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As a culture our written language skills have deteriorated to an alarming degree. We have become so addicted to instant communication that the simple act of writing someone a letter seems as ancient as 8-track tapes (if you don't know what those are, ask your mom). Even the speed of text messages and e-mails isn't fast enough for some people, giving rise to a host of abbreviations that I can't even begin to keep up with. And whether we realize it or not, there is a great danger in the loss of our ability to communicate via the written word.

The long-term danger is that we will become the first generation in history to leave no written record of ourselves. If George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, or Ernest Hemingway had only used e-mail, would we have the same record of them that we possess through their letters and journals today? If Jefferson had sent text messages to Adams, think what would have been lost to history.

I realize the irony of saying this as I write an article that people I have never met will read. But will anyone go to the trouble of printing the article and filing it away for posterity? Not likely. Because it's just one of possibly hundreds of articles, e-mails, and text message they will encounter over the course of the day. It may have good information, and they may even put some of it to use, but no one will keep the article.

From a more short-term perspective, consider what we have lost by abandoning the handwritten letter. A letter is a personal thing, even more now because we receive so few of them. They matter because they are personal in an increasingly disconnected world, and because they take time and effort to produce.

In business dealings, the deterioration of written language skill is even more obvious. People have become so reliant upon spell-check that spelling is no longer of any concern. This leads to any number of errors (using "then" instead of "than" or "it's when "its" is actually correct, to name a few). From news articles to business papers we come across looking like idiots who can't spell, and grammar is completely ignored as well.

There are some ways to start improving your writing skills, from journaling to writing for websites like Helium and Associated Content. Perhaps the easiest place to start is by writing letters, which has the added benefit of leaving a personal record that you really existed:

1. Choose a few friends or family members most likely to agree to begin a written correspondence with you. While it is not

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