Dealing with information flow to facilitate creativity
As a creative I can easily use up a lot of time making my way through information sources for material I’ll use. It can be time-consuming and sometimes repetitive.
I receive several newsletters every day. Most of them are sources for curated material to save me time finding the material. Not every link I receive is of value to me.
I scan through them, opening up tabs that I think are of interest. I then scan through the tabs to quickly determine which tabs are of actual interest.
I then work my way through the tabs of interest. Sometimes the content will spark ideas I want to explore further or they add to ideas I’ve already explored. They get a more in depth read so I can make notes and record my thoughts on the topics. Some of the tabs are of interest but not immediate, those I use record the links for future exploration when processing notes.
Over the last several weeks I’ve been working out a system in Obsidian where I can record these notes, thoughts, ideas in order to readily bring them back up again. For example, when I decided to write this post, I was able to easily recall the material on second brain and network thinking that I’ve gone through.
What do they have to do with this post?
A note-taking system built to facilitate recall of already recorded information means I don’t have to research a subject over and over again. I can go to what I’ve already recorded and thought about. Doing followup research for what I’ve not covered yet. And add that to base.
This gives me a personal knowledge base I can return to over and over again. Our brains are a personal knowledge base. The difference is, unless you’re gifted with perfect recall, we have to rely on memory to pull data from our brain. I just use the search feature, tags or links within the base.
The more I process material into my knowledge base, the less time I’ll have to spend combing through research material. I can use that time to explore my material, see connections I might not have seen before to generate ideas and material.
Obsidian is the tool I’m currently building this base in and one I expect I will keep using.
In the past I’ve used EverNote and Notion. They have some interesting benefits and some people prefer them for their process. One of the main things I love about Obsidian other than the fact I can still access my notes even without Obsidian, is I can create templates to fit my needs instead of adapting to already made ones.
Obsidian has a feature called a Daily Note. It’s setup to create a new note every day. The note is based on a template I create. Some people use the notes for journaling their day.
My Daily Note template is setup to allow for some journaling but is more my ongoing TO DO list where everything I want to get to or meetings are recorded.
If it’s dated, there is a deadline. If not, it’s there waiting for my attention. Everything I don’t have ticked off today, rolls over into tomorrow’s note the minute I open Obsidian.
I’ve been creating and publishing low content books for over a year now. I have a record setup in Obsidian for every book I’ve created. I can easily find all the information on each book including the keywords, categories and descriptions I used when listing the book.
Recently I’ve started setting up a template with a checklist for my publishing workflow on the different types of books I create. That checklist will be linked to the book record allowing me to track the book’s status at any time.
In a world full of floods of information, it’s nice to have the tools and process to turn the flood into directed streams to be put to work.
NOTES:
Shadowspub is a writer from Ontario, Canada. She writes on a variety of subjects as she pursues her passion for learning. She also writes on other platforms and enjoys creating books you use like journals, notebooks, coloring books etc.
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