The goal of Zettelkasten
To use zettelkasten is to write, to generate, and to produce. It is a process of understanding and internalization.
The motivation of using Zettelkasten
Learning is hard – we have to go through all these process (taking notes, writing comments, summarizes) – compared to doing nothing.
The process of Zettelkasten
Fleeting notes: Collecting what you find interesting or important is the very beginning of the information funnel. It is the building block that paves our way to find useful information later. So it is important to make it:
- enjoyable and frictionless
- comprehensive but not too ambitious
Literature notes: Re-writing is the first step of internalizing what you read, and it also reinforces this idea of producing outputs while encourages you to find, extract and summarize important or interesting ideas. It can be seen as a teaching process where you are the teacher and you are trying to explain an idea or a concept to your students. ^81e096
Re-writing can take several rounds so that you ends up with the absolute important ones. (Zettelkasten should not be a brain dump nor any dump)
To think associatively is the second step in building your zettelkasten. It helps us make connections between isolated ideas and further inspires new ideas. We are essentially putting bricks into walls!
Permanent notes: one idea per note that emerges while you going through your [[]]❌.