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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Tiago Forte
Read between
May 30, 2023 - April 6, 2024
Making the shift to working in terms of Intermediate Packets unlocks several very powerful benefits.
First, you’ll become interruption-proof because you are focusing only on one small packet at a time, instead of trying to load up the entire project into your mind at once.
Second, you’ll be able to make progress in any span of time.
Third, Intermediate Packets increase the quality of your work by allowing you to collect feedback more often.
Fourth, and best of all, eventually you’ll have so many IPs at your disposal that you can execute entire projects just by assembling previously created IPs.
Our creativity thrives on examples. When we have a template to fill in, our ideas are channeled into useful forms instead of splattered around haphazardly. There are best practices and plentiful models for almost anything you might want to make.
The Express step is where we practice and hone our ability to retrieve what we need, when we need it. It’s the step where we build the confidence that our Second Brain is working for us.
This inherent unpredictability means that there is no single, perfectly reliable retrieval system for the ideas contained in your notes. Instead, there are four methods for retrieval that overlap and complement one another. Together they are more powerful than any computer yet more flexible than any human mind. You can step through them in order until you find what you’re looking for. Those four retrieval methods are: Search Browsing Tags Serendipity
Retrieval Method #1: Search
If you don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, don’t have a preexisting folder to look through, or are interested in images or graphics, it’s time to turn to browsing.
Retrieval Method #2: Browsing
If you’ve followed the PARA system outlined in Chapter 5 to organize your notes, you already have a series of dedicated folders for each of your active projects, areas of responsibility, resources, and archives. Each of these folders is a dedicated environ...
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As powerful as search can be, studies5 have found that in many situations people strongly prefer to navigate their file systems manually, scanning for the information they’re looking for. Manual navigation gives people control over how they navigate, with folders and file names providing small contextual clues about where to look next.
It is for the unforeseen and the unexpected that tags really shine.
Retrieval Method #3: Tags
Tags are like small labels you can apply to certain notes regardless of w...
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Retrieval Method #4: Serendipity
Beyond searching, browsing, and tagging, there is a frontier of possibility that simply cannot be planned or predicted by human minds. There are moments when it feels like the stars align and a connection between ideas jumps out at you like a bolt of lightning from a blue sky. These are the moments creatives live for.
Serendipity takes a few different forms when it comes to retrieval.
First, while using the previous retrieval methods, it is a good idea to keep your focus a little broad.
Second, serendipity is amplified by visual patterns.
Third, sharing our ideas with others introduces a major element of serendipity.
Three Stages of Expressing: What Does It Look Like to Show Our Work?
Remember: Retrieve an Idea Exactly When It’s Needed
Connect: Use Notes to Tell a Bigger Story
Create: Complete Projects and Accomplish Goals Stress-Free
Whatever you are responsible for creating—whether it is documents or presentations or decisions or outcomes—your Second Brain is a vital repository of all the bits and pieces you’ll want in front of you when you sit down to focus. It is a creative environment you can step into at any time, in any place, when it’s time to make things happen.
A common myth of creativity is that of the solitary artist, working in total isolation. We are implicitly told that we must shut ourselves off from the influence of others and flesh out our masterpiece by the sweat of our brow. In my experience, this isn’t how creativity works at all. It doesn’t matter what medium you work in; sooner or later you must work with others.
It is by sharing our ideas with other people that we discover which ones represent our most valuable expertise.
The CODE Method is based on an important aspect of creativity: that it is always a remix of existing parts. We all stand on the shoulders of our predecessors. No one creates anything out of a pure void.
Giving credit where credit is due doesn’t lessen the value of your contribution—it increases it. Having a Second Brain where all your sources are clearly documented will make it much easier to track them down and include those citations in the finished version.
To truly “know” something, it’s not enough to read about it in a book. Ideas are merely thoughts until you put them into action.
We learn by making concrete things—before we feel ready, before we have it completely figured out, and before we know where it’s going.
You have to value your ideas enough to share them. You have to believe that the smallest idea has the potential to change people’s lives. If you don’t believe that now, start with the smallest project you can think of to begin to prove to yourself that your ideas can make a difference.
All the steps of the CODE Method are designed to do one thing: to help you put your digital tools to work for you so that your human, fallible, endlessly creative first brain can do what it does best. Imagine. Invent. Innovate. Create.
One of the most important patterns that underlies the creative process is called “divergence and convergence.”
A creative endeavor begins with an act of divergence. You open the space of possibilities and consider as many options as possible.
The purpose of divergence is to generate new ideas, so the process is necessarily spontaneous, chaotic, and messy. You can’t fully plan or organize what you’re doing in divergence mode, and you shouldn’t try. This is the time to wander.
Convergence forces us to eliminate options, make trade-offs, and decide what is truly essential. It is about narrowing the range of possibilities so that you can make forward progress and end up with a final result you are proud of. Convergence allows our work to take on a life of its own and become something separate from ourselves.
If we overlay the four steps of CODE onto the model of divergence and convergence, we arrive at a powerful template for the creative process in our time. The first two steps of CODE, Capture and Organize, make up divergence. They are about gathering seeds of imagination carried on the wind and storing them in a secure place. This is where you research, explore, and add ideas. The final two steps, Distill and Express, are about convergence. They help us shut the door to new ideas and begin constructing something new out of the knowledge building blocks we’ve assembled.
There are three powerful strategies for completing creative projects I recommend to help you through the pitfalls of convergence. Each of them depends on having a Second Brain where you can manipulate and shape information without worrying it will disappear.
1. The Archipelago of Ideas: Give Yourself Stepping-Stones
To create an Archipelago of Ideas, you divergently gather a group of ideas, sources, or points that will form the backbone of your essay, presentation, or deliverable. Once you have a critical mass of ideas to work with, you switch decisively into convergence mode and link them together in an order that makes sense.
An Archipelago of Ideas separates the two activities your brain has the most difficulty performing at the same time: choosing ideas (known as selection) and arranging them into a logical flow (known as sequencing).
2. The Hemingway Bridge: Use Yesterday’s Momentum Today
Besides his prolific works, Hemingway was known for a particular writing strategy, which I call the “Hemingway Bridge.”2 He would always end a writing session only when he knew what came next in the story. Instead of exhausting every last idea and bit of energy, he would stop when the next plot point became clear. This meant that the next time he sat down to work on his story, he knew exactly where to start. He built himself a bridge to the next day, using today’s energy and momentum to fuel tomorrow’s writing.IV
How do you create a Hemingway Bridge? Instead of burning through every last ounce of energy at the end of a work session, reserve the last few minutes to write down some of the following kinds of things in your digital notes: Write down ideas for next steps: At the end of a work session, write down what you think the next steps could be for the next one. Write down the current status: This could include your current biggest challenge, most important open question, or future roadblocks you expect. Write down any details you have in mind that are likely to be forgotten once you step away: Such
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3. Dial Down the Scope: Ship Something Small and Concrete
That doesn’t mean you have to throw away those parts. One of the best uses for a Second Brain is to collect and save the scraps on the cutting-room floor in case they can be used elsewhere.
Dialing Down the Scope is a way of short-circuiting that paradox and testing the waters with something small and concrete, while still protecting the fragile and tentative edges of your work.
