I cannot spell Dyslexia

A thought that often comes to me is doing things as a child with my mother. This generally involved helping her in the kitchen. My mother was a wonderful cook. 

One recurring memory I have is of the smell in the house when she baked Christmas cake for her sisters and for us. When it came time to decorate the cake each year, out came the plastic tube with fine nozzle attached and a plunger, allowing her to write “Merry Christmas” on the top of the cakes.

Then the annual question would arise: Is there one R or two Rs in Merry?  

She would then ask me, and I would not be sure either. The solution was to get out some of last year’s Christmas cards and check the spelling; problem solved.

Now looking back, she was probably dyslexic as I am.  I had to look up again how to spell dyslexic as I always get it wrong.

First sales job: 

In my first sales job, in my twenties, every sales report I wrote was returned to me with spelling corrections.

Thankfully, I was good at sales, so my sales manager put up with my poor spelling.

I was not aware that I was dyslexic until I started typing for myself in my forties.

Up to then, I presumed I was just a bad speller or stupid or both!

One simple example, I know the word create has an ‘e’ at the end, but I always leave out the ‘e’.  Another example would be ‘your,’ I always write ‘you’. Before the advent of spell check, I would always have to get someone to read over my articles and other important documents before sending them.

How lucky are people to have the myriads of tools available nowadays to ensure they can focus on being creative while allowing software to support and improve their communications. 

It’s interesting to note that, with all the tools available to us to ensure our communication is understood, many documents, texts, emails, etc., are full of errors and difficult to understand.

Please note that I am not advocating that AI generate all your communications. What these types of tools should be doing is checking, enhancing and also providing advice and support.

In the past when I spoke to audiences, I would on occasion mention my dyslexia, usually by way of apologising for an incorrect spelling on a slide in the time before spellcheck.

What surprised me was that people who would come to me after my talk either to thank me for speaking openly about my dyslexia, or to tell me that they also came to the realisation that they were dyslexic. 

“People who march to the beat of a different drummer”

I first heard this expression when the great singer song writer Harry Chapin introduced his song ‘Flowers are Red’ and explained that a schoolteacher told a parent that their child was painting flowers and leaves the wrong colours.

“But not to worry, I will soon have him marching to the beat of my drum.”

Did we not all experience this type of teacher in the past?

In these times there is an increasing awareness of diagnoses such as dyslexia and thankfully a greater understanding.

People are often out of step with the norm, and this can be a good thing.

In my view, this is the unconventional space where our most creative people reside. 

With the right encouragement and support, the next generation can achieve more than we might have believed possible. 

By Executive Coach Andrew Keogh of Aristo.ie