You’ve probably come across great works that have inspired you and left you wondering how the author came up with the idea. You may have even thought to yourself that the very person who had the idea seems like a regular person just like you. That person just had a smarter system of collecting the greatness that lead to their contribution.
One of our limitations as humans is how much memory we have in our heads. It’s especially harder on our short term memories to remember things like quotes from books, diagrams in papers, and more. Our long term memories tend to give us a pointer to where we remember seeing these things, but often it’s not very helpful or we come up a bit short in the retrieval process.
Out of Mind
So sadly, having everything in your head is not enough, as getting it down on paper is the harder part. That is why one of the most important skills in life is being able to take good notes. Think of it another way, having something already written and then using your mind to make the connections or discoveries is infinitely easier and faster than doing this all in your head.
It doesn’t matter if you are gifted enough with a photogenic memory or competed in the world’s memory championship, what really matters is what you do. You can do things in smart ways which can lead to success.
There is no need to build a complex system to do this nor the need to reorganize everything you already have. Rather you can start to utilize your ideas in a way where you take smarter notes and organize them to be easier to retrieve.
Enter the Slip-Box
One way to do this is by creating a slip-box (Zettelkasten) in which you can improve the connectivity of your thoughts, be more productive, waste less time, and tackle more complex problems all in one.
Each note is organized with a unique identifier, the contents, and references. As your slip-box grows in size, so does the many strings that attach to other references does. This starts to create what most people refer to as a “second brain” that you can use with modern tools like rich keyword search, nested hyperlinks to references, and more.
In other words, you’re creating the typical police detective “crazy wall”:
Examples of Slip-Boxes
- Ryan Holiday uses notecards to write new books.
- Tiago Forte teaches the importance of building a second brain.
- Ali Abdaal writes book notes to remember what he reads.
- Derek Sivers writes book summaries of all the books he’s read.
Ways to Make Your Own
There are many ways to create your own slip-box. The first choice you have to make is whether you will create a slip-box in a physical or digital fashion. Next, you’ll need to choose the context around your slip-box. Will this be just for book notes? Will it be for everything? Sometimes it makes sense to create individual slip-boxes. For example, it makes sense to create a slip-box when learning a challenging skill like programming as there are many technical references, terminology, and resources you may use and regularly revisit.
One of my favorite ways to create a physical slip-box is to buy a notecard holder online that can store a good amount of index cards. These boxes are about the size of a shoe box and help you become a bit more attached to the physical process of curating your notes.
Some of my favorite apps to create a digital slip-box is using notion, evernote, or obsidian. The app isn’t really the important part here, but rather just having the basic functionality of being able to uniquely store information, nest references, and link to other pages.
Build Your Second Brain
To collect greatness, you have to start creating your second brain. The work that you put into curating, organizing, and regularly contributing to your second brain will not be wasted. You’ll be able to think more clearly and connect ideas elegantly. You’ll be sitting on a mountain of greatness before no-time and be able to create amazing things with it.