Building a Second Brain: A Proven Method to Organise Your Digital Life and Unlock Your Creative Potential

by Tiago Forte

Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them. —David Allen, author of Getting Things Done

the value of physical capital in the US—land, machinery, and buildings for example—is about $10 trillion, but that value is dwarfed by the total value of human capital, which is estimated to be five to ten times larger. 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.”1

My experience managing my chronic

condition had taught me a way of getting organized that was ideal for solving problems and producing results now, not in some far-off future.

Information is the fundamental building block of everything you do.

Information Overload has become Information Exhaustion, taxing our mental resources and leaving us constantly anxious that we’re forgetting something.

This digital commonplace book is what I call a Second Brain. Think of it as the combination of a study notebook, a personal journal, and a sketchbook

It is in the power of remembering that the self’s ultimate freedom consists. I am free because I remember.

Projects: Short-term efforts in your work or life that you’re working on now. Areas: Long-term responsibilities you want to manage over time. Resources: Topics or interests that may be useful in the future. Archives: Inactive items from the other three categories.