Always Looking It Up: Curiosity as a Language Practice

What Interpreters and Journalists Can Teach Us About Growing in a Language

Image from Pisit Heng, from Unsplash

I’m constantly looking up words. Not because I don’t know them—but because I want to know them better. I’ve noticed that when we learn a language as adults, we sometimes feel bad about needing to look things up. Like it means we’re not fluent enough. But I’d argue the opposite: it means we’re doing the real work of becoming more precise, more expressive.

I was listening to an interview with Ezra Klein while on the bus. He said something about being at an “apex.” The word cúspide immediately popped into my head. I checked a bilingual dictionary and sure enough—it was there. It felt like a small mental high-five. My Spanish brain is still alive and kicking; I haven’t lost those low-frequency words.

But the truth is, I do this all the time. I look up words to confirm they mean what I think, to find tighter or more precise ways of saying something, to make sure a turn of phrase works across languages.

The Interpreter’s Instinct: Say It Fast, Say It Right

A little later in the podcast, I heard a phrase like “pull it off”, I know exactly what it means. But my brain shifted into interpreter mode. How would I say this fast and clean in Spanish? I looked it up and sacar adelante does the job.

Interpreting demands concision and clarity. You don’t have time to fumble around. That need for speed sharpens your ear and trains your curiosity. It makes you chase not just meaning, but efficiency.

Writers Do It Too

I was recently having coffee with my uncle, a retired journalist and lifelong writer in Spanish. At one point, he pulled out his phone to compare two near-synonyms in a monolingual Spanish dictionary.

This is someone who’s been writing professionally for decades. And yet—still looking up words.

We often imagine bilinguals and monolinguals as fundamentally different learners. But the process of improving your language never really ends. Whether you speak two languages or only one, it’s the same instinct driving you, curiosity.

Language Learning vs. Language Living

Years ago, linguists made a big deal out of the difference between “learning” and “acquiring” a language. One was supposed to be conscious and effortful, the other natural and subconscious.

But when does “acquiring” stop? If my uncle still checks word usage after more than 60 years of speaking Spanish, isn’t he still acquiring it? If I’m double-checking an idiom mid-podcast, don’t I fall into the same category?

Language is never a finished product. It’s a living, shifting thing. And whether we’re beginners or seasoned professionals, the drive to look something up is a sign we’re still engaging with it fully.

The Dictionary I Missed Most

I realized the depth of this instinct in the summer of 2022, during a silent meditation retreat in rural Massachusetts.

Five days. No phones, no writing, no talking. Just meditation and the occasional dharma talk in the evening.

What did I miss the most?
Not Instagram. Not texting.
The dictionary.

During those days, I read every shampoo label and sign in the compound. Every time the teacher used a rare or “fancy” English word, I’d latch onto it. I knew the general meaning, but I wanted to be sure. I wanted to know how to say it in Spanish in an equally elegant equivalent.

But I couldn’t check. No dictionary. No note-taking. Just my brain obsessively trying to hold onto words and meanings until I could look them up.

Curiosity: The Lifelong Skill

This isn’t about being a language nerd (although I am one). It’s about the mindset that helps us get better. Whether you’re a monolingual journalist or a bilingual interpreter, the habit is the same: you chase the word. You don’t settle for “close enough.”

Curiosity is the muscle that keeps a language alive in us.
Looking up words isn’t a sign of weakness, but rather a sign of commitment.