Are you ready to take the “genius” test? In cursive, write the name “Michelle.” OK. Now, when did you dot the “i”? Did you complete writing the entire name, and then go back and dot the “i”? Or did you write “Mi”, then stop, dot the “i” and then write “chelle”? Which way is faster?
It’s faster to stop and dot the “i” immediately, especially if the “i” is near the beginning of a word. “I dunno,” you may be thinking, “how could it be faster to stop in the middle of the word?”
It’s faster, because when you dot the “i” immediately, by the time you get to the end of the word, you’re ready to go on to the next word. If you write the whole word without stopping, you need to move your hand all the way back to the beginning of the word, dot the “i,” and then move your hand to the end of the word before starting the next word. Stopping to dot your “i’s” is not only faster, it’s smarter. Interestingly, very intelligent people usually stop to dot their “i’s,” intuitively, without even realizing it.
Which brings us to the handwriting of Albert Einstein. Do you notice the little gaps after many of his “i’s”? They show that before writing the rest of the word, Einstein stopped for a millisecond to dot his “i” Sometimes, the little gaps occur after the “t’s.” That is because his brain was thinking so far ahead, that he subconsciously understood that it was more efficient to stop only once, and cross his “t” and dot his “i” at the same time.
Einstein’s “t’s” tell tales, too. Look at how high he crossed them. Most of them are crossed at the very top of the stem, or even rise above the stem. The higher a person crosses their “t’s,” the higher their goals and aspirations. Einstein’s high, long, and strong t-bars show his fervent work drive. However, there is one place where Einstein’s t bar is weak and short…on his first name, Albert.
While last names often show how we feel about ourselves in our sphere of work, first names show how we feel about ourselves in a personal sense. Einstein’s t-bars are high, long, and strong everywhere except in his first name. This shows that he was highly directed and goal-oriented everywhere except for his personal life. In fact, this was one area where Einstein may have been, well, no Einstein. His lover, fellow physicist Mileva Maric, became pregnant with his child. She gave birth to a baby girl whom Einstein never saw. (No one knows for sure what happened to this child. It’s thought that she either died in infancy or was given up for adoption.) He married Mileva, but continued to have numerous lovers. Eventually, he left Mileva to marry one of his long-time lovers, Elsa, who was also his cousin. However, before proposing to Elsa, he came close to proposing to her daughter, who instead, became his stepdaughter.
I guess you could say, relatively speaking, geniuses aren’t necessarily geniuses in every part of their lives.