# Arrêtez d'Oublier ce que vous Lisez - Author(s): [[Eliott Meunier]] - Link: https://www.editions-eyrolles.com/Livre/9782416006807/arretez-d-oublier-ce-que-vous-lisez ![[Arretez d'oublier ce que vous lisez (book).jpg|200]] ## Brief description Stop forgetting what you read. Memorize better and retain information longer. The goal is to: - Manage your information streams - Organize your knowledge so that it supports your life, your projects, your work How to achieve it? By embracing the [[Atomic Thinking]] approach. ## Introduction ### The Four Periods of Attention During the industrial era, people mostly exchanged their time for money. Now, we're in the era of the [[Attention economy]]. Revenue has more and more potential to be disconnected from the work time and efforts. Revenue is instead correlated to the number of eyeballs you manage to expose your content and ideas to, and of course, to their perceived value. Thus, [[Capturing attention creates leverage]] The value of attention has evolved a lot recently. Cfr [[Evolution of the value of attention]]. In the distant past, information was rare and difficult to access. It had immense value. At that time, others were mostly interested in people's time and labor, not their attention. With the rise of the World Wide Web, information has become infinitely cheaper, and [[Information Overload]] has become a thing, and is even ruining people's lives. As a result, information is much less valuable. Meanwhile, our attention is limited, and now has much more value. Everyone wants our attention to sell us goods and services, directly, or indirectly. The more competition there is to grab our attention, the more valuable it becomes. ### Types of Attention 1. [[Directed attention]]: linked to internal goals 2. [[Stimulated attention]]: linked to external stimuli Cfr [[Attention types]]. Directed attention is studied by cognitive sciences, to help us understand how we function, and how to change our behavior. Stimulated attention is studied by marketing, to "steal" our attention, and influence us to buy products or services. ### People need help The problem is that [[Most people don't value their attention and their time nearly enough. They sell themselves cheaply]]. People need help. They need to regain control and ownership of their time and attention. And it starts with the realization that attention is indeed highly valuable. [[When you lose your control of your attention, you lose your time, your most precious asset]]. ### People need new perspectives People also need new perspectives. They need to take more distance from the information they consume. They need to create space for critical thinking. ### The Challenges of attention Cfr [[The challenges of attention]]. Three different stages can be considered: 1. Manage your [[Directed attention]] - Free more time to read/learn - Better select your information sources - Read smarter - Retain more 2. Manage your knowledge - Invest in your cognitive potential - Create new perspectives for yourself and others - Develop your own system 3. Learn to capture and leverage attention ### Everyone is a creator Most people don't want to think of themselves as creators, but [[We are all creators]]. We all create content in various contexts. ### Why you should have a Personal Knowledge Management System Eliott makes an interesting analogy between content creation and mountain climbing. When you're in front of a blank page, it's the same as being in front of the mountain. Without a [[Personal Knowledge Management (PKM)]] system, you have to climb it all without any external help. Of course you can use search engines and AI, but those won't think for you. Sadly, the climb is sometimes too hard, and people give up. When you have a Personal Knowledge Management System at your disposal, you have a treasure trove of ideas, content and knowledge to repurpose and reuse. And its value compounds over time. Instead of starting new projects from scratch, you leverage the information and knowledge you've accumulated, helping you achieve your goals more efficiently. ### Building a Personal Knowledge Management System To build a valuable Personal Knowledge Management System, you need to adjust the way you work. As you read and learn new things, you need to take notes, and capture insights, ideas, concepts, etc. You also need to regularly review, review, and explore the ideas you've captured more deeply. If you turn that into a habit, you'll start new projects with a ton of knowledge and wisdom at your disposal. Taking notes should become an integral part of your work. It's not a separate activity. It's part of it. You need to read, listen, watch, observe, and think with a pen in your hand. Going back to the mountain climbing analogy, you'll have a much easier time to get to the top if you have a system to assist and support you. ### Atomic Thinking System overview Eliott shared the high-level summary of his [[Atomic Thinking]] system. It includes multiple steps: - Select: Picking the right content to consume - Capture: Take notes, capture ideas/knowledge/concepts, ... - Deconstruct: Identify and extract underlying concepts. Start from [[First principle]] and extract atomic ideas (cfr [[Atomic notes]]) - Emergence: Order and assemble ideas to develop new ones - Improve overall quality - Organize: Become more effective and efficient by having a solid organization system ### Permanent notes should be portable, independent and atomic Permanent notes need to be: - **Portable**: Each note should contain a single concept or idea that you can reuse and assemble in different concepts (e.g., the [[Pareto Principle]]) - **Independent**: Each note should stand on its own. Links to/from other notes should generally only be about going further and exploring related/supporting ideas - **Atomic**: Notes should be connected to other ones (cfr [[Atomic notes]]) By starting from first principles, creating atomic notes, and thinking in systems, we can combine ideas and elaborate those to form more complex ones. ### How to create better notes We can ask ourselves various questions to help us improve our notes: - What can I do with this idea? - What attracts me to this idea? - What other ideas does this one validate? - What other ideas does this contradict? - Could this idea change by taking a different point of view? - How does this note explain other ones in my system? Cfr [[How to create better atomic notes]] ### The Return On Investment of PKM Are note-taking and [[Personal Knowledge Management (PKM)]] devoid of value? Of course not. But we do few people see it? Why do so many people give it up so quickly? In my opinion, it's because the Return On Investment (ROI) of PKM is delayed. When people start, they generally have very few (if any) notes, and those are not necessarily connected. Thus, their system has little value, and can't be leveraged. It takes a while to reach a critical mass of notes and connections. And it's only when that critical mass has been reached that the system starts creating leverage and actually feels valuable. Unfortunately, few people get to that point. You need to consider Personal Knowledge Management like investing. If you buy a new videogame, then you have an instant reward, but zero long-term value. On the other hand, if you keep investing money (e.g., into Index funds), the value will compound, you'll build wealth and you'll create leverage. The same is true for your [[Knowledge Graph (KG)]]. Amass valuable knowledge, inspiration and ideas, and it will compound. If you write 3 notes a day, you could have >1K within a year ### Going from consumption to production Cfr [[How to go from information consumption to Personal Knowledge Management]]. Assuming that you have an inbox for your inspiration, you can fill it with carefully selected, interesting and valuable things. Then, you can go through that inbox to consume timely, relevant, and useful information. While you consume the pieces you have carefully handpicked, you can highlight the juicy parts and take notes using your own words (just like I have done here with Eliott's book). Those highlights and notes can then become part of your personal knowledge base, also called a [[Personal Knowledge Graph (PKG)]]. Then, you can deconstruct those, extract the core ideas, first principles and concepts into valuable [[Atomic notes]]. Once you start connecting those with the rest of your knowledge, you'll strengthen your whole knowledge base, creating more and more leverage for yourself. ## Characteristics of a Good Personal Organization System ### Overview A solid system can propel you forward. It creates leverage. [[A great artist with a bad system can be beaten by a mediocre artist with a good one]] There are four key principles to create a good Personal Organization System: - It should feel safe to use (i.e., you trust your system) - It should be holistic - It should be simple - The structure is not a plan ### It should feel safe to use Your system needs to be reliable. You need to be able to trust it. It should simplify your life, allow you to forget more, and let you focus on important work. With a good system, your information should be safe, available, secure, etc. ### It should be holistic Everything should be in your system, whether you use a single app or not, analog, digital, or a mix of both. You have to think about the system as a whole. And for the whole to be reliable, the whole should be solid. Your system does not need to be perfect. Nothing is. And you shouldn't even try. Your system just needs to be useful, efficient, effortless, maintainable, and hassle-free. It should not be a source of stress. And it certainly shouldn't make your life miserable. It needs to free your mind. It should save you time, effort, and energy. ### It should be simple The structure of your system should be lean. Complexity should be seen as the enemy. It should only be introduced when there's no other way, when the benefits of adding complexity outweigh the drawbacks. The goal of the system is to maximize your chances of success. It's not to take away your time and energy, trying to create the perfect thing that you will never use. [[Complexity does not imply quality]]. The more complex and rigid a system is, the less emergence and serendipity there can be. Complexity also hinders focus and productivity. Avoid needless noise. Enforce simple rules, and remove as much complexity and friction as possible (cfr [[Choose your hard]]). ### The structure is not a plan [[Motivation comes through action]]. [[Rigid plans reduce motivation and kill creativity]]. ## Step 1: Carefully choose your sources and inputs Cfr [[How to choose your sources and inputs]]. In summary, [[Garbage in, Garbage out (GIGO)]]. Carefully choose your sources and inputs. ## Step 2: Capture ### You need a capture system Knowing [[How to choose your sources and inputs]] is only the first step. The next one consists in finding time to read the content you have selected, and to capture the interesting bits. To support you, [[You need a capture system]]. See also [[What a capture system looks like]]. ### Why take notes See: - [[Why take notes]] - [[Why take and make notes]] ### How to take notes, and what to write See [[How to take notes, and what to write down]] and [[Rules for reading]]. ## Step 3: Deconstruction Capturing information is only the first step. Once new ideas and concepts join your [[Personal Knowledge Management System (PKMS)]], you still have some work to do. Each concept now needs to be extracted into its own note and connected to other ones. That is, unless you have already created [[Atomic notes]] while capturing, as recommended earlier. Eliott highlighted two important principles: - The atomicity of ideas and the independence of each note: [[Atomic notes]] - The portability of knowledge He mentions that the brain is an association machine. It picks the most relevant set of concepts, depending on the context. By mimicking the way the brain works, and organizing knowledge as a graph of concepts (i.e., a [[Knowledge Graph (KG)]]), we can facilitate memorization, connections, etc. Deconstructing ideas into [[Atomic notes]] can be compared to human digestion. We have ingested "brain food", and need to transform it, extracting all the "vitamins" and useful "elements". Consider the fact that [[Categories are limiting]] for ideas. See also [[T Shape]]. Luckily, there are many [[Ways to locate notes]]. Further in this chapter, Eliott introduced the [[Zettelkasten method]]. Eliott considers four types of notes: - Instant notes (fleeting): capture ideas, thoughts, etc - Those are unfinished notes, temporary by definition - They need to be reviewed regularly, and either dropped or converted to literature and/or permanent notes (e.g., during [[Periodic reviews]]) - Literature notes: Raw captures of content you have consumed (need post-processing) - Those should be useful for you in the short/medium term. Those can take different forms: pure text, drawings, schemas, mind maps, highlights, or a combination of those - Ideally, those should be [[Atomic notes]] already - Permanent notes: Long-term notes. Those can evolve over time (evergreen) - Those have to be [[Atomic notes]], or you'll miss opportunities to [[Cross-pollination of ideas|cross-pollinate ideas]] - Those are timeless. They contain knowledge, wisdom, etc - Focus on timeless ideas (cfr [[Focus on memorizing timeless information]]) - Project notes: Project-related outputs. Those are only relevant/useful for a specific project. They will probably be obsolete once completed. Examples: articles, essays, task lists, plannings, meeting notes, etc The workflow being something like: - You consume content - You capture instant notes and literature notes - You create permanent notes based on your instant notes, then you delete those - You create permanent notes based on your literature notes, you keep those around, and you link to those - You develop projects, leveraging your permanent notes and literature notes More topics he explores in this chapter: - [[Characteristics of good notes]] - [[Map of Content (MoC)]] - [[Issues with old-school note-taking]] ## Step 4: Emergence and creation This part of the book focuses on growing permanent notes (cfr [[Zettelkasten method]]) from fleeting and literature notes, exploring ideas further, and creating content. Eliott makes a strong case about the fact that we are all creators in different contexts, and this is why he insists on the creation part, beyond the pure knowledge management discussion. ### Why create content and share ideas? [[Power is not taken, it is received]] [[Creating communities, sharing ideas, helping and empowering people builds trust, and social capital]]. It convinces them to trust you, and gives you power and leverage in various ways. First, people give you their purchasing power by buying your products and supporting your work. Second, they increase your reach through word-of-mouth, sharing your ideas and products with other people. It all builds trust, social capital. In addition, [[Creating content enables reaching a deeper understanding of the subject matter]]. When you create content for others, you reach a deeper understanding of the subject matter. Content creation acts as a [[Forcing function]] for learning and growing. The first drafts are de-facto exploratory. You will get to learn more about what you are explaining, because there are always gaps in our understanding, and opportunities to learn more. ### The stakes of content creation To win in the attention economy, you need to: - Attract attention - Keep it for as long as possible - Offer new and interesting perspectives Cfr [[Tips to win in the attention economy]] ### Content creation in practice [[All ideas are mashups of old ideas. Pure novelty is ultra rare]]. Cfr [[Austin Kleon]]'s [[Steal Like An Artist (book)]]. [[There's no need to focus on having original or unique ideas]]. What matters a lot more is the way you present ideas. That has to be unique. And that's actually easy, because you have a unique story, a unique perspective, personality and pedagogy. You have a unique voice, and all you need is to find it and use it. [[Assembling is creating. All ideas are associations]] ### Traps of the audience [[Learn and grow with your audience]]. Once you have an audience that trusts you, don't start acting like a know-it-all guru. Stay humble, admit your gaps in knowledge, mistakes, and failures. [[Be a perfectionist, but don't stay stuck on details]]. Iterate your way to success, and keep your focus on the end goals. Use feedback as an engine to improve. Practice, iterate, and avoid [[Analysis paralysis]]. ### Emergence Our best ideas come to us subconsciously. [[Our brain continues to work on solving the problems even when we're not paying attention]] [[Serendipity (MoC)|Serendipity]] and Emergence are important properties of a good system. Associated with a critical mass of relevant ideas, and notes, you can generate and stumble upon the ideas you need to make the progress you're after. You need to observe, identify what you want and need to capture in order to help your brain find the solutions you need. [[Exploring new ideas regularly helps solve all sorts of problems in creative ways]]. ### From atomic to linear To create new content, you need to go from [[Atomic notes]] organized as a graph (i.e., connected) to a linear form. The notes you have at your disposal should be like neurons, densely connected. In order to create new content, you will explore those with a specific goal in mind. You will focus on the relevant notes and links. By listing and ordering those, you will create the plan you need to prepare your new piece of content. That's the first step. The plan you create is like a mental model for a specific idea. It represents a path through your knowledge base, telling a specific story in a logical way. The plan itself is valuable, and you should keep it around, as it can be reused/repurposed to create additional pieces later on. Then, by going through the points one at a time, you will expand each point, reusing content from the corresponding notes, maybe even improving those along the way, in order to expand on each idea you want to cover. It's okay to copy/paste content from your atomic notes to your new piece of content. Consider those as separate. In a way, a new piece of content (as opposed to atomic notes) is like a snapshot of a set of ideas in your knowledge base at a specific point in time. And you'll end up with a linear piece of content (i.e., knowledge) that you can publish, and share with others. Cfr [[How to create new content using your existing notes]] ## How to find ideas