A systematic approach to filtering the modern firehose of data into a well-curated knowledge-base.

The methodology in a nutshell

Capture: Keep what resonates

Filter incoming data, remembering that information is knowledge we don't already have, and aggressively identifying and discard as much chaff as feasible at the intake stage.

Remember that in any piece of content, the value is not evenly distributed. Also, if your rate of data capture exceeds the rate at which you can practicably process it into usable information and insights, this whole thing grinds to a halt. Thus, leaving out the chaff is just as important as picking out the wheat.

Trust your intuition: if it makes your ears perk up, capture first and ask questions later. Your subconscious has most likely spotted something that your conscious mind hasn't caught up with yet.

Capture references to primary sources (and those sources) wherever feasible. This enables you to go back to those sources and harvest them for more value, to extract additional context that turned out to be less obvious than you thought at the time, or back up your claims with evidence.

Maybe also grab the ToC and/or summary/abstract for quick reference, especially for Articles.

Suggested capture criteria:

• Does it inspire me?
• Is it useful?
  • Or could it plausibly be useful in the future?
• Is it personal?
  • Thoughts, reflections, memories, and especially your own insights.
• Is it surprising?

Bounding your search

It's an easy trap, to stay perpetually in the search phase, fearing that if you stop now you'll just miss out on that one critical bit of input.

This is not the path to perfection. It's the never-ending road.

To break the cycle, end each search session with this question:

Can you make the next prototype with only the materials you already have on hand?

• Yes -> do it.
• No -> build a Hemingway bridge to the next session.

Organise: save for actionability

Connect ideas to topics and other things that give them context, such as Projects and Areas from the PARA methodology.

Create categorisers like tags only as the need actually arises. It's a mistake to try to anticipate them ahead of time, and to then sort incoming information according to your preconceptions.

Remember that this is an iterative process, so it's OK if you miss an association on any given pass. Have faith that if it's worth making, you'll spot it on a subsequent pass. Some of them take multiple passes to recognise anyway, along with mental digestion that takes time.

Try to think in terms of projects you're actively working on, but remain open to other associations that come to mind. This provides a concrete point of focus, which increases your mental clarity with tasks like this.

Put it where you'll reach for it.

Distil: find the essence

This will often take multiple passes, and quickly-made incremental changes are better than blocking yourself for long periods in search of the perfect summarisation in a single step, so move fast and touch lightly.

The progressive summarisation approach works well here.

Express: share your discoveries and insights

Use the information and insights you accumulate, and do so often.

Don't wait for the KMS to be complete before you start work, because it never will be. Instead, start drawing on it as soon as it's useful.

Do this iteratively: release early, update often. Update it in response to new information, new insights, finding better ways to express an idea, and especially to insightful feedback.

4 Transformations

Acts as a force-multiplier for the four transformations that are essential to a second brain as described in Building a Second Brain:

Make ideas concrete

Articulating ideas in written form turns them into (mentally) tangible units that can be much more effectively examined, edited, subdivided, compared, rearranged and remixed.

Reveal/find/discover new associates between ideas

The greater the quantity and variety of ideas you assemble in one place, the easier it becomes to notice new associations between them, and the more likely it is that higher-level patterns will emerge.

Incubate ideas over time

Accumulating ideas and repeatedly revisiting them helps to reduce recency bias, and enables you to progressively digest them, again leading to greater depth of understanding and insight.

Sharpen the user's unique perspective

According to some Stanford study, deriving and promting a curated perspective is pretty much the only job likely to prove resistant to replacement by machine.