Day 3: How to suck at storing notes

Photo by Patrick Perkins on Unsplash

I love learning about notes and how to keep them in a nice and tidy way. 📝

To be honest, I didn’t know I cared about any of this until I heard a podcast with Tiago Forte and found his PARA method. This was way back in 2020 — the pandemic days!

My journey with this system is quite a rollercoaster. These are the phases I went through:

1. I stored notes all over the place. Didn’t have one particular system or organisation method. I guess we’re all here.
2. Tiago Forte is my god and my notes are his tribute. This didn’t last long…
3. Zettelkasten! Notes backlinking!! A visual graph representation of your second brain!!! 🤯 The idea is so much better than the execution!
4. I’m too old for this s**t. Why am I really storing all of these notes? Let’s go back to Apple notes.

So… A couple of years have passed, no more breadmaking or washing every supermarket item that went through the door, and I’ve gone through Apple Notes, Notion, Obsidian, Roam, etc.

I’ve tried backlinking, naming conventions and tagging.

I’ve done my Projects, Areas, Resources and Archives.

At the end of the day, this complex, yet beautiful system, isn’t for me.

I’m always reminded of Tiago Forte saying that this system is not for everyone and he’s right. I’m glad to have tried and failed. It was a fun ride.

So, if you want to go down the rabbit hole and learn more about note-keeping, these are the top 3 resources I would recommend:

• Read This Book: “Building a Second Brain” by Tiago Forte as it will give you everything you need to keep a strong long-lasting system if you’re the chosen one!
• Read This Article: “The PARA Method: The Simple System for Organizing Your Digital Life in Seconds” also by Tiago Forte is a great quick introduction to his system.
• Watch This Video: “The Second-Brain — A Life Changing Productivity System” by Ali Abdaal is a good way of getting to know the system from someone implementing it.

Even if you try and find that this is not for you, I can assure you, it’s a hell of a journey to go through.