Now that our words are increasingly absorbed into screens, the lines between what’s real and what’s fake are becoming a blur. Words born on a screen can’t avoid seeming only half real because they are. Reading digital news lacks the weight of ink printed on paper. Something we can hold in our hands. Even when the facts are accurate words on a screen feel unreal.

There’s a reason why a handwritten letter means more than a text message.

Words on paper aren’t easily crushed by tech or time. Years from now, the ideas we float on screens risk being lost to a forgotten password or, erased in the middle of the night by an auto-update. But a handwritten letter, a journal entry, or even a scribbled note has the power to endure. Your Instagram post won’t be found tucked away in an old coat pocket. Your kids won’t discover your best TikTok folded between the pages of a book. Words on paper find ways to be found again.

The best poem you’ll ever read may still be waiting in the corner of an old purse.

Handwriting is more than just an act of communication, it’s an extension of you. More unique than a fingerprint, handwriting is a personal signature of the soul. Just as the act of signing a work of art makes it instantly more valuable, the same is true of handwriting in everyday life. A hastily written grocery list, a heartfelt thank-you note, or a doodle in the corner of a notebook becomes the trail of art you leave behind.

The handwritten bits of our lives tell the real story of who we are.

Someday we’ll tell our grandchildren about our laptops and they’ll ask what it was like to carry around our lung. Hand them an old journal however, and they’ll carry it like treasured history they've been entrusted to preserve.

If you want to live forever, pick up a pen.