How to Take Smart Notes

by Sönke Ahrens

Learning would be not so much about saving information, like on a hard disk, but about building connections and bridges between pieces of information to circumvent the inhibition mechanism in the right moment.

It is about making sure that the right “cues” trigger the right memory, about how we can think strategically to remember the most useful information when we need it.

the vast majority of all learning still aims to improve “storage strength,” even though it cannot be improved. It is still mostly about remembering isolated facts and not so much about building connections.

If we instead focus on “retrieval strength,” we instantly start to think strategically about what kind of cues should trigger the retrieval of a memory.

useful learning is to connect a piece of information to as many meaningful contexts as possible, which is what we do when we connect our notes in the slip-box with other notes.

Learned right, which means understanding, which means connecting in a meaningful way to previous knowledge, information almost cannot be forgotten anymore and will be reliably retrieved if triggered by the right cues.

1. Add a note to the slip-box

2. Add links to other notes

Ideally, new notes are written with explicit reference to already existing notes.

An initial subsequence that attracts more and more follow-up notes can easily become a main topic with many subtopics over time

note sequences are the backbone of text development. They combine the advantages of an abstract with a topic-related order.

A pure topic-related order would have to be organised top down and requires a hierarchical order up front.

A pure abstract order would not allow idea clusters and topics to be built bottom up. The individual notes would stay mostly independent and isol...

The note sequences are the clusters where order emerges from complexity. We extract information from different linear sources and mix it all up and shake it until new patterns emerge. Then, we form these patterns into new linear texts.

A few wisely chosen notes are sufficient for each entry point. The quicker we get from the index to the concrete notes, the quicker we move our attention from mentally preconceived ideas towards the fact-rich level of interconnected content, where we can conduct a fact-based dialogue with the slip-box.

because the structure of topics and subtopics is not a given, but the outcome of our thinking, they too are subject to ongoing considerations and alteration.

Every consideration on the structure of a topic is just another consideration on a note – bound to change and dependent on the development of our understanding.

The archivist asks: Which keyword is the most fitting? A writer asks: In which circumstances will I want to stumble upon this note, even if I forget about it? It is a crucial difference.

Keywords should always be assigned with an eye towards the topics you are working on or interested in, never by looking at the note in isolation.

Assigning keywords is much more than just a bureaucratic act. It is a crucial part of the thinking process, which often leads to a deeper elaboration of the note itself and the connection to other notes.

The first type of links are those on notes that are giving you the overview of a topic. These are notes directly referred to from the index and usually used as an entry point into a topic that has already developed to such a degree that an overview is needed or at least becomes helpful. On a note like this, you can collect links to other relevant notes to this topic

The most common form of reference is plain note-to-note links. They have no function other than indicating a relevant connection between two individual notes.

These links can help us to find surprising connections and similarities between seemingly unrelated topics. Patterns might not become visible right away, but they might emerge after multiple note-to-note links between two topics have been established.

The search for meaningful connections is a crucial part of the thinking process towards the finished manuscript. But here, it is dealt with in a very concrete way. Instead of figuratively searching our internal memory, we literally go through the file-box and look for connections.

As we are making these connections, we build up an internal structure of the slip-box, which is shaped by our thinking.

the confrontation with old notes helps to detect differences we wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.

The clarification of differences in the use of words and concepts is a major part of every serious academic work anyway – but it is so much easier if you have a nit-picking partner like the slip-box.

Comparing notes also helps us to detect contradictions, paradoxes or oppositions – important facilitators for insight.

looking out for the most powerful concepts in every discipline and to try to understand them so thoroughly that they become part of our thinking. The moment one starts to combine these mental models and attach one’s experiences to them, one cannot help but gain what he calls “worldly wisdom.”

You’ve got to hang experience on a latticework of models in your head.” (Munger 1994).

when we try to make sense of something, combine different ideas and develop lines of thought, we do exactly that: we build up a “latticework of mental models” instead of just “remembering isolated facts and try and bang ’em back.”

If we practice learning not as a pure accumulation of knowledge, but as an attempt to build up a latticework of theories and mental models to which information can stick, we enter a virtuous circle where learning facilitates learning.

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something.” (Steve Jobs)

intuition is not the opposition to rationality and knowledge, it is rather the incorporated, practical side of our intellectual endeavours, the sedimented experience on which we build our conscious, explicit knowledge (cf. Ahrens 2014).

To have concrete notes in front of our eyes and be able to compare them directly makes differences, even small ones, much easier to spot. (This is an advantage of the original paper slip-box, as you can spread out multiple notes on a desk instead of just seeing them on a computer screen.)

thinking works so much better when we have the very things we think about in front of our eyes. It is in our nature.

Comparing, differentiating and connecting notes are the basis of good academic writing, but playing and tinkering with ideas is what leads to insight and exceptional texts.

Being able to abstract and re-specify ideas is, again, only one side of the equation. It is not good for anything if we don’t have a system in place that allows us to put this into practice. Here, it is the concrete standardization of notes in just one format that enables us to literally shuffle them around, to add one idea to multiple contexts and to compare and combine them in a creative way without losing sight of what they truly contain.

Most often, the crucial step forward is to redefine the problem in such a way that an already existing solution can be employed. The first question should always be directed towards the question itself: What kind of answer can you expect from asking a question in this particular way? What is missing?

We can make it a habit to always think about what is missing when we write down our own ideas.

And we can practice asking good questions when we sort our notes into the slip-box and connect them with other notes.

we also restrict ourselves to just one idea per note and force ourselves to be as precise and brief as possible. The restriction to one idea per note is also the precondition to recombine them freely later.

Without structure, we cannot differentiate, compare or experiment with ideas. Without restrictions, we would never be forced to make the decision on what is worth pursuing and what is not.

Indifference is the worst environment for insight. And the slip-box is, above all, a tool for enforcing distinctions, decisions and making differences visible.

writing is nothing more than the revision of a rough draft, which is nothing more than turning a series of notes into a continuous text, which are written on a day-to-day basis, connected and indexed in the slip-box,

we who have already accompanied our studies by writing and collecting notes in a smart way simply don’t have the need for brainstorming anymore.

We constantly make explicit how ideas and information connect with each other and turn them into literal connections between our notes. By doing this, we develop visible clusters of ideas that are now ready to be turned into manuscripts.

The process is self-reinforcing. A visibly developed cluster attracts more ideas and provides more possible connections, which in return influence our choices on what to read and think further. They become signposts for our daily work and orient us to what is worth thinking about.

When it comes to finding good questions, it is therefore not enough to think about it. We have to do something with an idea before we know enough about it to make a good judgement. We have to work, write, connect, differentiate, complement and elaborate on questions – but this is what we do when we take smart notes.

Developing topics and questions from what we have has a huge advantage. The ideas we decide on are not taken out of thin air, but are already embedded in a content-rich context and come with material that we can use.