zwyczai

Zwyczai is a Polish verb meaning to accustom or to habituate, especially in the sense of making someone or oneself become used to a new condition or environment. It is the stem of the perfective verb zwyczaić, and is related to the noun zwyczaj, meaning custom or habit. The imperfective counterpart is zwyczajać, while the related reflexive form zwyczaić się expresses the idea of becoming accustomed to something.

In usage, zwyczaić is typically employed to indicate an act of causing familiarity with a situation or object, for example by exposure or adjustment. It can be used transitively with a direct object and a target of habituation, such as zwyczaić kogoś do czegoś (to accustom someone to something). It can also appear in an intransitive reflexive sense, zwyczaić się do czegoś, to denote that one has grown accustomed to something. The construction often occurs with settings involving changes in routines, environments, or norms, where gradual acceptance or adaptation is implied.

In modern Polish, zwyczaić is less common in everyday speech than przywyknąć or przyzwyczaić się, which express similar ideas with greater frequency. Zwyczaić may appear in literary or formal contexts and in historical texts, where a slightly more nuanced or formal tone is intended.

See also: przywyknąć, przyzwyczaić się, zapaść w przyzwyczajenie.