[balder1991]

You’re not wrong, but there’s a nuance here. More often than not our thoughts fool us into thinking we have something clear when we have only a vague idea of what you want to do.

I kinda [wrote about this before](https://dielsonsales.github.io/2023/05/11/starting-a-new-blo...) but the takeaway is that writing forces you to structure your thoughts, giving them a final shape and enables you to notice flaws or gaps in your own thinking process. It’s impossible to do this without writing.

[mewpmewp2]

It would be good to have specific situations here I guess, otherwise it's quite abstract, and I'm not sure what to make of it.

As to your post, I think rather than writing it's the act of pressuring yourself to figure the thing out that is making you more knowledgeable about the thing.

You are putting it out publicly out there so you really want to be certain that you are correct, and therefore you do a lot of research.

If you wanted to be accurate and prove a point, the motivation mechanism could vary, but also the eventual communication mechanism could vary. It doesn't necessarily have to be in writing, it could be a live debate or simply something else you built. The writing or the product are end product, but the process of wanting to produce something is what made you research and to understand.

You could be writing to yourself into a Google Docs, and not care and you would not go deep to research since there's no incentive to be accurate.

E.g. I could be doing a home project whether hardware, software or DIY, that in order to produce this output I have to learn and think. Similar to as good set of words to communicate some idea. But also I could build some slop without thinking and I could produce slop writing without thinking, and about nothing special.