How to Take Better Notes

You’re Taking Notes the WRONG Way — Here’s Why

A Simple (And Valuable) Lesson That Can Change the Way You’re Taking notes… Forever!

If you’re a knowledge worker, content creator, entrepreneur or just a lifelong learner you’re probably already taking notes.

Hopefully, every day.

Notes from the content you consume,
the interesting things you stumble across,
or simply for the sake of not losing your sparking insights.

You may use a popular app like Evernote, Bear, Google Keep, OneNote, or anything in between.

And that’s cool.

Because taking notes is not only essential to save and retrieve information.

(Our brains are pretty bad at remembering the details of everything we encounter — Did you remember which and how many apps I just mentioned?).

Nope.

Taking notes is also important because it frees up mental bandwidth.

Why?

Because unfinished tasks create “open loops”, running the task in the background of our mind.

But most of us (me included for a very long time) take notes the wrong way.

Because the wrong way is the one that seems the more intuitive.

Let me explain:

Your typical note-workflow may look like that…

1.You come across an idea that seems valuable.
2.You open your note app.
3.You write it down, maybe classify it (with a tag or by placing it in a folder).
4.You go ahead with your day.

Well done.

Your brain freed up some bandwidth.

You’re also 100% sure that this insight is not lost (and that you can retrieve it at any time.)

But the crucial question is:

What comes next?
What comes after recording this note?