For Planet Notes, an essay worth reading.

Like a 1970s throwback, I’m writing this essay by hand. How satisfying the slowness, the inefficiency, the sheer insulting pleasure of doing something slower than it can be done. It’s a small, defiant act in this age of box-ticking busyness. And a luxury I thought I could ill afford.

Writing longhand is glacial. A draft takes two to three times longer than blasting it on the laptop. Surely, that’s a fatal statistic? No. Writing by hand produces deeper, more thoughtful, more layered work in the same or less time than pecking away at a keyboard. You’re forced to think about every word lest your hand cease into a claw. A longhand first draft feels like the third or fourth.

Buried under our relentless culture of efficiency and perfection was the answer I’d long sought. Finally, the tortoise has beaten the hare.