Digital notes take an insignificant amount of space, you can just keep them and ignore them, use them when you need to. Deleting them seems to me like neuroticism. Some kind of symbolic gesture for emotional relief. There are a lot of productivity gurus online that will try to sell you a course on the best way to take notes, and perhaps the author has fallen into one of those traps, taking notes of things they don’t have interest in. in a way that does not feel natural and satisfying. I only take notes when I am compelled to. It’s a gut feeling that I rely on. It’s effortless for me to take notes because of it. It provides me comfort and relief knowing that my memories are accessible, and I gladly write them. The author makes some grandiose assumptions that we have to forget. You don’t have to, and neither do you have a choice in it. It’s some kind of idealist way of thinking to justify the author's actions. Seems misguided. Memorization plays an extremely important role in learning, but for those of us with executive function problems, using our notes augments our life for the better. Just as the author talks about how memories work, my notes are just like my thoughts, webs of interlinked notes strung together. A lot of times, I just remember what tags and backlinks I can use to find the information I am looking for in my notes.

[dead]

[flagged]

[flagged]

A poor workman blames their tools.

My notes are basically like Smeegol's precious ring, and to burn them is unfathomable. But initially these notes they were garbage, I initially got into all these PKM systems and used a stripped down Zettelkasten, but then realised that I was focused on creating the system not the outcome. My wonderfully linked notes were never being seen, the notes I was taking was not connected to my current focuses. They were virtually all "maybe I'll use this in the next 10 years" type notes.

I changed my goal away from following a system to focusing on getting meaningful changes in understanding from notes. This means having the ability to recall information, not rely on a second brain. I spent a fair chunk of time reducing my inputs to notes which are focused on my current goals: metacognition, mental health and business. If the note does not fall in these category it is not noted, I still read things for pleasure just noteless. The value of applying what I read in the short-term outweighs notes for possible futures. As possible futures are everchanging and so the likely value of these notes are heavily weighted down. I do have troves of notes which will be transformed when I need them, but these notes have a very high chance of being seen and are related to my goals, but not applicable currently. I delayed transforming these troves until I am applying them, as I will get the most value out of my notes when they are being applied Not someday dreams, but in reality never to seen again notes of yesteryear.

Relying on a second brain is not the same as understanding concepts and applicable learning. An example: When you read an article and come across a word you don't know it stops your train of thought, going to you PKM to find the definition doesn't help. When you know the word it allows you to chunk info and think deeper thoughts about said article. That requires understanding, which you won't get from these PKM systems which focus on input with little concern for output. By having deeper understanding it reveals further planes of thought previously impossible.

Adding a note feels good, it feels like work but it really isn't. PKM has sprung up about making feel good systems but have rarely leads to any meaningful changes or outcomes, such as this blog. To get to deeper thought requires way more than creating a note which is literally one of the first parts in my understanding chain. PKM systems focus on this, but spend very little on the other end- meaningful output.

My "learning stack" - fleeting ideas go into Todoist, ideas are encoded/transformed and go to into Obsidian, at the same time these ideas go into Anki, which I go through multiple times a week. These ideas are further elaborated on and changed in Anki. My pkm is a single step in developing understanding not the destination.

for further anki learning: https://augmentingcognition.com/ltm.html