Useful Note-Taking

My old belief was that storing all these links in a souped-up database would lead me to magically generate new insights about the topics I write about. After several years of banging my head into a wall, I realized that to generate new insights from these links I would need a new approach.

That led me to Zettelkasten, a technique for creating webs o... See more

Anyone who says X must be done in Y way is most absolutely wrong. Who is Tiago Forte to tell how I should organize my thoughts? Am I a robot to follow so simply in the footsteps of another? I would like a more general approach, please.

Any serious note taker eventually realizes that the way their brain works doesn't really fit into any PARA, ARPA or... See more

A major limitation exists for spaced repetition software (e.g. Anki, SuperMemo, or other flashcard-style systems), in my experience using them for several years for long-term memory: it's neither necessary nor sufficient to use this software to learn certain topics.

Several excellent physics and math students I worked with have never used spaced rep... See more

Tiago Forte has pioneered the concept of a Second Brain. As the author of two books, he's learned that quantity and quality aren't opposing forces. Here's what else he's taught me about writing: 1. The brain is for having ideas, not storing them. Write stuff down. 2. If you… Show more

“Better note-taking” misses the point; what matters is “better thinking”

Lots of people write about solutions to the problem that Note-writing practices are generally ineffective. The vast majority of that writing fixates on a myopic, “lifehacking”-type frame, focused on answering questions like: “how should I organize my notes?”, “what kind of jou... See more