LLTT Newsletter - September 2026

You Don't Have to Love It (Yet)

This newsletter has carried the word ‘love’ in its name for more than three years now, but we have never once stopped to talk about what that word is asking of you.

When learning shorthand, the usual advice is that you have to love it. In August 2024 we looked at a quote from K.S. Aiyar, who told students to ask themselves at the beginning ‘whether you have a love of the subject.’

For some learners that question is useful. For others, perhaps not so much.

A fair question but at the wrong time

Picture a student three weeks into learning Teeline blends. She takes dictation at 50 words per minute and can read half of it back. Afterwards she may ask herself whether or not she ‘loves’ shorthand. The honest answer is no. She doesn't love it. Rather, she finds it hard, and perhaps a bit humiliating. In a moment of frustration, she may even decide she isn't cut out for it, and give up.

What happened?

The short(hand) answer is: she asked a fair question at the wrong time.

Very few people love shorthand at 50 wpm. The enjoyment tends to arrive later, when your outlines start coming without conscious thought, or when you read back a passage (you were sure was a disaster) and find most of it is there.

Ask any fluent writer whether they loved Teeline in the early days. Most will laugh.

We said this ourselves in that same August 2024 issue: interest and enjoyment often grow with competence.

But it deserves more than that, because it changes the order of things. Love is not the price of entry. For most of us, it is what we find waiting further down the road.

You won't love all of it

Even fluent writers don't. There will always be parts of the work you'd rather skip.

You should keep in mind that the most beneficial drills are usually the most hated ones.

The things we do badly are seldom the things we enjoy, which is why we avoid them, and which is why we keep doing them badly.

So if you wait to love every part of Teeline before you commit to it, you might be waiting a long time.

A better aim is to first find one thing you do enjoy.

For some people it is the moment they realise a long word can be folded down into a small, tidy outline. For others, it is inventing their own grouping or special outline for a phrase they meet all the time. And for many, it is the immense satisfaction of reading back a clean page.

You need to find yours, and let it carry you through the parts you don't care for.

Enjoyment will not always turn up on its own, so plan for it. Once a week, take a dictation passage about 10 words per minute below your comfortable speed. The purpose is not to push: it is to feel what fluency is like. Your pen moving, the outlines coming, and best of all, no panic. Try to finish your week on that session if you can.

This is never to be considered wasted time. It is to remind you what you are working towards, and it gives you a taste of the shorthand you will one day write at speed.

Most relationships worth having don't begin as love at first sight. They are built by turning up, day after day, including the days when it feels like hard work. Especially when it feels like hard work.

So, you don't have to love Teeline today to be successful. You only have to turn up. Do that often enough, and one day you may notice that the love arrived some time ago.

As always, if you have suggestions or topics you'd like to see covered in future newsletters, please contact us:
https://www.letsloveteelinetogether.com/contact-us

If you find this newsletter helpful, please help us spread the word and forward it to a friend!

A Parting Thought

Be sure to visit us at the LLTT Website, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Quizlet and Soundcloud.

Looking to build speed, sharpen your reading skills, and improve your Teeline shorthand without hours of aimless dictation practice?

Here's what LLTT+ can do for you:

• Spend less time practising and make more progress — because every session is focussed, not accidental

• See outlines you've been avoiding finally click into place, so you stop hesitating at the exact moments it matters most

• Build reading fluency alongside writing speed — the most overlooked skill in shorthand, and the one that holds most learners back

• Experience greater confidence walking into a dictation knowing you've genuinely prepared, and not just hoped for the best

• Master word groupings and special outlines that experienced writers use

• Stop wasting time on material you've already mastered; work instead on the specific outlines that are slowing you down

• Identify your bottlenecks — because your overall speed is only as fast as your slowest outlines

• Develop the kind of automatic, fluent responses that come from practising the right things, not just practising more

  LLTT+ grows alongside you, from early stages through to exam standards and beyond.

  Find out more at letsloveteelinetogether.com/llttplus

"Don't Get Worried. Don't Get Stressed. Let's Love Teeline Together."