I Forgot How to Write by Hand

I Forgot How to Write by Hand

I pivoted from retail into the "tech" space exactly 10 years ago, this month. When showing up to my first job as a QA engineer, they assigned me a MacBook and a bunch of digital peripherals. Every document I created or reviewed was digital. From this moment on, I stopped 99% of my handwriting.

To some of you, this might seem crazy. You might be reading this at your work desk. That desk might be covered with paper, notebooks, and sticky notes. Mine is generally bare. Sure, I am an unabashed minimalist, but that is not why I have not handwritten things over the past 10 years.

For me, it was a combination of things. Firstly, my handwriting has always been shit. If I take my time and be really intentional about each letter, it's fine, but that is not how my brain works. I think fast and need to write fast, so I do not miss anything. Secondly, I have dyslexia. I make a lot of mistakes when writing. Most are grammar mistakes, but I'll randomly place letters or start writing the next sentence before the current one is complete. This is not exclusive to handwriting, but it's way easier to fix when it's digital. When I was younger, I counteracted this by using an erasable pen. While those pens were garbage to write with, they solved the problem. So when digital was the first and only medium at all of my jobs, I leaned in.

So what's the problem? Well, I kind of forgot how to handwrite.

Not exactly forgot, but it felt almost unnatural. The only time I would handwrite anything was filling out a form at a doctor's office or addressing a package. The rest of the time I would type on my MacBook, iPhone, or iPad. Handwriting became so unnatural that I would have to stop and think about the next word every few words. Then I would get back to one of my devices and forget all about it.

This changed when I started my business. When designing workflows and systems for people, you have to do a lot of non-linear thinking. I need to write, sketch, and diagram interchangeably. While this is doable in a lot of modern tools, it just does not feel organic. So I started to lean back into handwriting. I did this with the help of my 2020 iPad Pro.

This method has worked really well for me, and I would like to share it with you. You might be in a similar situation or maybe just want to get into digital handwriting; either way, you might learn something valuable.

To be clear, you don't need an iPad to do this; it's just my preferred method. There are other digital handwriting tools that are amazing for this.

Handwriting as a thinking tool

While I did lean back into handwriting because it is a skill that I should have never lost, it is also a skill that I needed for my thinking process. To me, handwriting is a fluid and disposable creation medium. When a problem is presented to me, instead of solving it quickly, I think about it with handwriting.

If you are in the tech or design space, you probably hear the term "wire framing" pretty often. If not, it is a design method for creating low-fidelity designs. This is my analogy for handwriting. It is my wire framing stage. It allows me to think quickly, with constraints.

By going to handwriting first, it allows me to think deeper and come up with more solutions, fast. I can mix writing, sketching, and diagramming all on one page.

Handwriting for retention

Most people have likely heard this, but writing things by hand helps you retain the information. This is 100% accurate for me. But it has to be done intentionally. If you are just writing quickly and passively, you likely won't find much value.

Slow down, rewrite, and summarize. This is my process for handwriting retention.

Slow Down

Handwriting is an analog process, even when digital. Analog processes allow us to slow down, so lean into it when trying to retain information. Don't rush through the topic; write each word and draw each sketch with intention. Think deeply, add marginalia, highlight, and underline.

Rewrite

When you have a draft or a concept you are trying to hone in on, rewrite it in its entirety. Not just copy, paste, and change a few things. Do this until the concept or draft feels like it sticks its landing.

Summarize

After you have the idea to a point that it feels right, confirm that you understand it. Write the thing in a few sentences, distilling the concept clearly. This will not only help you retain it in the moment, but it also gives you something to come back to in the future as the idea starts to fade.

Handwriting to feel human

We live a lot of our lives looking at a glowing rectangle with a blinking cursor. While my process is still on a glowing rectangle, interacting with that rectangle is different. Using the Apple Pencil allows me to start and end my thoughts anywhere on the page. I know this sounds kind of stupid, but it makes me feel more human.

The modern computer process feels robotic, sterile, predictable. When creating with a pen, it feels natural. So using the pen to abstract the interaction paradigm helps the digital-ness of the ritual feel better. Don't we all want to feel better than we do currently when interacting with our glowing rectangles? I do.

Writing for Neurodiversity

Lastly, I leaned into digital handwriting due to my dyslexia. You might be in the same situation or have another form of neurodiversity. If so, digital handwriting has all the benefits mentioned above, but also the flexibility that typed text allows.

I use an app called Goodnotes for my handwriting, and it allows me to scratch out to erase and use the lasso tool to quickly select and change something. All digital handwriting tools offer the ability to erase or copy, but the way Goodnotes pulls this off feels right and doesn't slow me down.

I also use various tools together while writing to make the content stand out. Using the highlighter, various pen weights and types, and the ability to drop in images really helps with speed and retention. It is also better than carrying around a baggie of pens, pencils, and markers.

After using these methods for the last year, I am doing an experiment to take my digital handwriting to the next level. I bought a Remarkable Paper Pro. It is an e-ink tablet with much less digital-ness and a much more organic writing experience. Remarkable offers a 100-day trial, which I intend to use for this experiment.

I want the thinking process to feel more human without making me less effective. For me, digital handwriting is just that. You might not care about handwriting, or you never stopped using your favorite paper notebook; that's perfectly fine. But if any of the above resonated, give digital handwriting a shot. It might make you think differently or just feel better than typing everything. Don’t we all want to feel better and more human?