Exactly! Systematized note-taking is very nebulous. I have talked to many people who have tried it, many of whom become discouraged and quit, like me.
I did some more thinking about my note-taking system, and I realized I was using it as a garbage collection of information - a common pitfall that people who practice note-taking talk about. I think that, as with anything else, I need to ask myself, "why am I taking notes?"
I was feeling some regret about spending so much time learning and executing the system; but, after changing my mindset, I realized that it was all part of the process. I wouldn't have been able to make the realizations I'm making now without first trying out note-taking. So, I'm looking at is as a growth experience and a step in my evolution :-)
Your take on note-taking is absolutely relatable. I developed an aversion to it too at the moment it felt more like a chore than a pleasure. It was as if the act of taking notes drained the fun out of reading or even thinking, because everytime I would have to interrupt my flow to write down my ideas---and of course that behavior wouldn't scale.
I retook the practice of note-taking after a long hiatus thanks to some new ideas I accidentaly stumbled upon on twitter. One of them was that when I'm reading non-fiction, I shouldn't be writing down every interesting insight that pops up at my face. Instead, I could wait and let them sink in. Wait a week (or a month). The most important ideas will still be there floating in the back of your mind. Write those down. It's a matter of improving the signal-to-noise ratio and making notes more interesting, as you wrote.
Yes! What you wrote resonates so much. I particularly like this passage in your note on "why." You write:
"My zettelkasten can’t be a Personal Knowledge Management system. Sure, I could be audacious enough to declare a current belief as “knowledge”, but I’m certain I’ll eventually rewrite it because the The self is fluid and constantly changing."
I really like the idea of creating a system to house my own beliefs and others' beliefs. The latter, others' beliefs, is so important because, like you write in your digital garden, all of our beliefs are remixed from someone else's beliefs.
Also, related to digital gardening, I found that I spent a lot of time on the technical aspects of it e.g, figuring out how to host and maintain a digital garden website. It was fun, intellectually stimulating, and the accomplishment gave me a sense of pride, but, as a hobbyist developer, it was too time consuming. I would love to have a public digital garden that looks like yours, but I worry that maintaining it will be a trap for a non-developer like myself.
A couple of thoughts. There's a guy on Youtube who isn't that famous who recently posted on his separation from Zettelkasten. This is his channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKuK7cMQFx9qu9xXStG3uWw (for reference). I think there's something interesting in what he said, which is that atomic notes kind of solve a different problem than he has. He found, like you, that the atomic notes were just too flat. He's trying out moving to longer/richer/more narrative notes. I think there's something to what he says in that the way we remember stuff is mostly by incorporating it into our web of knowledge. Making atomic notes with links does this in theory, but a lot of times when we look at them they feel shorn of context.
Second thought: When I used to teach project management, there's an ongoing debate about the volume of management overhead vs the size of the project. It's obvious that smaller projects cannot afford the full scale of management reporting that you need for a larger project, but what's the right amount? I feel like note-taking has a similar issue. How much time on taking notes vs writing my newsletter? (ironic of course that I've had to put my newsletter on hold because I ran out of time, but let's let that pass) Anyway, note-taking is to make other things we do better, so there's a balance to be struck about how much time/effort we spend on it.
100%. Like Danny said, and you pointed out in your comment, atomic notes on their own are too flat. I'm working on experimenting with adding more depth to my notes, while, like you brilliantly pointed out, not falling into the overhead trap. Notes should be a tool for writing, not an end in and of themselves. Effective notes should help us write more thoughtful and rich content to share with others.
Urghh..out of time...I hear you. I wish you luck, my friend!
So what your wrestling with is the question. Is this a bad idea or is my execution flawed? As you experiment with the execution, keep us updated
Exactly! Systematized note-taking is very nebulous. I have talked to many people who have tried it, many of whom become discouraged and quit, like me.
I did some more thinking about my note-taking system, and I realized I was using it as a garbage collection of information - a common pitfall that people who practice note-taking talk about. I think that, as with anything else, I need to ask myself, "why am I taking notes?"
I was feeling some regret about spending so much time learning and executing the system; but, after changing my mindset, I realized that it was all part of the process. I wouldn't have been able to make the realizations I'm making now without first trying out note-taking. So, I'm looking at is as a growth experience and a step in my evolution :-)
Your take on note-taking is absolutely relatable. I developed an aversion to it too at the moment it felt more like a chore than a pleasure. It was as if the act of taking notes drained the fun out of reading or even thinking, because everytime I would have to interrupt my flow to write down my ideas---and of course that behavior wouldn't scale.
I retook the practice of note-taking after a long hiatus thanks to some new ideas I accidentaly stumbled upon on twitter. One of them was that when I'm reading non-fiction, I shouldn't be writing down every interesting insight that pops up at my face. Instead, I could wait and let them sink in. Wait a week (or a month). The most important ideas will still be there floating in the back of your mind. Write those down. It's a matter of improving the signal-to-noise ratio and making notes more interesting, as you wrote.
The other thing that helped me retake my note taking habit was understanding **why** I was doing that (I even wrote a note about it here: https://notes.brunoarine.com/posts/2021-10-11-my-digital-garden-looks-more-like-a-microblog-than-a-slipbox/ ). Once I realized why I was doing what I was doing, it felt natural to carry on with it.
Yes! What you wrote resonates so much. I particularly like this passage in your note on "why." You write:
"My zettelkasten can’t be a Personal Knowledge Management system. Sure, I could be audacious enough to declare a current belief as “knowledge”, but I’m certain I’ll eventually rewrite it because the The self is fluid and constantly changing."
I really like the idea of creating a system to house my own beliefs and others' beliefs. The latter, others' beliefs, is so important because, like you write in your digital garden, all of our beliefs are remixed from someone else's beliefs.
Also, related to digital gardening, I found that I spent a lot of time on the technical aspects of it e.g, figuring out how to host and maintain a digital garden website. It was fun, intellectually stimulating, and the accomplishment gave me a sense of pride, but, as a hobbyist developer, it was too time consuming. I would love to have a public digital garden that looks like yours, but I worry that maintaining it will be a trap for a non-developer like myself.
A couple of thoughts. There's a guy on Youtube who isn't that famous who recently posted on his separation from Zettelkasten. This is his channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKuK7cMQFx9qu9xXStG3uWw (for reference). I think there's something interesting in what he said, which is that atomic notes kind of solve a different problem than he has. He found, like you, that the atomic notes were just too flat. He's trying out moving to longer/richer/more narrative notes. I think there's something to what he says in that the way we remember stuff is mostly by incorporating it into our web of knowledge. Making atomic notes with links does this in theory, but a lot of times when we look at them they feel shorn of context.
Second thought: When I used to teach project management, there's an ongoing debate about the volume of management overhead vs the size of the project. It's obvious that smaller projects cannot afford the full scale of management reporting that you need for a larger project, but what's the right amount? I feel like note-taking has a similar issue. How much time on taking notes vs writing my newsletter? (ironic of course that I've had to put my newsletter on hold because I ran out of time, but let's let that pass) Anyway, note-taking is to make other things we do better, so there's a balance to be struck about how much time/effort we spend on it.
100%. Like Danny said, and you pointed out in your comment, atomic notes on their own are too flat. I'm working on experimenting with adding more depth to my notes, while, like you brilliantly pointed out, not falling into the overhead trap. Notes should be a tool for writing, not an end in and of themselves. Effective notes should help us write more thoughtful and rich content to share with others.
Urghh..out of time...I hear you. I wish you luck, my friend!
Re:
"The most fundamental right is the freedom to quit."
Play Makes Us Human #16
Peter Gray (Substack)