That daily golden hour of writing
Sunday weblog notes from December 7, 2025 that were compiled and shared.
Right now at this time in my life that daily golden hour of writing happens in the morning. My college writing life was way more night owl focused. Most of my best writing in college happened after sunset. Today, in the morning during this writing endeavor, it’s about an hour where anything is possible. My mind is clear and my focus is unstoppable and sustained. It really is a time where anything can happen. At the height of my writing powers it is about just digging in and letting my mind break down problems and produce solutions on the page. Maybe you have not had that moment of clarity where the things in front of you just make sense and choice is possible. It’s an empowering feeling and one that I try not to waste. This daily golden hour of writing is about focus and delivery. You may have experienced the spark of creativity where you just feel compelled to produce something. That really can happen at any time and is a far greater thing to waste than the rhythm of daily writing. Within the spark of creativity sometimes you can see the path forward on something and you know what to do to deliver it and those moments where the spark is real are something you don’t want to waste. That is when the time is right to put in the work and deliver on whatever happened to ignite that spark of creativity.
During this missive we are talking about two very powerful elements of the creativity journey. First, being in the rhythm to write daily is an awesome super power and something I feel you can control through persistence and being open to the process of writing. Second, and more elusive by nurturing, hoping for, and recognizing the spark of creativity you can find something different and separate from that golden hour of writing. Maybe you can be set up for both of these types of moments through hard work and dedication. Having extreme preparation in a lot of areas helps have the foundation to deliver on the spark of creativity, but in the end is really just about recognizing the moment and seizing it so that no creative waste occurs. Maybe you were thinking about something and the outline of a book just presented itself or maybe the solution to an amazing argument that you could put into a treatise. For somebody who is more musically aligned you might just call it being in a flow space where the notes just show up and are most excellent. I’ll admit that even after years of playing guitar for me, those times where I just lock into a real flow space have become fewer and less prevalent. For me unlocking the superpower of creativity is more a writing based endeavor. I enjoy music, but ultimately that is for better or worse a more personal journey.
Earlier this week I started to evaluate what exactly I was using this writing super power to accomplish. Honestly, I know intellectually that I should be working building research notes into papers for publication. That is what needs doing and should be a part of my process. On a daily basis I’m taking the time to engage in research. During the weekend that tends to be for Lindahl Letter missives and during weekdays that effort is being folded into nels.ai which has been a focus of mine for the last few weeks. I’m actively sharing my research into the world of quantum computers on a daily basis. That work gets linked out to Substack Notes, Twitter, and Bluesky each and every weekday.