Guest Blog with Rita Pomade

Guest Blog with Rita Pomade

                                                                                                            6/18/2020

How the Skills Learned From Handwriting Analysis Made Me a Better Writer

I never dreamed when I became a Graphoanalyst, the official title for those who graduate with a certificate in the scientific study of handwriting, that the skills I acquired would cross over so fortuitously into my career as a writer.

I worked for the police department, psychologists, social service agencies, corporations, school boards, government, and individuals looking for personal insight or a compatibility study with another person. Sometimes I was asked to answer specific questions related to the service that hired me, but at other times, I worked for clients who asked for complete profiles. Handwriting analysis can determine a person’s emotional predisposition, type of intelligence, integrity, fears, coping mechanisms, sociability, ambition, and strengths and weakness for fulfilling goals.

In the process of putting together portraits for individuals, I had to determine each of these character traits and create an integrated personality. I needed to understand how conflicting traits influenced one another. In short, I had to show the complexity that exists in all of us. In doing my study of each individual, I was writing a story about them with all their lights and shadows. This crossed over into my writing and helped bring characters in my stories alive. Because I had been trained to probe into the complexities of human nature, it became second nature in my writing, even when looking into my own character while writing my memoir Seeker: A Sea  Odyssey. I was more insightful about the other “actors” in my personal story because I had spent years probing beneath the surface of clients in my practice.

I was often asked to look at letters and documents from people long deceased when family members wanted to know about a particular ancestor or wanted to have more insight into a parent long gone when they were writing their own stories. At one point, I was asked to look at the letters of a famous singer who had died. A film company wanted to do a biography of her life. She had a lover, much younger. They also gave me his letters from their correspondence because they wanted to do an accurate presentation of their relationship. Handwriting analysis is the most effective tool for exploring compatibility.

Handwriting is as personal as a fingerprint, and from a person’s handwriting you can bring the whole character alive. After completing a personality profile, I felt as though I had known the person for a lifetime. If I were to write a biography, I wouldn’t do it without studying handwriting samples. It would give me accurate insight into what motivated the character to be or act a certain way. That greater understanding would bring the person alive with more integrity. To know what moves a person to act the way they do gives a richer and more nuanced portrait.  As a bonus, my training as a Graphoanalyst gave me greater insight into myself and that has carried over into making me a better writer.

Biography

Rita Pomade— teacher, poet, memoirist—lived six years aboard a small yacht that took her from Taiwan to the Suez to Mallorca, dropping anchor in 22 countries. She and her husband navigated through raging monsoons, encountered real-life pirates, and experienced cultures that profoundly changed them. Seeker: A Sea Odyssey, published by Guernica Editions under the Miroland label tells her story.

Rita Pomade, a native New Yorker, first settled in Mexico before immigrating to Quebec. During her time in Mexico, she taught English, wrote articles and book reviews for Mexconnect, an ezine devoted to Mexican culture, and had a Dear Rita monthly column on handwriting analysis in the Chapala Review. In Montreal she taught English as a Second Language at Concordia University and McGill University until her retirement. She is a two-time Moondance International Film Festival award winner, once for a film script and again for a short story deemed film worthy. Her work is represented in the Monologues Bank, a storehouse of monologues for actors in need of material for auditions, in several anthologies, and in literary reviews. Her travel biography, Seeker: A Sea Odyssey, was shortlisted for the 2019 Concordia University First Book Award. .