The Power of Handwriting
Today, I would like to re-evaluate the power of handwriting.
Human evolution spans over a million years, and handwriting has played an essential role in our cultural and intellectual development. While symbolic expressions like cave paintings and rudimentary symbols have existed for tens of thousands of years, what we recognize today as systematic written language took shape around 3000 B.C. This was the true dawn of “recorded history,” since from that point onward, humans could document events, ideas, and knowledge in written form.
Handwriting allowed humanity to:
- Record what happened for posterity
- Express ideas through pictures or symbols
- Develop alphabets to represent sounds and characters to represent meanings
By converting spoken words into visible symbols, we learned to externalize thought and engage in deep reflection. Through the dexterous use of fingers and hands, we wrote and drew incessantly, pushing our communication skills to new heights. Over time, those sketches evolved into consistent symbols, enabling faster and more precise exchange of information. In many ways, human history itself is the story of how writing flourished and how our species thrived by harnessing the power of recorded knowledge.
Even after humanity invented the abacus to tackle complex arithmetic, handwriting remained indispensable. For math prodigies capable of lightning-fast mental calculations, pen speed could be the real bottleneck—just as a computer’s read/write speed can limit overall performance. With modern computing, we tap screens and press buttons, often forgoing handwriting entirely. As a result, our brains might spend more time consuming information than producing it.
However, the brain’s fundamental purpose is to integrate sensory input and control motor output—it was designed to help organisms expand their range of actions. We see efforts like Tesla Optimus robots tirelessly practicing not to stumble in a park, or carefully pouring liquid into a glass. These challenges mirror the path our ancestors traveled in mastering hand-eye coordination. Given the billions of years of biological evolution behind our dexterity, abandoning such abilities would be, in a word, “Mottainai.” It would be a tragic loss to let these finely honed skills atrophy.
For our brains, coordinating hands and fingers to write is a complex motor task. Achieving the speed and accuracy we take for granted is anything but trivial. Technology may have advanced rapidly, but even sturdy, high-tech robots like Tesla Optimus still struggle with basic tasks that humans master early in life. That’s where BrainDojo comes in—it harnesses this fundamental “power of handwriting” to help users keep their minds sharp. As we increasingly rely on digital tools for communication, many adults rarely pick up a pen. If your handwriting feels awkward or you often struggle to recall how to form certain letters, it could be a sign of declining cognitive function—a kind of “brain rot,” if you will. Handwriting-based brain training can be particularly beneficial for adults who sense they’re not utilizing their cognitive abilities as much as before.
Handwriting, after all these centuries, is still a core driver of mental engagement and creative expression. It challenges our brains to coordinate complex hand movements at high speed, something robots are only beginning to approximate. By prioritizing these skills in BrainDojo, we aim to support brain health in a way that complements our modern, digital lifestyle. Even if tapping and swiping dominate our day-to-day habits, spending a few minutes actually writing might just be the key to maintaining a vibrant and agile mind.
For example, performing calculations at such a high speed is an extremely demanding training exercise for the brain.
If you want to try BrainDojo, you can download it on the App Store.
