Handwriting Happiness Is Real And It's A Habit We Need To Cultivate
Writing allows us to express ourselves, to process and articulate emotions through the power of words, says Montalescot.
Chinese writer and calligrapher Feng Tang never leaves home without his fountain pen. Handwriting, he says, not only boosts his creativity, it helps him relax and process his thoughts and emotions and make sense of the world.
"Writing helps me process... It helps me slow down and find a balance. It doesn't just help me create, writing helps me escape the busyness of work and life," he said in a recent online session organised by luxury pen, watch and leather goods brand Montblanc to promote their #InspireWriting initiative.
Trained as a gynaecologist, the 49-year-old writer said that he discovered the benefits of writing when he was in medical school at the Peking Union Medical College in Beijing, China in the 1990s. Back then, he would spend what little spare time he had practising his handwriting. This habit continued even after he left his medical practice and joined the global management consulting firm McKinsey as a consultant.
"At meetings, I'd often be the only one writing notes with a pen and paper, and not using a laptop or tablet," he shared.
For Feng Tang, writing is a quiet process of reflection that calms the mind and the spirit. Photos: MontblancFeng Tang, who recently launched the luxury brand's first official Chinese font, is among Montblanc's Mark Makers (inspiring and influential individuals who make their mark on the world through their creative pursuits) who are leading the #InspireWriting initiative. The initiative was launched in June, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, as an avenue for people the world over to find some solace through handwriting.
Montblanc's executive vice president of marketing Vincent Montalescot extols the many benefits of writing: The scratching of nib on paper, the flow of ink giving shape to thoughts and the slow and deliberate pace of writing are what he deems "handwriting happiness".
"While recent circumstances have proved challenging for communities around the world, many have found comfort and enjoyment in the art of handwriting, sharing messages of hope with loved ones or finding ways to express their creativity," said Montalescot.
"At Montblanc, we believe there is such a thing as 'handwriting happiness', the joy many people are finding from capturing their thoughts and emotions in writing. With this initiative, we are encouraging them to reap the benefits of putting pen to paper and share the pleasure with others," he added.
The benefits of writing by hand, Montalescot said, is available to anyone.
"Writing is powerful. It allows us to express ourselves, to process and articulate emotions through the power of words. Putting pen to paper helps us observe, capture and process the many twists and turns that shape our existence, particularly in the most challenging time."In recent months, handwriting has helped me escape the distractions of the digital world and explore a different kind of creative outlet," shared Montalescot.
In the #InspireWriting initiative, Feng Tang and the brand's other Mark Makers will set writing challenges and exercises for people to follow on Instagram. This will then be featured on Montblanc's Instagram page (it has over 1,000 posts already) and website.
The exercises and tips show how we can add more handwriting into our lives – simple things like choosing a quote, poem, song lyric or affirmation and writing it down on paper. It doesn't matter if the writing isn't perfect; the point is to enjoy the process of writing.
Another exercise suggests that we go to a quiet spot, take a few deep breaths, and put our thoughts onto paper for 15 to 30 minutes. Once again, it doesn't really matter if your handwriting is legible or if our thoughts are profound or just random words – the exercise is simply to let our mind flow.
Or, we could carry a notebook around and write down things we notice that are funny, beautiful, surprising, delightful or sad. And, perhaps the most popular exercise would be to compose a letter to a friend you haven't spoken to for a while or surprise your partner or flatmate with a handwritten positive note.
For Feng Tang, who insists on writing all his manuscripts with a fountain pen, writing is a quiet process of reflection that calms the mind and the spirit.
"Writing is something that everyone can do. It is inherently thoughtful and emotional. Handwriting is always associated with life and warmth, unlike typing on a cold computer keyboard," he says, adding that the Montblanc Simplified Chinese Feng Tang Font is a graphical reinterpretation of his handwriting style.
Local Mom Creates Resource To Help Keep Handwriting Skills Sharp
Many parents have concerns about what this school year will look like and how our children’s learning will be impacted.
Now, a special writing resource is easing some of those parents' anxiety.
It’s called “Channie’s Handwriting” — created by a Charlotte mom looking to improve her own son’s handwriting. It’s already been ordered for incoming kindergartners in the fall at Oakhurst Academy.
Its creators say their program has gained popularity as more parents are looking for more resources at home.
Channie's Handwriting was developed four years ago by Chan Stimart, after looking for a solution to improve her son's handwriting.
Since then, she's sold more than 300,000 copies of her workbook material and expanded it to two schools in the Charlotte area.
Stimart said the pandemic has increased sales by 120% as more parents are looking for resources for at-home learning.
Students can use the workbooks to practice their handwriting without the direct supervision of a parent.
Stimart said the results have helped children become better students.
“We have seen studies show that kids with better handwriting, they have a better organized skill built in their learning,” said Stimart.
“I’m a parent in Union County and my children will only go back one day a week so most of the learning is going to happen at home virtually through a computer,” said Heather Haymore, sales manager at Channie’s Handwriting. “A child still needs to take a pencil and pen and put it to paper.”
It is important to note that even with remote learning, students will need supplies for the school year.
Since 1997, in partnership with Classroom Central and Communities in Schools of Charlotte-Mecklenburg, WSOC-TV’s 9 School Tools drive has collected school supplies, which are then distributed free to students in grades K-12.
Covering 22 counties, 9 School Tools is the largest school supply drive in the Carolinas and will run now through August 14.
Financial donations to the 9 School Tools program can be made at different levels of giving that support Classroom Central.
Learn more about 9 School Tools at www.9SchoolTools.Com.
Local mom creates resource to help keep handwriting skills sharp
© 2020 Cox Media Group
Sloppy Handwriting Could Get Your Mail Ballot Tossed In California
Californians’ handwriting is getting worse and it’s causing increasing problems for election officials.
More than 14,000 mail ballots were rejected in the March 3 primary because the signature on the vote-by-mail envelope didn’t match the one on the voter registration card. Thousands more were counted only after voters were required to provide a new signature for scrutiny.
For voters in their 60s, the signature they put on that ballot envelope might be compared to the one they signed when they registered to vote at age 18. For younger voters, that comparison could be with an electronic signature they never really use, having replaced it in day-to-day transactions with a squiggle on a touch pad or just the tap of a phone or an Apple watch.
“The quality of signatures we get is a real concern,” said Jim Irizarry, assistant elections officer for San Mateo County. “Electronic signatures are also one of our biggest challenges.”
A survey released last week by Secretary of State Alex Padilla found that 102,000 mail ballots were never counted in March for a variety of reasons. While ballots arriving late or postmarked after election day made up 70% of the rejections, mismatched signatures were the second-highest reason mail votes were not tallied.
Although that’s not a huge percentage of the more than 7 million mail ballots cast in the primary, it’s still an embarrassment to a state where the 2018 law that set many of California’s newest voting rules was titled the “Every Vote Counts Act.”
A Stanford Law School case study on signature verification and mail ballots, released in May, found that procedures for checking signatures vary from county to county. While state law bars a ballot from being rejected for mismatched signatures without an election official signing off, counties come to that final decision in different ways.
“There’s no set standard,” said Tom Westphal, a lead author of the study. “Each county has developed their own protocols.”
The secretary of state’s office is “in the process of creating updated regulations on signature verification,” a spokesman said, but that hasn’t happened yet.
“There’s a lot of criteria we look at,” said Evelyn Mendez, a spokeswoman for the Santa Clara County registrar of voters. “It’s not one look and if it doesn’t match it’s rejected.”
Those differing standards mean rejection rates vary dramatically between counties.
In March, Los Angeles County, with 1.1 million mail ballots, rejected 267 for mismatched signatures. San Mateo County, with just under 200,000 mail ballots, eliminated 1,169. It was a similar story in Sonoma County, which rejected 969 of its 154,000 mail ballots for bad signatures.
The number of rejections “means we’re doing our job. We’re not rejecting signatures whimsically,” said Irizarry of San Mateo County. “We’re doing as good a job as anyone in the state.”
The county looks at the signatures in “a very straightforward manner,” he added, with at least five steps involving different people checking before deciding the signatures don’t match.
For many years, that final review was the end of it. If election officials rejected the ballot, it wasn’t counted and the voter wasn’t notified.
But in 2018, Peter La Follette of Sonoma County, joined by the American Civil Liberties Union, sued the secretary of state, arguing that he should have been given a chance to fix his mismatched signature before his mail ballot was rejected in the 2016 presidential election. A San Francisco judge agreed, saying the state and its counties had to allow ballot fixes.
Those “cure” notices, which let voters fix their signature problems with a postcard, haven’t solved all the woes. About half the voters who received the letters, emails and phone calls in San Francisco in the March primary fixed their problem, while in San Mateo County only about 142 of the more than 2,000 voters with unsigned ballots or mismatched signatures replied.
“We really didn’t have that many responses,” Irizarry said.
The signature problem is only going to get worse in November, when mail ballots will go out to every active voter in the state. The huge anticipated turnout, most of it coming by mail, is likely to include many young voters, a group that has the highest percentage of rejected ballots.
In the Stanford study, election officials complained that many young people never learned or don’t use cursive writing, which doesn’t make matching signatures easier.
“I cannot compare a printed name to a signature,” said an anonymous official quoted in the study.
Then there are the electronic signatures, many of them written on a touch pad with a stylus or even a finger. While the Department of Motor Vehicles’ touch pads were updated in 2016 to make it easier for people to sign their name and standardize the size of the signature, they still can be very different from a “wet” signature on paper.
Since online voter registrations rely on that signature in the DMV records, there now are 2.8 million active voter records with only that electronic signature. The number is growing each year.
A number of counties are reaching beyond that signature on the registration card or DMV computer file. San Francisco, for example, uses copies of signatures from earlier vote-by-mail envelopes and other signed state and local documents to give election workers more examples for comparison, said John Arntz, the city’s elections director.
Since everyone’s signature changes over the years, using a variety of documents allows election officials “to look across time” in an effort to make the matches, said Westphal of the Stanford study.
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