Tiago Forte takes (extremely) systematic notes. (Everybody knows Tim Ferriss.) Journalists take notes. That’s when I stumbled upon a profound pattern in productive writers: Some content creators are more prolific than others by a large extent, and the common thing they have is they take notes.īest selling author Ryan Holiday takes a lot of notes - that was one “secret” that made him a prolific writer. (in that order)Įver since college, note-taking didn’t make sense…until I wanted to become a better writer myself. “What really is the point of note-taking?” Started doing knowledge work that I started asking the same question again: Some people think I am, but they’ve got it all wrong - I used Anki in place of note-taking, that’s why.

It was tremendous freedom! I didn’t know you could score high on exams without even copying a word from a single slide. I stopped taking them religiously, at least. In that case, though, I’d rather use superior methods like Spaced Repetition and Method of Loci.Īnd so in college, I stopped taking notes. You might say we take notes “for better retention”, but I, too, thought retention was the goal of note-taking. You know what I mean - you take borderline legible notes, get them checked, and then get a “good job” for all the hand cramps. I’ve always thought note-taking was wasteful ever since I was in grade school. I mean, our notes don’t even get returned to. “ Why do we take notes in the first place?”Īsking that question more often. After reading this, make sure you implement what you learned, and then check out the “Further Readings” section. But, I do think this will help you understand the Zettelkasten Method (the how part) better if you’re a beginner. By no means is this guide perfect, nor am I trying to imply that this is the only way to do it. Author’s Note: This is the Zettelkasten guide I wish existed when I started.

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