- Creator:: [[Ali Abdaal]] <!--ID: 1631100130967--> - URL: https://youtu.be/OP3dA2GcAh8 - [[Productivity]] [[Zettelkasten]] [[Second Brain]] - [[Building a Second Brain allows you to outsource storage, freeing your brain up to make ideas instead of remembering them.]] - Building a second brain is a method around the premise that your brain is great at having ideas, but not at keeping track of them. This is a bit like the idea of "a mind like water" from the GTD philosophy, where capturing ideas elsewhere frees your mind up to make connections creatively and intuitively rather than getting bogged down in needing to remember things. A second brain is a system for capturing and storing ideas so that you can refer to them later. - [[Having a mind like water is a flow state where the mind is free from the anxiety in needing to remember.]] - # 10 Principles of Building a Second Brain - Borrowed Creativity - [[Creativity isn't about coming up with entirely new ideas; it's about seeing connections between existing ideas or using them for a new purpose.]] - If you keep track of every good idea, you'll eventually be able to connect a few of them together to come up with a new implementation. - The Capture Habit - [[Developing a system to capture and process your ideas is essential to learning from them]] - Develop the habit of keeping track of things that resonate with you. Come up with systems for every situation you find yourself having ideas in, whether that's in the car or in the shower. - Idea Recycling - [[Recycle ideas you've used before to create new work.]] - Keeping track of everything you create means you'll be able to reuse them later. Every blog post/video/podcast you create should be in your Second Brain. Then, when you have new projects about a certain topic, you can just take existing things you've created and reuse them rather than starting from a blank page— a sure way of getting writer's block. - Projects over Categories - [[Situate good ideas within the context of a project to focus on producing output.]] - Instead of organizing these notes by category, try to relate them to existing projects in your life right now. That way, you'll be able to use them directly and tangibly rather than just having them float around in the void. - Slow Burns - [[Slow Burn vs Heavy Lift: Gradually collecting ideas over time and then tying them together is easier than starting from nothing.]] We approach most tasks as if we were doing heavy lifting. We start from scratch, block out a certain amount of time, and redo it all. This can be really intimidating. ^69e5ce Instead, keeping a Second Brain means we can start several projects at once and then just start collecting material or work or ideas towards each one. That way, we're slowly building up these projects simultaneously until we have enough material to link together. This is way less daunting than heavy lifting. ^1a5c83 - Start with Abundance - Having a Second Brain available to rifle through means we never DO have to start from scratch. There's always some material we've already made or earmarked as interesting that we can start from. - Intermediate Packets - [[Clarifying a project as a series of Next Actions makes it less daunting.]] > - Every big piece of work can be broken into smaller, more digestible chunks. If we make each chunk self-contained and index them properly (so that we can find them if we need to), then we can actually reuse relevant chunks elsewhere for something else. ^85af6d > - Example: if in an essay about improving brain health, you write a paragraph about memory, you can reuse that paragraph in an essay about productivity. - You Only Know What You Make - [[Restate an idea in your own words to truly learn it.]] > When it comes down to it, we remember things more if WE create something based on other content. Consuming is the first step, but it means nothing if we don't reflect and just write down some insights we've learned from it. ^2968b1 - Make It Easier for Your Future Self - [[Overcommunicate to your future self.]] - Your brain is a dumbass, and your future self is a dumbass. Don't just write down a term and think "I'm sure I'll remember this and know what I was thinking later". You won't. So do yourself a favor and spend some time to flesh it out and spell things out for your stupid future self. - Keep Your Ideas Moving - Don't get sidetracked by the systems and processes or getting it right the first time. What really matters is the output and making sure you DO something with all this information.