Handwriting is slow which gives me time to think

This afternoon, I once again took my notebook and retreated away from my work desk to sit on a couch in the office kitchen to think. I had gotten a bit of blank canvas issue with a project I was working on and figured correctly that it would be a good time to leave the computer and focus on processing my thoughts through writing.

As I opened a new page and took my pen and started scribbling and doodling, random thoughts started to take form and the notebook started to fill up from words and sentences, annotations and arrows, anecdotes and ideas.

I realised something profound. One reason why it’s so much easier for me to get my thoughts out on a pen and paper compared to keyboard and screen is that I write much slower than I type. The slowdown gives me more time to process what’s coming next and develop my ideas. The physicality of feeling how the letters delineate on the paper through distinct muscle movement feeds those ideas back to me much slower and more pronounced than the dance of fingers on a keyboard.

In a world obsessed with speed, I find it comforting that with writing and thinking, slowing down is the winning move.

It didn’t take me long to get going and suddenly I had pages after pages full of fresh ideas and tangible steps to help me unblock my progress from the morning.