Lefties playing righty?

[David Higginbotham]

I wrote left handed until my third grade teacher made me switch to right hand. (My handwriting remains atrocious to this day) She didn’t like lefties…mainly for religious beliefs I later learned. I play all instruments righty because that’s the way I learned. I shoot handguns more accurately lefty and long guns righty. But can transition either with minimal effort and when my career required I carry a handgun I chose righty as did other lefties I worked with. Most everything else I do lefty. My friend and fellow forum member Dale Foreman is a lefty but plays both steel & 6 string righty. I believe lefties living in a righty world probably requires a bit more unintentional adapting.

[Brooks Montgomery]

I shoot handguns more accurately lefty and long guns righty. But can transition either with minimal effort and when my career required I carry a handgun I chose righty as did other lefties I worked with.

How does that work? Are you left eye or right eye dominant? (Or are you eye-ambidextrous?
..which is a new one to me).

[Greg Vincent]

Lefty here who plays guitar & steel righty.

[David Higginbotham]

Brooks Montgomery wrote:

How does that work? Are you left eye or right eye dominant? (Or are you eye-ambidextrous?
..which is a new one to me).

I’m left eye dominant and thus a slight better accuracy shooting left handed. But I obviously learned to adjust to this early on as a kid. The firearms instructors over the years apparently see this regularly as none ever made issue of it. I have a lefty friend who does everything lefty (very talented tattoo artist and freehand drawing) but she’s right eye dominant. Amazing what our brains adjust to and we never notice until it’s brought to our attention.

[Roddy Ring]

Another example of Lefty/Righty outside of the music world: One of my best friends played football in HS, primarily as Tight End. But he was also the punter and the long (desperation) field goal kicker. He kicked with his right foot but punted with his left.

[Doug Beaumier]

I recently read this useless piece of information: 45% of left handed people are also left footed! I am such a person, although I play pedal steel right handed.

[Dave O'Brien]

Me too.

[Brett Day]

In the year 2000, country singer Mark Wills released a song and video called "I Want To Know Everything There Is To Know About You", and in the video, the steel player is playing a left handed Emmons guitar.

[Mark Eaton]

It’s funny, in the fly-fishing world, of which I’ve retired, there is this axiom of the old guard that says if you’re right handed, then you should cast with your right hand, switch the rod to your left hand, and then reel with your right, your so-called strong hand. The old revered angling companies such as Hardy in England (been around since 1870) made all their reels right-hand retrieve for the majority of anglers that were right handed.

This is of course baloney, and my response has always been in those fishing circles, “if you only have one hand that is coordinated, then no one would be able to play the guitar!”

It’s muscle memory pure and simple . I’m left-handed, left-eyed, left-footed. I cast left, reel right.
Always played all guitars right handed.

Amen, Brooks! I took up fly fishing around 1979-80, and I recall thinking from the beginning that the hand switching business was just dumb.

As a lefty living in a predominantly right handed world, you think about things differently than the average righty. When I took up golf at age 20, I remember right handed golfers telling me I should play as a righty for three reasons: 1. golf courses are designed for righties - which is true. 2. lefty clubs were hard to find (like lefty guitars) and 3. as a lefty, your more coordinated hand was leading in the swing, so it would be better for accuracy in your short game. But those guys never tried to drive a ball off the tee with left handed clubs, and without that "coiled" power, like when hitting a baseball - your drives wouldn't go very far and it would make the game a whole lot harder. So I shopped around and found lefty clubs - and it made a huge difference.

But I'm glad I play guitar and steel as a righty, I believe having the more coordinated left hand fretting and barring made things a whole lot easier.

[Brooks Montgomery]

Mark, yes, you and I, similar lefty experiences.
And golf—that’s where my soapbox about muscle memory kind of falls apart. My father tried to get me to golf right-handed to avoid buying a set of lefty clubs—so I tried.
And tried. Short drives and a wicked slice. So i took up something as ridiculous as golf: flyfishing.

Now that I think about it, on steel guitar, I might have a bit of a slice with my right hand technique.
I’d rather have a hook

[Joe Rogers]

I eat and write left handed, but do everything else right handed including playing steel guitar.

David, your story about getting punished mirrors my grandmother. She too was left handed and got whacked with rulers to write right handed. She had the worst handwriting in the world...so know that you're Number 2 behind her... God Bless her soul, I miss her dearly.


Joe Rogers

[David Higginbotham]

Joe, it seems as tho I was a belated victim of the “lefty devil” syndrome your grandmother experienced. My 3rd grade teacher was around 70 and despised lefties. She further embarrassed me by showing a paper of my handwriting from the beginning of the school year and the atrocious handwriting at the end of the school year to the entire class while ridiculing how bad it had become instead of improving like everyone else. One of those embedded memories as the class laughed.

One of my sisters has been blessed with the same issue. One of the best gifts in her estimation I gave her was a left handed can opener! She was ecstatic as I was when my wife gave me a left handed tape measure!

Your lefty/righty syndrome seems to go hand and hand with my righty/lefty syndrome. Together we should have it all figured out!

Dave

[Joe Rogers]

The first 3 children in our family are left handed. We were lucky to have escaped what you went through, which is beyond cruel to do to any child.


Joe Rogers

[Rich Ertelt]

Here is my perspective.

I am a right handed guitar player in a family of lefties. When I started playing guitar, it was on my brothers, so I started left handed. I quickly realized it felt off, switched to holding it right handed. And learned with the strings upside down, til I got my own guitar.
My brothers both played lefty. Yea, finding guitars was not as easy, but they had strats and teles and Pbass and one even had an old Harmony Rocket. All lefty. I asked my brother one time if he ever tried right, he said he started righty (on one of my old guitars) and just could not do it.

My son is a lefty and I have tried his left handed scissors right handed. Wow. Real eye opener, as it was next to impossible. I put them in my left hand and it was easy. And I am 100% righty. I think that someone who is truly 100% left is going to have as hard a time playing righty as I did playing lefty.

That being said, finding a lefty pedal steel would be close to impossible. Custom made most likely.
I do know this, being righty, if I had to do pedal steel lefty, picking with my left hand, I don't know if it would work. That has got to be a tough one, if one is full on lefty.

[James Holland]

" as a lefty, your more coordinated hand was leading in the swing, so it would be better for accuracy..."

If that were true, rightys would lead with their more cordinated hand... come on folks, everyone uses their strongest best hand, eye, foot, whatever for a reason. It really seems to bother the 90% righty world though.

[Gary Mahalak]

I've never heard of a pro doing that, but I'm not super plugged into the pro scene. Ten years is a long time to stick with something, though! I wouldn't worry about it unless it's actively hindering your game.

[Dale Foreman]

I too am left handed and play steel and guitar righty! Oh and Travis Toy is also left handed