Just so you know, I'm not going to tell you to read a dictionary... I'm going to tell you to create one...
This article works on the one I have regarding labelling. If you haven't read that already, I recommend you do.
When I was in high-school, I took a unit-2 English studies (not language) course. We also had higher and lower levels of English too but I didn't find it important enough to study the higher version, and didn't want to hang out with the people who didn't take academia seriously in the lower level.
One advantage of these sorts of courses that you might not realise as that important when you were younger is that it exposes you to different types of media, information, and different ways of conveying emotions and meaning. Whether this be using fancy words in a book, or communicating emotion through cinematography, there are lots of ways to quantify emotions and communicate them.
But the point of this is that the author was capable of translating their emotions and meaning into rational and quantifiable words. It's not 100% exactly what they were trying to go for, but it's real, rational, interactive and communicable. It allows you to have at least a sense of understanding that's clearer than the fog or scattered energy that would represent the original emotion.
If you've ever tried journalling, you may recognise this feeling. There's a really soothing feeling when you are able to write down how you feel, then read it back and just feel like you've been listened to. It feels good to dump that emotional energy onto the paper, then read it back and maybe realise that it wasn't as big of a problem as you made it out to be. But you might also experience the exact opposite. I know I've had this problem when I've written my thoughts down, then read them back and feel inadequate, like the puzzle pieces don't fit, or as if it feels like it's made-up, or fanciful. This feeling I usually attribute to the fact that I don't actually have the vocabulary to accurately describe my feelings in that moment, and I only figured out this feeling after I started learning and re-learning definitions to words which I always had doubts about in terms of their meaning.
So when I was coming back to Australia from my Canada trip, an ad on Instagram took my fancy. It was a self-help kinda app that just exposes you to various quotes and book summaries and other stuff. As I was going through it, I noticed that they were using a lot of words that were familiar to me, but when I thought twice about what they actually meant, I either came up with only a feeling to describe it, or my understanding of it felt limited, like I wouldn't put it as an answer in an exam.
So what I did was download an offline dictionary, read some of my books on the plane ride home, and while reading, stop myself every time I came across something that I didn't understand. I'd then write down the word as a title in this big document I have, and then under the title, I would write my version of the definition after looking it up, and then come up with an example (like a story that involves the concept). The importance of this is that it not only enforces the knowledge into your mind by writing it down, but it enforces it in a way that you understand, which will make it easier to recall the meaning.
You might be surprised just how little you know about the words you read about everyday. Like for example, I just learned today that compassion is not actually a synonym for kindness. It actually means to understand someone else's suffering and to have the urge to extend a hand to them.
But not only does this help you understand yourself better, it also helps you communicate yourself better to others too. Like for example, after understanding all of these definitions, I've started to notice that my choice in words in the way I speak is far too exaggerated, and I've been using the wrong words to describe things for a while now.
Essentially doing this can help you make what you say more intentional. (I'll probably have another article explaining why intent is important, but for now, just assume it is). It will make you a better speaker and listener too because you'll have confidence that you actually understand what you are saying, and have the words to be able to quantify your ideas and emotions.