Hello my name is Shu. In this video I want to show you how to take smart notes
in Roam. This personal knowledge management system is based on the Zettelkasten
method which was developed by a German sociologist Niklas Luhmann. I
explained this method in detail in my previous video, so if you haven't watched
it you should check it out. The process of the Zettelkasten method is very simple first
you take literature nores, then you take reference notes and transform them
into permanent notes. So let's start from the step one. The first step is take
literature notes. They are basically the information you don't want to forget or
think you will use later in your writing or thinking. But they are two rules you
should follow: One, it should be brief so that it's easy to review later and two
you have to write it in your own words. This means no quoting! Copy and pasting
is easy but rewriting in your own words forces you to really understand what
you're reading. If you're reading a physical book, take a note of information
you don't want to forget in Roam. Simply create a page for the book and start
writing. If you're reading on Kindle you can do the same thing. Take notes while
reading. But if you're like me who don't want to take notes while reading just
highlight text, and when you finish reading, import the highlight into
Evernote or OneNote using email. Alternatively you can go to your Kindle
website and copy your highlights from there
Once you copy the highlights, paste them in your book page then you can start
taking literature notes while going through each highlight.
And if you want to quote or want to remember where you've got your idea from, simply use block reference using alt + drag. This way you can always come back
to the source. Again, I have to remind you these notes should be brief and they
have to be in your own words. No copy and pasting! This is a very simple step
all you have to do is make a reference note at the top of your page when you
finish reading a book or article it's just the author and a brief note about
content. Creating a permanent notes is the most important step in
the Zettelkasten method. They are the notes that become part of your mental models.
Simply go through each note you made in the previous step while thinking about
how they relate to what you already know. Try to find connections between each
note and your interests, learning, research, and thinking .Your goal is not
collecting as many notes as possible but it's adding new values to your existing
ideas argument and discussions. And if you think some of the notes can meet
that criteria, transform them into permanent notes. In order to do that just
create a page for the idea at the top of the page, write a reference information. I
usually write source, keywords and relevant notes. Source is straightforward:
it just where you got the idea from so in this case, it's the great mental models
by Shane Parrish. Now finding keywords and relevant notes it's the most important
process when you're making permanent notes. This is because learning is about
connecting information as Sönke Ahrens says learning is not so much about saving
information like on hard disk but about building connections and bridges between
pieces of information. It is about making sure that the right cues triggered the
right memory. About how we can think strategically to remember the most
useful information when we need it. This is also why Roam is a great learning tool
It makes it so easy to find connections among pieces of your knowledge. So how do
you do that? You have to find keywords and relevant nodes. Keyword is like a tag
but a typical mistake people make when finding a keyword is asking which keyword
is most fitting or what categories does this note fall into. Instead, you should
ask yourself, in which circumstances will I want to stumble upon this note, or
when and how will I use this idea? For example in this case
if you think about categories, it might be like productivity but it's more likely
that I search for specific phrases like how to journal, feedback or how to get
feedbacks. Finding relevant notes is as important as finding keywords Niklas Luhmann
always wrote links to relevant notes on his permanent notes. By finding
relevant notes you can build connections which is the core of learning. To find
relevant notes open your permanent notes page in the sidebar using shift-click. Go
through each note to find a relevant notes. And if you need, you can filter
them using keywords. Finally you can start writing your notes but make sure
you write in a proper sentence not like bullet points. It has to be sentences you
can actually use in your article or essay as they are. And before we go, don't
forget to add permanent note tag next to the keywords this allows you to see
the list of your permanent notes in one place with the keywords. This is great
because you can see your knowledge growing day by day. Also you can use
filter to see clusters of your interest. So for me I can see that I'm interesting
learning education life lessons writing and so on. And when you need to find a
topic to write about, just come to this page and see the clusteres you developed
then you can easily write about them because you already have tons of
information in your prominent notes. You may be thinking this is unnecessarily
long process. Yes that's true it takes time but learning is supposed to take
time and effort. You can't just import highlights to
Evernote and expect your brain to understand everything. You have to work
for it. You have to think to understand and
writing it's a best facilitator of thinking. Thank you so much for watching
please let me know what you think about this method in the comment or Twitter or
Instagram. See you in the next video!