How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day

by Michael J. Gelb

Leonardo da Vinci carried a notebook with him at all times so that he could jot down ideas, impressions, and observations as they occurred. His notebooks (seven thousand pages exist; most scholars estimate that this is about one half of the amount he left to Francesco Melzi in his will) contained jokes and fables, the observations and thoughts of scholars he admired, personal financial records, letters, reflections on domestic problems, philosophical musings and prophecies, plans for inventions, and treatises on anatomy, botany, geology, flight, water, and painting.

Although he expressed an intention to organize and publish them someday, he never got around to it. He was too busy searching for truth and beauty. For Da Vinci, the process of recording questions, observations, and ideas was of great importance. “This is to be a collection without order, taken from many papers, which I have copied here, hoping afterwards to arrange them according to the subjects of which they treat; and I believe that I shall have to repeat the same thing several times; for which, O reader, blame me not …” — FROM THE FRONT PAGE OF ONE OF LEONARDO’S MANUSCRIPTS ON PHYSICS You can, like Leonardo, facilitate Curiosità by keeping a notebook or journal.