We recently had a question during our Wacky Wednesday radio show about non-dominant handwriting therapy. Is it New Age?For the most part, yes.
From a scientific point-of-view, there are many theories about the benefits of non-dominant handwriting therapy ranging from how it can create stronger connections between the brain’s hemispheres to making your smarter, but current research is divided on these hypotheses.
Legitimate scientific researchers conducted an experiment in 2016 challenging right-handed participants to trace shapes with their left hand for 20 minutes a day for 10 days.
“Researchers found that the sketches did grow smoother,” this article reports. “They had guessed that the superior control would come from stronger connections between the left- and right-hand motor cortices controlling the hands. Instead, fMRI imaging revealed that both control areas had strengthened connections with the praxis network, a group of structures spanning both hemispheres, which supports skilled movements and tool use.”
In other words, “practicing left-handed tracing makes you better at left-handed tracing, but not necessarily anything else.”
Since then, research has remain divided on just how beneficial this therapy is for anything other than improving non-dominant hand coordination.
But that doesn’t stop New Agers from affixing all kinds of fanciful powers to this therapy, such as how it can enable you to tap into your inner child and discover your inner wisdom.
Although connecting with one’s inner child is not necessarily New Age and is quite common in therapy as a way to address and heal from past trauma, this practitioner describes how the New Age version of non-dominant handwriting therapy employs it.
For example, she starts by making a connection with her inner child by using her non-dominant hand to draw her “child self.”
“Then, I had a conversation with her, alternating writing with my right, dominant hand (my normal self) and my left hand (through which my inner child spoke),” she wrote.
This inner child spoke about things she loved and cleared up some painful conclusions she made as a child. From there she moved on to her teen self and confronted the “angry, hurt part of herself.”
From there, she heads into solid New Age territory.
“Then, I dove into the magical world of the inner wise self,” she writes. “I asked with my right hand for advice. I put the pen in my left hand, took a deep breath, and let my inner wise self speak. And speak she did. I filled journal after journal after journal with powerful insights, perspectives, poetry, art, and guidance. While I know now that my inner wisdom was always guiding me, journaling with the non-dominant hand isolated her voice from the cacophony of child, teen, and other ego-mind chatter.”
Much like what is encouraged in Internal Family Systems, which is based upon the idea that all of us have multiple sub-personalities, or different parts of ourselves, she claims non-dominant handwriting therapy helped her to distinguish between the voice of the child, the teen, and her inner wisdom.
“This ability deepened my confidence, my self-understanding, and ultimately the direction of my life.”
In other words, she was relying on this mysterious “inner wisdom” to be her guide in life. Where is this guidance coming from? Herself, or some other spiritual source?
According to New Age ideology, all of us contain a kind of intuitive knowledge within ourselves which is accessed through connection to either a divine universal energy or a deeper spiritual self. This connection can be established in various ways ranging from meditation and psychic readings to regression journeys and the use of the Akashic records.
For example, one can rely upon shamanistic methods such as drumming or chanting which puts one into an altered state that allows them to come into communion with what some call “subconscious forces, framed as spirits or ancestors.”
Another method is to use guided visualization or meditation to enter a trance-like state and gain access to an alleged database of “soul knowledge” known as the Akashic Records. The dream work of Carl Jung is another favorite as is the use of lucid dreaming and astro traveling.
Meditation which requires focus on breathing or mantras to blank the mind is yet another means of achieving an altered state of consciousness that enables one to journey deep into their spirit and discover the soul’s hidden wisdom.
It’s not hard to imagine how easy it is for demonic entities to masquerade as one’s inner wisdom and thus acquire the ability to dictate the terms of their lives.
Non-dominant handwriting therapy may be beneficial for improving one’s motor skills, but using it to connect with your "inner wisdom" is a very bad idea.
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