Common Reasons for Poor Handwriting

What are the common reasons for poor handwriting? Why do many people have poor, bad, ugly handwriting? Is it possible to fix poor handwriting? Is it a matter of simply learning to write more neatly? Or is there something more complex in the background? And what is even the point in improving handwriting when many people now type more than write?

Here are the common reasons for poor handwriting:

• if someone has low vision. When you can’t see well, you’ll probably have poor handwriting.
• when someone spells poorly.  It’s easy to hide spelling mistakes in messy handwriting.
• when someone has letters moving in the head when s/he looks at a page.  Movement makes handwriting indecipherable. Or at best very difficult to decipher.
• if someone’s internal pictures fade quickly.  Then the person won’t have time to notice the details in the pictures, thus in his/her handwriting. It takes time to notice details. Plus the movement [fading] of internal pictures will cause a blur / mess in the mind – and therefore also handwriting.
• if someone believes that there’s something motorically wrong with their hand or arm.  This belief will provide an excuse for poor handwriting and a barrier to the person’s motivation to improve it.
• when someone writes quickly. Writing neatly takes longer. When you don’t have time, you won’t write neatly. This is why doctors and other professionals under the pressure of time are notorious for poor handwriting.
• when someone is ungrounded. We must be stable/grounded if we want to write neatly.

Do you have poor handwriting? Or does your child or someone you know have poor handwriting? Even if there is something in the background that causes your or the person’s poor handwriting, we can fix it. If you’d like to improve yours or help a child or the person you’re thinking of improve theirs, it’s easy when you know how. NLP has strategies that can help. And I’ve shared many in other articles on this website. Let’s talk about how.