Day 19/245

At first, I was worried that eight months might not be enough time. Now I'm thinking that it might not take that long at all.

I timed myself the other day. My left-handed printing is now at 80% of the speed of my right hand, and the penmanship is at least equal, if not a little better. The same thing holds for cursive writing (82%, to be precise), and the penmanship is much better. I can now sign my name with my left hand equally well, and what's more, the signature is virtually identical. This is good--I'd rather not be arrested for forging my own signature.

For certain tasks, I now use my left hand without thinking. These are the "every day" sorts of tasks, cooking and cleaning and brushing my teeth. For others I still experience some confusion, but it passes quickly.

Finally yesterday, I experienced something new. On a task that I had never tried before--filling a glass bottle with mead, if you're curious--I did it with my left hand without thinking about it first. This was a big step.

You see, one thing that was worrying me is this. It's one thing to master tasks that you've done before with a non-dominant hand. But what about developing skill and dexterity for new tasks? How can you practice developing skill in things you've never done before?

Logically, though, dexterity in certain tasks carries over to dexterity in others. The greater general dexterity I have, the greater specific dexterity I'll have as well. And without realizing it, I've taken the precise tactic necessary to achieve this. By forcing my non-dominant hand to behave as the dominant one in all tasks, I have begun to achieve specific dexterity in all these tasks, which then translates into a higher level of general dexterity.

There are certain tasks, though, at which my left side is woefully inadequate. Throwing, for example. I'm not awesome at throwing with my right side, for that matter, but my left is totally stupid. And it's not something I have an easy opportunity to practice.

Another is crochet. I have several projects that I need to complete at the moment, but I can't really switch in the middle. (Although, come to think of it, I'd love to see what it would look like if I did each alternate row left handed, then right handed. I've never seen it done, probably because no one can really do it. That would be worth trying out.)

I'm less than three weeks into this project, but in a way, it feels much longer. I'll just have to see how I progress after a few months have passed.