so often?

Blanking on words (or the feeling of having a word “on the tip of your tongue”) is one of the most annoying feelings. Knowing the reason behind your struggles can lead to the solution. There is actually a word for the “I forgot that word!” feeling. It has the name lethologica (weird word, I know!).

While it is not super satisfying, this is actually a pretty normal brain process. I know, I know, it is much easier to have someone tell you about some rare disorder that you have. Really, it is just your brain having its own “processing failure” kind of like a computer!

And even better, people with large vocabularies tend to blank on words more often! So if this if a common occurrence you might be a smart cookie!

Also, your drinking habits could contribute to your word finding issues. Lots of caffeine (like coffee or energy drinks) could also be a cause.

Lastly, if you are an older adult who has memory loss, this could be just another symptom of that.

What can you do about it?

So now that you know the root cause, you might be wondering what solutions there are.

One of the best tips I can give you is thinking “around the word.”

‘

Thinking around the word

Thinking around the word means that you think about characteristics like the first letter of the word, or a simple description. Even if this strategy sounds simple, it actually helps a lot.

Another important strategy is using a tool called Blanked. Blanked lets you enter an (optional) first letter and a description. Then, it uses AI to find the word you are looking for! It also has a voice mode where you just press a button and talk about the word.

It feels like magic, but it actually works. Check it out!