Before you start reading
this, stop for a few seconds and look down at your hands on the keyboard.
Think about the number of adages you can come up with that relate to using your
hands; having a hands on approach, grabbing life by the horns or even knowing
something like the back of your hand. All of them refer to your tactile sense.
This is because your sense of touch is most reliable amongst all of your
senses. Touch is the first sense that develops in the fetus, meaning it has the
most time to mature compared to your other senses. What do they look like? Are
your fingers long or short? Tapered or crooked? Are your palms square or
rectangular? The way they look just might be the marker that represents your
personality traits. Your hands say a lot about you, for example my square palms
and long fingers indicate that I am an air hand. The owner of the air hand is
logical, creative and possesses the ability to visualize and implement
innovative concepts far beyond the grasp of many of their more grounded
counterparts.
The hands are generally overlooked when a person is scrutinized – by themselves or someone else. Sure some people are regarded to have lovely hands but I want to show everyone that hands mean much more to me than aesthetic appeal. A crooked middle finger, knobby knuckles and a callous on my thumb may not mean much to you, but to me they tell a story of how my hands are made for sketching or how I wrote out answers for every question in a three page list for my history exam in three days. My hands can be used for tasks that require precision such as playing the piano or embroidering a cushion to performing heavy labor; and all the marks and scars left behind tell a story of our myriad of pursuits.
Gestures are the most basic form of communication; they can be used on their own or they can enhance your words. When I am speaking, I use my hands as a visual aid. It gives me the confidence that people actually understand the sentiments behind my speech. My hands allow me to forge bonds with people – to show them what I cannot express with vocalizations. When my grandmother passed away, my mother was beyond devastated. During the entirety of the funeral a frog had taken up permanent residence in my throat. I could not put into words the amount of grief I was in; much less produce a few words of consolation for my mother. I wanted to show her my support – everything was secondary to her needs to me at that time. All I could do was to grab her shoulder or hand tightly as numerous mourners came and went. My voice had deserted me. Touch is what broke the vicious cycle of miscommunication. My hand squeezing her shoulder was enough to let my mother know that I was there for her – vocalization of my turmoil was unnecessary. These words in particular describe what happened that day: “When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.” This verse from the Bible illustrates my epiphany of not only growing older but more mature.
My hands are a portal to channel all my rampant thoughts into corporeal form. Creativity has always been an outlet for me – for both negative and positive emotions. It helps me keeps a pseudo diary for the timeline of my life - like those growth charts etched into your doorways, not really accurate but they serve their purpose. Every night, before I go to sleep, I lie in my bed thinking of the day that slipped through my fingers – more time lost. If I’m feeling particularly restless, I grab my pencil and draw a picture of my life on paper. It doesn’t have to be Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel or Dante’s Inferno; it’s the sum of the mix of emotions that cause a ripple in the pond of my mind. With my fingers, I can control my personal therapy session without paying a psychologist an arm and a leg. With my drawings and writings, I cause reactions in people – elicit a visceral response that is completely primal. The reaction I cherish the most is when I can induce speechlessness. If the person who is examining my work comprehends the meaning behind it, I consider that piece an ultimate success of my hands that relayed my vision wholly on to paper.
Throughout this succinct and continuous journey that I call life, my hands are spectators – to my successes, to my tears. Every line is a path to major incidents when a clenched fist was all that was holding me together. All these lines on my palm make a map of my entire existence. My hands give me so much and yet ask for so little in return. Not only do they give me the ability of building my own world, they shape who I am.
The hands are generally overlooked when a person is scrutinized – by themselves or someone else. Sure some people are regarded to have lovely hands but I want to show everyone that hands mean much more to me than aesthetic appeal. A crooked middle finger, knobby knuckles and a callous on my thumb may not mean much to you, but to me they tell a story of how my hands are made for sketching or how I wrote out answers for every question in a three page list for my history exam in three days. My hands can be used for tasks that require precision such as playing the piano or embroidering a cushion to performing heavy labor; and all the marks and scars left behind tell a story of our myriad of pursuits.
Gestures are the most basic form of communication; they can be used on their own or they can enhance your words. When I am speaking, I use my hands as a visual aid. It gives me the confidence that people actually understand the sentiments behind my speech. My hands allow me to forge bonds with people – to show them what I cannot express with vocalizations. When my grandmother passed away, my mother was beyond devastated. During the entirety of the funeral a frog had taken up permanent residence in my throat. I could not put into words the amount of grief I was in; much less produce a few words of consolation for my mother. I wanted to show her my support – everything was secondary to her needs to me at that time. All I could do was to grab her shoulder or hand tightly as numerous mourners came and went. My voice had deserted me. Touch is what broke the vicious cycle of miscommunication. My hand squeezing her shoulder was enough to let my mother know that I was there for her – vocalization of my turmoil was unnecessary. These words in particular describe what happened that day: “When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.” This verse from the Bible illustrates my epiphany of not only growing older but more mature.
My hands are a portal to channel all my rampant thoughts into corporeal form. Creativity has always been an outlet for me – for both negative and positive emotions. It helps me keeps a pseudo diary for the timeline of my life - like those growth charts etched into your doorways, not really accurate but they serve their purpose. Every night, before I go to sleep, I lie in my bed thinking of the day that slipped through my fingers – more time lost. If I’m feeling particularly restless, I grab my pencil and draw a picture of my life on paper. It doesn’t have to be Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel or Dante’s Inferno; it’s the sum of the mix of emotions that cause a ripple in the pond of my mind. With my fingers, I can control my personal therapy session without paying a psychologist an arm and a leg. With my drawings and writings, I cause reactions in people – elicit a visceral response that is completely primal. The reaction I cherish the most is when I can induce speechlessness. If the person who is examining my work comprehends the meaning behind it, I consider that piece an ultimate success of my hands that relayed my vision wholly on to paper.
Throughout this succinct and continuous journey that I call life, my hands are spectators – to my successes, to my tears. Every line is a path to major incidents when a clenched fist was all that was holding me together. All these lines on my palm make a map of my entire existence. My hands give me so much and yet ask for so little in return. Not only do they give me the ability of building my own world, they shape who I am.
