How can I extend my vocabulary without oversaturating the point I am trying to get across in a sentence? I know a lot of words can be used in place of basic ones that sound more professional and make for a better-sounding sentence but I feel I am a bit limited with the words I am accustomed to using. I was thinking of just using the Thesaurus to expand on some words and play with some sentences but I am not sure if that is the right approach.
One thing I did when I first started writing was kept using synonyms for some words I felt were overused. But then again this had the bad habit of creating complex sentences or using words that weren't really necessary. With time I learnt to notice these and use them appropriately
Well using the thesaurus will work. But it is just replacing the words with their synonyms. I prefer using flashcards. Use them with related words and try to create sentences on the go. It worked for me.
Yes it can be quite a bad habit to just continuously be using synonyms, quite a transparent strategy as well.
One of the effective ways is to learn the etymology of a word, It makes it easier to retain. A lot of English words can be derived from a relatively small set of Latin and Greek roots. Super helpful for figuring out unfamiliar words in context and recalling known words.