DAY 9/30 - Round 2

Cross-pollinating ideas often leads to creative insights.

But how do you do it in an Obsidian zettelkasten?

Just follow these 7 easy steps:

@obsdmd

#ship30for30 #zettelkasten #creativity

First of all, I've spent 300+ hours studying and practicing (digitally) Niklas Luhmann's zettelkasten.

According to Luhmann, generalizing ideas is the KEY to finding new insights.

Let's have a look at what that looks like...

1. Generalize ideas

Basically, ideas can be abstracted by doing this:

Reimagine your note as an example of a greater phenomenon.

Here are two examples...

::: Example Note 1 :::

Read-it-later apps can lead to never reading anything.

• Generalized: Collector's fallacy

::: Example Note 2 :::

The problem with search is it requires memory, so forgotten notes can never be found again.

• Generalized: Search-Memory Conundrum

2. Create an index

Create a new note named 'Index'. List out keywords/phrases, and link them to the related notes on the Overview page.

The Overview consists of links to ALL your notes organized by the mantra of...

A new note is always added BEHIND the most related note.

👇

Now, I recommend creating a separate index note manually for beginners.

Personally, though, I leverage tags in Obsidian to do this, but it will require practicing some constraints (more on this in future essays).

Be warned!

Anyway, onto step 3...

3. Add notes with abstractions in mind

As you read about ideas related to these topics, add new notes next to the existing ones.

Due to zettelkasten's organizational structure, your notes will automatically group together.

Here's what it might look like after a while:

This is awesome because it's...

FREE 'mashing' of ideas!

Since ideas are group together by 'the most related' note', ideas from any genre and topic could end up 'mashing' together here.

That's the first power of zettelkasten's organizational structure.

But that's not all!

4. Navigate with the Index

Imagine you're writing about a topic. We'll use my essay from a few days ago as an example...

It was about folgezettel, (sorry this might be a bit too meta)😅

All this funny word means is 'organizingation by sequence'

Anyway, let's go into my index.

In my Index, I see there are 3 notes related to this idea.

Notice there aren't many results. This is a good thing...

Why?

Fewer search results mean every link is a high-quality connection.

Plus, it's not actually just pointing to one note.

Each note here represents ALL related notes next to it! 🤯

5. Explore

The first link brings me to the folgezettel sequence of thoughts.

It looks like this.

Nothing too surprising here.

But...

This second one...

I wonder how it's related to 'Associative Chaining'?

6. Explore unexpected branches

I go into this note to have a look, and I remembered.

Ah, the word 'chaining' reminded me of the 'sequencing' of a folgzettel structure.

From here, I wonder what sequence of thought this 'associative chaining' belongs to.

So, I click on the 'Linked mentions' at the bottom of the note to see this note on the Overview page.

So, now we're under the topic of Learning.

I also see short-term memory and long-term memory

Then, suddenly...

A new connection happened in my first brain.

'Folgezettel improves our memory

🤯

7. Write

With my new revelation, I proceed to clarify my thoughts through writing.

And this is how this essay was born.

https://twitter.com/kinginmotion/status/1612835654748049408?s=20&t=1GJcpLEk_I27Mnc29GmG4w

If you look hard enough at my screenshots, you might also notice how the essays in the following days came to be. 😉

And hey, if you're interested in building a zettelkasten in Obsidian, sign up for my starter guide. It's coming soon!

https://kingchan.substack.com/

tl;dr

1. Generalize

2. Index

3. Add notes with abstractions in mind

4. Navigate with the Index

5. Explore

6. Explore unexpected sequences

7. Write for clarity