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Mirth, genial, convivial, enraptured, blithe, unalloyed, delirious, exhilarated, rhapsodic, enrapt, beatific, bonny, exultant, rollicking, jaunty, elysian, chipper, cavort, carousing, reveling - Isn't it interesting to discover that a normally used word 'happy' has so many synonyms?

Won't it be a delight to know most of these words - so that it is easier for you to comprehend most of the text you read?

Have you ever read a book, a magazine or a newspaper where in you could not enjoy it completely, because you couldn't understand or comprehend a particular word? Or have you some time left reading something; may be some article, because you got stuck up with a word? Or for that matter, did you sometimes feel the problem of not laughing at the punch line of a joke, because you couldn't understand a vocabulary word in the punch line? Or you couldn't follow a piece of conversation because you were not able to understand the words spoken by the speaker! Doesn't this all make it a mandate for all of us to be reasonably good (if not very good) with vocabulary? In a nutshell - to read, to enjoy, to converse, to understand - for almost everything, you require a good vocabulary.

The second most important issue is, when we want to learn words and want to know vocabulary but we don't know how to do it, as mugging up a word-list is one of the most tedious jobs possible. Learning up words is a very, very arduous task because one can't remember huge lists full of words one hasn't even heard of. Let us try to work out what are the possible ways in which we can improve our know-how of words.

Your goal should be a deep-processing of words. Deep-processing implies that these words become a part of you, almost as your native language is a part of you.

You might find it hackneyed & clichéd but flash-cards do help you. It is the quickest way to get just the repetition that you need on the words you want to repeat. Write target words & phrases on the cards (at the back as well as on the front). As you review the list, separate the words in 2 piles; those you understand & those you do not. Keep going through the yet-unlearned words until you attain a speedy mastery of them.

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* Contributed by -
Jasveen Grewal is an alumnus of New Delhi's International Management Institute (IMI). She is a Verbal Faculty at Top Careers and You (www.tcyonline.com), the leaders in MBA, MCA, GRE & GMAT preparation in Punjab.