Building a Second Brain

For modern, professional notetaking, a note is a “knowledge building block”—a discrete unit of information interpreted through your unique perspective and stored outside your head.

There are four essential capabilities that we can rely on a Second Brain to perform for us: Making our ideas concrete. Revealing new associations between ideas. Incubating our ideas over time. Sharpening our unique perspectives.

The solution is to keep only what resonates in a trusted place that you control, and to leave the rest aside.

Our notes are things to use, not just things to collect.

Organizing by project is the most natural way to manage information with minimal effort—why not make it the default?

The best curators are picky about what they allow into their collections. Thinking like a curator means taking charge of your own information stream, instead of just letting it wash over you.

Thinking doesn't just produce writing; writing also enriches thinking.

The moment you first encounter an idea is the worst time to decide what it means. You need to set it aside and gain some objectivity.

If you can’t locate a piece of information quickly... you might as well not have it at all.

Distilling makes our ideas small and compact, so we can load them up into our minds with minimal effort.

Progressive Summarization is not a method for remembering as much as possible—it is a method for forgetting as much as possible.

Knowledge is the only resource that gets better and more valuable the more it multiplies.

It's not about having the perfect tools—it's about having a reliable set of tools you can depend on.

When you transform your relationship to information, technology becomes not just a storage medium but a tool for thinking.

A knowledge asset is anything that can be used in the future to solve a problem, save time, illuminate a concept, or learn from past experience.

Thinking small is the best way to elevate your horizons and expand your ambitions.

There is a cost to your sleep, your peace of mind, and your time with family when the full burden of constantly coming up with good ideas rests solely on your fickle biological brain.

Getting feedback is really about borrowing someone else’s eyes to see what only a novice can see.

Instead of thinking of your job in terms of tasks... start to think in terms of assets and building blocks that you can assemble.

When we are organized and efficient, that creates space for creativity to arise.

Your attention, like money, can grow and compound over time.

We have to remember that we are not building an encyclopedia of immaculately organized knowledge. We are building a working system.

Self-expression is as vital to our survival as food or shelter. With mere words, you can open doors to unimaginable horizons for the people around you.