Transcription
Zettelkasten is a very efficient way of taking notes, and its strength comes from the fact that it's not just about collecting and organizing notes, but it's also about doing something with them. Really, it is a tool for thinking and writing, and it was popularized by a German sociologist in the 1950s.
Um, the guy was called Nicholas Luman, and he had this habit of collecting ideas and notes about everything he was reading about or everything he was thinking about, writing them on on little cards, index cards, and storing those cards into his Zettelkasten. It sounds very cool when you say that in German, but it translates to a less grammar and maybe more humble "slip box" in English. But it was a very efficient and simple system that today we're going to try and replicate in Apple Notes.
Before we do that, let's try and have a look at how the system worked so we can define how to adapt it to Apple Notes. The first thing to notice is that, um, as you can see here, Zettelkasten was very a very simple thing. It's just really a chest of drawers full of index cards. Those cards were of different types, but the most important type were the so-called permanent notes. These are ideas or maybe summaries of other cards that were present in the system.
Luman would write manually. Remember, it was the 1950s or 60s. There were no computers. So Luman was doing everything using pen and paper. And by the time he died, by the way, this Zettelkasten was full of cards. He had 90,000 cards, which over a career that spanned 50 years means Luman collected seven cards a day for his entire life. No, six days, no weekends, no holidays. Seven cards a day.
And, um, every card was usually about a single idea that he would pick up from books or from his own thoughts. But the important thing is that these cards were linked to other cards. So if we have a look at one of these permanent notes, this is an example. Um, he had, as you can see here, a reference number, which Luman used to connect cards. He had to come up with this linking system. So every card would have, in this case, like 997a. It is just a reference that he would then use to link other cards to this one, and this one to other cards.
It would then have a description of his idea. Maybe it's one thought, maybe it's a couple of thoughts. And then this card, as you can see here, it's linked to another one. And look at how complex the index, the reference number for the other card is. It is 213d, 26g, 70m, 2, 5. So the overall idea is that he started with a very simple indexing system. So three cards could be numbered one, two, and three, maybe. But then if he wanted to branch off from card one, he would create card 1a, and then 1b, and 1c to continue that train of thoughts. And again, if he wanted to branch off from card 1a, it would create another note called 1a1, and then 1a2, and so on.
And over the course of 50 years, of course, this indexing system became much more complex, and there are cards in the, there are, described by maybe 13 or 14 levels of letters and numbers. Now, we don't have to worry about any of this in Apple Notes because everything is done digitally. But you can imagine how difficult it was for Luman to have an idea, jot it down, and then try to link it to existing ideas in the Zettelkasten. The more notes he had, the more this thing probably became complex and time-consuming.
But at the same time, once the linking was in place, Luman was able to start from one card and then, following the links on that card, he could discover a train of thoughts and pathways that were always different. So one day he could start from this card and choose to follow the first link, and then on the next card, he would follow the second link, and so on. And the following week, he could do the opposite, go for link number two, and then for link number one, and so on. So he would basically, it was basically able to move from one card to to the other, let's say, at the speed of thought. I mean, it was still quite cumbersome to find and locate all the cards, but you get the principle.
And he actually credited his Zettelkasten and this complete linking system to his very prolific career as a writer because in the course of his career, he wrote 70 books, 400 articles. And when he died, people found, um, in his office, dozens, if not hundreds, of unfinished drafts and articles. So he was really able to connect ideas very, very quickly because, and he said that he was able to communicate with his Zettelkasten. And when he said communicate, what he meant was that after years, the Zettelkasten was able to resurface ideas, his ideas, actually, something that he had stored in the Zettelkasten and maybe forgotten about, and all of a sudden, it was presented back with those ideas.
So Zettelkasten is actually an incredible, um, system which, if you think about it, becomes even more amazing when you think Luman was doing everything by hand. And it is actually a testament, probably, to the fact that having a good enough system, something that works and delivers, trumps having a state-of-the-art, perfect system that doesn't deliver, that doesn't give you what you want.
And let's not forget that Luman, um, again, when he wrote his book about communicating with the Zettelkasten, he was very clear about the fact that he knew that the system wasn't perfect. He knew that some ideas may be buried in the Zettelkasten forever, never able to resurface. But he accepted that less than perfect system because the rest of it was working so well for him. And it is a principle that we can probably all apply to our own lives.
Now, going back to the Zettelkasten, the other main type of note is the literature note. I've got an example here. Every time, um, Luman was reading books, and at the time, really, the majority of his knowledge used to come from books or maybe articles, he would write a complete note about that book, like this one that we're seeing here. But he would write very, very simply: the page number and a little description of what interested him about that particular subject. It's a really short list that has a description of where to find that information if needed, and what was interesting about it.
At the end of the book, he would store this literature note into a specific literature box, ready to do something with it. And maybe later on, some of these notes or comments could become permanent notes in the Zettelkasten. There are probably two or three things that we can learn from this, and this is actually really useful. Number one, there is always a reference that we need to include when linking back to a specific piece of content. So if at some point we want to go back to that point and read about it, we know where to search for.
The second thing is these very short descriptions of what was interesting for Luman, or for us, if you're reading the book, about that specific idea or passage in the book. And the third point, which is extremely important, is that everything here was written in Luman's own words. And this is really key. Every time we take note about something, it needs to be written in our own words. We basically need to internalize the idea and reconvert it into something which is us. So there's no copying and pasting passages of the book. I'm afraid Luman didn't have that luxury. He didn't have a computer, so he couldn't simply, you know, copy and paste pieces of the book. But we do have Command C and Command V, very, very convenient on our keyboards, and we need to make an effort not to use them.
And by the way, in modern days, a literature note is probably kind of limiting in a way because we consume much more than just books. You could be watching videos, and there are podcasts, there are documentaries, there are interviews, there are lessons, there are lots of things that can provide us with material that we want to store and save. So maybe a literature note should be called a content note at this point. But the key principle still stands: it is a reference to a specific piece of content with a brief description in our own words.
The third type of note is what Luman called reference notes, and this is really different types of notes that he would use. It could be bibliographical notes, so metadata about one of the books he was reading. They could be entry points to specific subjects. Let's call them hubs, to a single topic. You can then use to branch off to subtopics. And I've got an example of a reference note here. For example, he has this card 7/40 about realm, whatever that means in German. As you can see, it's just some sort of an entry point to more detailed subtopics. So this one would be 536, 71b. I think this one would have a different entry point, and so on. So consider them like some switches, really. You are on this card, and you can then choose what type of train of thought to follow from this point on.
Another type of reference note is the so-called keywords index, like this one. As you can see, this is quite brittle, but it's really a list of keywords. We will probably call them tags at this point, a list of keywords with a few potential entry points to those keywords. Now, one important thing that I would like you to notice: this guy had 90,000 cards in the Zettelkasten, but as you can see, these references only link to maybe one, two, I think the maximum was four entry points. So it was again, it's another confirmation that the guy didn't go for completeness. He didn't want a perfect system. He wanted a good enough system. He didn't want to clutter this card with lots of entry points to every single note that had this keyword. He only wanted a few entry points because he trusted, and this is really key, that the system will then provide him with the next steps in his train of thought. In every single card, you will find at least one other link to another thought that he could then follow. This is again something we can replicate very easily, actually, in Apple Notes now that we have tags, and these things will be pulled automatically for us.
The other type of notes is something that I don't have an example here, but it's what Luman referred to as fleeting notes. And these are just really thoughts and quick ideas. We may call them shower thoughts, for example, something that comes to you at some point. You take note of it without any context, without any details, just to be reminded in a few days to do something with them. I don't have an example here, but sometimes this was a one-liner: "Has this ever been explored?" or "I realized that this could mean that." Something very simple, stored without any context, only to be discarded in a few days after having done something with them.
And this is the key difference, actually. Something that I didn't mention: permanent notes have the permanent notes are written in exactly the opposite way. Permanent notes are self-contained notes that include enough content, enough context, to be self-standing. They are written carefully, as if for publication, in a way, and they are meant to be there forever. That's the meaning of a permanent note. So they are carefully crafted, and they could be summaries of many other cards or maybe completely new ideas. And the overall system should aim at the creation of permanent notes.
Now, I've given you an overview of the Zettelkasten method. Now let's try and see how we can replicate this in Apple Notes. And many of these things are very simple because the system was so basic at the beginning that the majority of the things Luman was doing can be replicated in Apple Notes very effectively. So I've created a folder here, and in this folder, I've got four categories, really. That's it: fleeting notes, literature notes, permanent notes, and reference notes.
And in my literature notes, for example, I've got just a few examples. This is a book that I may have read. And by the way, this is just random data that I've created for the purpose of this demonstration. This could be a book that I've read, and I've got some metadata here: the title, the author, publisher, the year it was published, and so on. And this is written using the mono style font, which is here. And then following Luman's suggestion, I may have taken notes indicating the page number and what was interesting for me at that specific point about that particular bit of text. The fact that this guy left school at 12 as he wanted to be a chef on page 35. There is something else on this page. There is the fact that he won a very prestigious prize for a three-story dish, whatever. And then I've got to tag him. You can be much more detailed with your tags, and this is something you need to decide based on your circumstances.
This one is another literature or maybe content note. And in this case, it's about a video. So I've stored the link to the video, the channel name, and maybe the year with an indication of the timestamps. So 12 minutes 29 seconds, it shows something about, you know, W numbers for flour. And at this point, 13:49, it tells that he says that the pizza base becomes stronger when cooked at the base of the oven, and so on. As you can see, my theme is around baking. And then I've got another book here. So my literature notes. And this folder will grow and grow and grow.
And by the way, Luman was very adamant that he only wanted to have a few categories because the key bit, the key ingredient in his system, was links. There's no point in assigning things to categories because that would basically pigeonhole a specific thought, a specific item, to a single category. Instead, when you're using links, you can reuse the same idea in different contexts without any problems. And by the way, if you're looking for some serendipities or you're looking for something else, and you almost by chance stumble on something else, maybe different, you need to have everything into the same category. If you start creating categories and subcategories and subfolders, every level down will restrict your perspective.
Then we've got a, we may have a folder for permanent notes. And these are, these are, as we said, either summaries of existing notes or our own personal thoughts, original thinking, really. In this case, I've got maybe a summary card that I've created about W numbers in flour. And as you can see, this is my idea about storing information about this topic, which is something that I wrote. And also a few links, as we discovered in Luman's example. These are really key because at this point, if I'm reading this card, I can decide which route to go down. Do I want to look at ingredients, maybe for flour types, or do I want to look at baking techniques? I may have more, of course. And if I decide to go to this link, it will bring me to, in this case, in this example, to my note about this baking technique, where I can discover more and I can come up with new thoughts and ideas.
As you can see, I've created a link in Apple Notes, which are very easy to create, definitely easier than the ones Luman was creating by hand. And I'm going to show you how to create these links. It's really simple in Apple Notes, especially if you write on your computer, but it works in the same way on your mobile. You highlight a word, you right-click, or maybe you tap on a phone, you choose "Add Link," and in this window, you start typing the first few letters of the internal note that you want to create. In my case, that was a baking, uh, that baking page. So if I start typing "baking," I can then select the note that I want to link to. I'm not going to do it now, but this is it. And by the way, if you want to change your link, you can hover over it, right-click, and edit link, and you can change it.
As I said, on a million occasions on this channel, I'm also a very big fan of the shortcut to create links, which works especially well on your Mac. If you type two greater than signs, you can then create links on the fly. So if I wanted to click on this to this Zettelkasten note, or maybe Keyword Index, and so on, I could simply do that. Otherwise, I could start typing the first letters of the note and pick the one that I wanted. Now, I'm going to delete this one, and I can continue showing you around.
Now I've got, maybe a folder for fleeting notes, just random ideas, as we said, shower thoughts, ideas, something your friends tell you, something you think about when you wake up in the morning. You take a note, and it could be a silly note, it could be a question, it could be a very profound thing. The overall point is that you park that idea there, ready to be used somehow in your Zettelkasten. "Has anyone ever created a three-story pizza?" That could be the entry point for one big exploration of my Zettelkasten, looking for that bit of information. And maybe if no one has ever created one, I could create mine to create my own new permanent note about this specific project.
And the final thing are reference notes. As we said, Luman had mainly two types of reference notes. One was, um, keywords indexes. In our case, a keyword index can be achieved in a much easier way using our tag cloud here. So if I'm looking for all my notes tagged ingredients, for example, I can simply click here, and the list will be returned to me of every note that contains that tag. And if I want it, I can then further refine my search using this very efficient search box here. And then if I go back to my reference notes, the other type of reference notes is the hub. This is a, let's call it a curated note that you create just as an entry point to multiple pathways and trains of thought. So I've created this one called baking. And as you can see, inside of the baking hub, there could be lots of subtopics. There could be basics around ingredients and recipes and proportions. It could be something about techniques, you know, from long fermentation to the way you cook your bread, the science behind it, some popular bakers, some recipes. There are lots of things that you can connect to this card, really.
One potential way of linking content could be in four directions. So every time you have a piece of information, you can connect to something which comes before this piece of information, or maybe after. So a more detailed or a less detailed view. Or you can connect to something similar that maybe will reinforce the point you want to make or the type of research you want to do. Or something opposite that goes, as the name suggests, in a completely different direction. So there you have it again here, just as Luman would do, you can have several entry points. And the overall principle of the Zettelkasten is that once you do it for years, so consistency, as in many things in life, is really key.
All these entry points could be the start of a completely new journey, exploring your own thoughts, maybe something you've even forgotten about. So one day you are interested in baking, you come here today, you decide you want to explore the science behind the Maillard reaction, so you click on this one, you go to a further note, talks about that, and then you continue with that process until you're satisfied, until you're happy. And if you're not, you just come back.
Luman himself, who was very prolific, was also very clear and very relaxed about those occasions where he wasn't able to follow a specific train of thought. He very simply said, "Sometimes I start using the Zettelkasten, I don't go where I want to, I feel that I'm not motivated, and I just drop it, and I'll start again tomorrow." So it was, I think, in a nutshell, it was really so confident that the Zettelkasten would give him enough information and ideas to progress, that even if he had had a bad day, he knew that the following day it was going to be successful.
So you need to experiment with this thing, flex it in a way that works for you, because Luman was doing exactly that. He would take notes for himself, and not generic notes that anyone could use. And experiment with it and see how it got. The only thing is that you need to stick with it, maybe for a number of years, because this before this thing becomes so successful and useful as it was for Luman. But thankfully, technology can do quite a lot for us. And if you're looking for more ideas to use Apple Notes to achieve much more in your life, have a look at the channel, have a look at these videos, because I've posted quite a few interesting things that describe how you can use Apple Notes not just to capture information, but to actually do something with it. For now, though, thank you very much for watching, and see you soon.