Spirit Matters: Your signature is an icon of your soul

In a world increasingly internet-controlled, I fear the loss of soul.

As our daily lives become more robotized, we are losing our connection to that sacred, ineffable substance that makes each of us uniquely human.

Our soul.

Without soulfulness, life, and our place in it, loses its meaning.

Our souls give us the ability to learn, grow, question, study the arts and humanities, science and mathematics – and to find meaning in them – not just as they apply now, but how they have evolved over thousands of generations and numerous civilizations.

Our soul is what connects us to all the people that have gone before us, and all the people who will live after us.

Our soul gives us purpose. It is what makes us dream of a better world not only for ourselves, but for the planet as a whole, naturally and organically.

At its best, our soul seeks the well-being, protection and development of all living beings, knowing that when one of us is wounded, neglected or ignored, all of us suffer.

I feel this loss of soul in my own life.

As much as I desire otherwise, I often find myself losing entire parts of my day to surfing the internet or social media. I usually leave these sessions with an exhaustion that is difficult to explain; and the loss of hours at a time of my life to the digital gods feels like my soul has been pillaged. I am often angry that I cannot recover that lost time, and that it is my own fault for having fallen into the trap.

I think a good example of how we have lost our souls to technology is how much less handwriting is valued these days.

I attended elementary school in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. We learned to print in first grade and cursive in second grade. As we continued, we were expected to hand write all of our assignments. Essays were expected to be double spaced, so it was easier for teachers to read.

It wasn’t until I was a freshman in high school that I was introduced to basic computer use, and by the time I was in college, assignments completed with the computer became the norm.

Today, students are given minimal instruction in handwriting. In fact, they are often introduced to digital methods before they even begin preschool, and computerized learning is part of their education from day one. Handwriting instruction is often given as a second thought.

I don’t have a problem with students turning in digitized assignments, but I also think we are depriving younger generations of a simple way to express their humanity by not creatively engaging with handwriting more.

While I was on social media a while back, I noticed a post making fun of learning handwriting in school, implying that it was useless, and that the students would never need to use it again. Kind of how everyone felt about algebra back in my day.

I don’t normally respond to these posts, but as an old-school writer, I am passionate about this issue.

I wrote how our handwritten signature is an icon of our souls. It is our unique expressive fingerprint, and one of the last methods we have of asserting it in our daily lives.

Not only that, but there is a certain satisfaction that comes from using your hand, which is connected to your arm, which is connected to your heart, to write your name in ink, or whatever medium you choose on a piece of paper.

The ancients did so with hieroglyphics in stone. So expressing our soul this way is not something new, and is an indicator of how elemental doing so is to human nature.

But even more than this, graphology is a science, and much about us can be ascertained through our signature. Graphologists spend their lives studying handwriting, and have been used in criminal investigations to analyze the character of suspects. This can’t be done with type in Times New Roman on a computer screen.

In a world where too many people are posting filtered selfies on their social media or mindless videos to TikTok, why not be a rebel, and be yourself, searching your soul for what makes you, you?

Discover and express your originality by listening to various styles of music; engaging in thoughtful and meaningful conversations; creatively expressing yourself; cooking your meals at home with whole, fresh foods; reading a book from the library and/or gaining knowledge of the universe, our planet, and history through means other than a computer.

It might slow you down a little, but your soul will thank you for it, as you discover a new, enriching way of living your flesh-and-bone life in your all-too-brief visit to this world.

Spirit Matters is a weekly column by Jerrilyn Zavada Novak that examines experiences common to the human spirit. Contact her at jzblue33@yahoo.com.