We write when we need to remember something, be it an idea, a quote or the outcome of a study. We write when we want to organise our thoughts and when we want to exchange ideas with others.
Sönke Ahrens writes that writing is not only the act of preparing and delivering an output (an essay, a paper, a book) but the medium of all the work that supposedly leads up to it.
We think that note-taking, studying, brainstorming, researching are means to the end of writing, but all of that is already writing.
The notes are just the tangible outcome of it. All you have to do is to have a pen in your hand while you are doing what you are doing anyway (or a keyboard under your fingers).
I had a short rabbit hole into polymathy last December (2025) and it’s now part of my belief system that all knowledge inevitably pushes me forward, sometimes not in conventionally “useful” ways.
You can use this pool of notes not only to make writing easier and more fun for yourself, but also to learn for the long run and generate new ideas. But most of all, you can write every day in a way that brings your projects forward.
And like a side quest gremlin I took that as permission to knowledge hoard because if it resonates, it will probably make its way into a project some day.
Related: Austin Kleon’s writing and drawing are thinking on the page