# Building a Second Brain  ## Metadata - Author: [[Tiago Forte]] - Full Title: Building a Second Brain - Category: #books ## Highlights - I’ll show you how this simple habit is the first step in a system I’ve developed called Building a Second Brain, which draws on recent advancements in the field of PKM—or personal knowledge management.* ([Location 63](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=63)) - Save your best thinking so you don’t have to do it again. ([Location 71](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=71)) - Spend less time looking for things, and more time doing the best, most creative work you are capable of. ([Location 75](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=75)) - Like a personal library in your pocket, a Second Brain enables you to recall everything you might want to remember so you can achieve anything you desire. ([Location 83](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=83)) - Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them. —David Allen, author of Getting Things Done ([Location 111](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=111)) - Human capital includes “the knowledge and the knowhow embodied in humans—their education, their experience, their wisdom, their skills, their relationships, their common sense, their intuition.” ([Location 188](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=188)) - In other words, we go to work five days per week, but spend more than one of those days on average just looking for the information we need to do our work. Half the time, we don’t even succeed in doing that. ([Location 246](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=246)) - Every bit of energy we spend straining to recall things is energy not spent doing the thinking that only humans can do: inventing new things, crafting stories, recognizing patterns, following our intuition, collaborating with others, investigating new subjects, making plans, testing theories. ([Location 251](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=251)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - Commonplace books were a portal through which educated people interacted with the world. They drew on their notebooks in conversation and used them to connect bits of knowledge from different sources and to inspire their own thinking. ([Location 272](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=272)) - Once our notes and observations become digital, they can be searched, organized and synced across all our devices, and backed up to the cloud for safekeeping. ([Location 283](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=283)) - In past centuries, only the intellectual elite needed commonplace books—writers, politicians, philosophers, and scientists who had a reason to synthesize their writing or research. ([Location 302](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=302)) - Learning was treated as essentially disposable, with no intention of that knowledge being useful for the long term. ([Location 312](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=312)) - No one tells you when or how your notes will be used. ([Location 316](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=316)) - 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. ([Location 320](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=320)) - The length and format don’t matter—if a piece of content has been interpreted through your lens, curated according to your taste, translated into your own words, or drawn from your life experience, and stored in a secure place, then it qualifies as a note. ([Location 324](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=324)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - You start to see recurring patterns in your thinking: why you do things, what you really want, and what’s really important to you. Your Second Brain becomes like a mirror, teaching you about yourself and reflecting back to you the ideas worth keeping and acting on. ([Location 394](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=394)) - 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. ([Location 457](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=457)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - Digital notes aren’t physical, but they are visual. They turn vague concepts into tangible entities that can be observed, rearranged, edited, and combined together. ([Location 475](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=475)) - “Creative people are better at recognizing relationships, making associations and connections.” ([Location 483](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=483)) - This tendency is known as recency bias.4 We tend to favor the ideas, solutions, and influences that occurred to us most recently, regardless of whether they are the best ones. ([Location 497](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=497)) - It is a calmer, more sustainable approach to creativity that relies on the gradual accumulation of ideas, instead of all-out binges of manic hustle. ([Location 502](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=502)) - the jobs that are most likely to stick around are those that involve promoting or defending a particular perspective. ([Location 510](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=510)) - our ability to advance a particular point of view and persuade others to adopt it as well. ([Location 513](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=513)) - “It’s not that I’m blocked. It’s that I don’t have enough research to write with power and knowledge about that topic. It always means, not that I can’t find the right words, [but rather] that I don’t have the ammunition.” ([Location 517](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=517)) - While your Second Brain is made up of all the tools you use to interact with information, including a to-do list, a calendar, email, and reading apps, for example, there is one category of software I recommend as the centerpiece of your Second Brain: a digital notetaking app. ([Location 525](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=525)) - a notes app can store a wide variety of different kinds of content in one place, so you never need to wonder where to put something. ([Location 532](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=532)) - Notes are inherently messy, so there’s no need for perfect spelling or polished presentation. ([Location 533](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=533)) - notes are ideal for free-form exploration before you have a goal in mind. ([Location 537](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=537)) - notes don’t need to be comprehensive or precise. They are designed to help you quickly capture stray thoughts ([Location 539](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=539)) - As people set out on their Second Brain journey, there are three stages of progress I often observe—and even encourage. Those stages are remembering, connecting, and creating. ([Location 555](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=555)) - The first way that people tend to use their Second Brain is as a memory aid. ([Location 558](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=558)) - The second way that people use their Second Brain is to connect ideas together. ([Location 564](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=564)) - Eventually, the third and final way that people use their Second Brain is for creating new things. They realize that they have a lot of knowledge on a subject and decide to turn it into something concrete and shareable. ([Location 571](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=571)) - “CODE”—Capture; Organize; Distill; Express. ([Location 584](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=584)) - We need to adopt the perspective of a curator, stepping back from the raging river and starting to make intentional decisions about what information we want to fill our minds. ([Location 602](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=602)) - The solution is to keep only what resonates in a trusted place that you control, ([Location 609](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=609)) - The best way to organize your notes is to organize for action, according to the active projects you are working on right now. Consider new information in terms of its utility, asking, “How is this going to help me move forward one of my current projects?” ([Location 627](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=627)) - when you focus on taking action, the vast amount of information out there gets radically streamlined and simplified. ([Location 629](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=629)) - Every note is the seed of an idea, reminding you of what you already know and already think about a topic. ([Location 639](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=639)) - Every idea has an “essence”: the heart and soul of what it is trying to communicate. It might take hundreds of pages and thousands of words to fully explain a complex insight, but there is always a way to convey the core message in just a sentence or two. ([Location 641](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=641)) - Every time you take a note, ask yourself, “How can I make this as useful as possible for my future self?” That question will lead you to annotate the words and phrases that explain why you saved a note, what you were thinking, and what exactly caught your attention. ([Location 649](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=649)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - Think of yourself not just as a taker of notes, but as a giver of notes—you are giving your future self the gift of knowledge that is easy to find and understand. ([Location 652](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=652)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - A common challenge for people who are curious and love to learn is that we can fall into the habit of continuously force-feeding ourselves more and more information, but never actually take the next step and apply it. ([Location 659](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=659)) - Information becomes knowledge—personal, embodied, verified—only when we put it to use. ([Location 665](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=665)) - All these actions—evaluate, share, teach, record, post, and lobby*—are synonyms for the act of expression. ([Location 675](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=675)) ### Capture—Keep What Resonates - You are what you consume, and that applies just as much to information as to nutrition. ([Location 719](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=719)) - Think of it as planting your own “knowledge garden” where you are free to cultivate your ideas and develop your own thinking away from the deafening noise of other people’s opinions. ([Location 721](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=721)) #### Building a Private Collection of Knowledge #### Creating a Knowledge Bank: How to Generate Compounding Interest from Your Thoughts - knowledge most often shows up as “content”—snippets of text, screenshots, bookmarked articles, podcasts, or other kinds of media. ([Location 778](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=778)) - Knowledge assets can come from either the external world or your inner thoughts. ([Location 789](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=789)) #### What Not to Keep - there are four kinds of content that aren’t well suited to notes apps: ([Location 816](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=816)) - Note: Don't include: sensitive information, specialized formats, large files or collaborative files. #### Twelve Favorite Problems: A Nobel Prize Winner’s Approach to Capturing - You have to keep a dozen of your favorite problems constantly present in your mind, although by and large they will lay in a dormant state. Every time you hear or read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of your twelve problems to see whether it helps. Every once in a while there will be a hit, and people will say, “How did he do it? He must be a genius!” ([Location 840](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=840)) - He posed questions and constantly scanned for solutions to long-standing problems in his reading, conversations, and everyday life. ([Location 858](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=858)) - Ask yourself, “What are the questions I’ve always been interested in?” This could include grand, sweeping questions ([Location 860](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=860)) - The key to this exercise is to make them open-ended questions that don’t necessarily have a single answer. To find questions that invoke a state of wonder and curiosity about the amazing world we live in. ([Location 875](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=875)) - The goal isn’t to definitively answer the question once and for all, but to use the question as a North Star for my learning. ([Location 887](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=887)) - Use your list of favorite problems to make decisions about what to capture: anything potentially relevant to answering them. ([Location 895](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=895)) - Second Brain Resource Guide at Buildingasecondbrain.com/resources ([Location 896](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=896)) #### Capture Criteria: How to Avoid Keeping Too Much (or Too Little) - realizing that in any piece of content, the value is not evenly distributed. There are always certain parts that are especially interesting, helpful, or valuable to you. ([Location 909](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=909)) - There is a way to evoke a sense of inspiration more regularly: keep a collection of inspiring quotes, photos, ideas, and stories. Any time you need a break, a new perspective, or a dash of motivation, you can look through it and see what sparks your imagination. ([Location 925](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=925)) - Sometimes you come across a piece of information that isn’t necessarily inspiring, but you know it might come in handy in the future. A statistic, a reference, a research finding, or a helpful diagram—these are the equivalents of the spare parts a carpenter might keep around their workshop. ([Location 933](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=933)) - a simple definition for “information”: that which surprises you.7 If you’re not surprised, then you already knew it at some level, so why take note of it? ([Location 949](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=949)) - “emotions organize—rather than disrupt—rational thinking.”8 When something resonates with us, it is our emotion-based, intuitive mind telling us it is interesting before our logical mind can explain why. ([Location 973](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B09MDNDYYF&location=973)) - Tags: [[favorite]]