Well, you (tongue in cheek) quoted Plato in support of your "invention" and reading your work it seems as though you believe this system is necessary for learning and understanding. So I was (tongue in cheek) responding by pointing out that, for thousands of years, better educated men and women than us have lived and learnt without highlighters or notebooks, and so I think there is something faulty with your whole premise. For someone who is so involved in Classical education, this is an incredibly modern system.
I mean, Plato wrote that one of the "dangers" of writing too much was its detrimental affect on memory and understanding. Perhaps there is a better way, or, at least an acknowledgement that such a system is a weakness and not a strength.
Working on it. I'm sure all my explanations will end up in the post but it has to do with conferences, articles, running a not-for-profit, and welcoming a new grandson into the world. I'm frustrated myself and with myself, but it'll come asap.
I've worked through these 3 lessons--it wasn't hard since it only required a few small yet thrilling shifts from how I already use notebooks--and I find myself anticipating with such eagerness the lesson that will explain what the 4 pen colors are for.
About your Confucius quote... I agree that one should have a reason for choosing a neighborhood! When we moved it was to be near family (as in across the street!). When the exiles in the OT returned home, they established a place of worship first. When we moved to our new state, choosing a church was primary. So yes, let's place thought, care, consideration, and wisdom in view when we assign relationships between things and purposes for those things. That is yet another way of bringing order to chaos.
Thank you, Andrew! I'm a little behind in my reading, but this is all fitting together beautifully! As a confirmed "highlighter with colors", I would encourage anyone reading this to give that a try!
What I have learned from these lessons so far:
*chaos and order are both necessary and one need not fear either.
*however, one need not remain stuck in either a state of chaos or order because that wouldn't be productive
*Just take the notes! Don't worry about how they might or might not relate to the ones before or after. That's the beauty of this! Looking for the harmony and relationships is being in a place of wonder and discovery.
*One area I want to grow in, and I do believe this processing skill will help, is my ability to think and reflect before noting thoughts. I tend to want to get the actual, literal, words/notes down in my book and then call it "good." But I can see the benefit in taking time to think and include the extra layer of my reflections about those literal words and notes. Does this make sense?
Thank you so much for continuing this series! I'm looking forward to the next steps!
Good stuff. When it comes to getting your thoughts and notes expressed with the right words or following reflection, the notebook can be the place for that reflection. As you know, the thought in your mind goes on a long journey before it reaches the end of your pen.
Thanks for this series! I’m curious what your thoughts are on pages that don’t end up full. Do you ever return to add to them or does it stay sparse? I’ve been returning to some of my earlier pages, but I wonder if there are any “processing considerations” or other ideas
Good question. The biggest issue when you return to a page is that you may have already indexed it and ticked it as indexed. In that case, I just add a circle next to the tick mark or else add it immediately to the index. I don’t hesitate to turn back to pages with more space.
Tick mark? Did I miss something? Are we dealing with arachnids now in our note-taking? Do we have to train them? Feed them blood? Have special innoculations? This seemed really good at the start but seems to be going in a strange direction. Too many legs...
I haven't started this process yet. I've just been writing things in a single notebook, but the question of finding things later had occurred to me. My method has been to put icons in the margin, such a a lightbulb for ideas, exclamation mark for something interesting or amazing, i for investigate further, happy faces, sad faces, etc. It's rather easy to scan through and pick out a specific icon, which corresponds more or less to different coloured highlighters. This new system has merit but I can also see it getting unwieldly. As time goes on, obviously some older notes would be related to newer ones. But what if you don't remember writing the older ones, and especially if they're in a previous volume?
I did read them, and I like the indexing idea, but it seems like a lot of work to go back, after writing a note, to all your previous volumes and refer to their indices to add links back and forth. Also, my current notebook is a complete hodge-podge. There might be several single lines for things I want to dig into later, then 3 pages of something on an unrelated topic that just interests me, like how to build a cabin, random ideas, fun things that happened today, etc. Your method would be fantastic for studying or research, but I can't quite see it fitting into normal journaling, not that I'd call mine normal. I'm eager to read the rest of your series to see how you use it and how it helps you.
I’m experimenting with using the left hand side for my version of simple mind mapping/bubble chart. This helps me sort the jumble of thoughts/ideas. And yes, I have already started adding ToC and indices to project journals (e.g. all my Substack writing ideas in one place!, and an art show project I need to start visualising).
I also like the suggestions for a go-easy start to indexing old journals.
You have identified the core challenge and the central question!
The question is: what am I doing this for?
The challenge is: what do I do with all the notes already written over the (in my case) decades?
The way you are journaling makes total sense for getting thoughts out. What you might need to determine is whether you want to access some of them in the future and if so what for.
Research would be one thing, as you indicated. Another reason to access in the future might for a project, like building a cabin.
It is perfectly good and permissible to write notes about something for no other reason than that you enjoyed noticing or discovering something. We could call that “curiosity.” Those are notes you have no intention of ever needing.
If the notes are for a project and/or for research, that’s when you’ll want a way to find it in the future. For those notes, I recommend an index.
If you have lots of notes from over the years, creating an index for each would be like opening a vein just enough to make your blood drain out slowly over the next few years. It would be too awful to consider.
What you could do, however, is identify a project or topic that you have thought about over the years, create or identify a page for it in your current J or P, and then scan old notebooks one at a time during leisure moments. You could use the page in J or P as a specific project index. That way you could gather at least some of the older information without being overwhelmed by all your old notebooks.
If you find yourself wanting to index and link things, I’d start with an index for your current notebook and get some practice with it. After you feel comfortable with the idea, then I’d add the project index within a current notebook that I described above.
Thank you for explaining to me what you’ve been doing. Even if I’ve missed your point and been no help at all, you’ve been helpful to me because you gave me the chance to think closely about how to do this!
Actually, you've been very helpful. I only started making a journal about a year ago. Before that, I had random scribbled pieces of paper, some of which I transcribed into specific notebooks for art or writing. I had another notebook where I wrote how-to's for my graphics program and another for webinars I attended, whatever the subject. But yes, finding the info I need when I need it becomes a retrieval issue, so I'm definitely going to spend some time indexing those, as well as the general notebook I'm currently using. I love the idea of a summary project page as a starting point to collect the bits and pieces on a specific subject. And now another question: how do you deal with things that are somewhat related but not closely related? Let's say I have a bunch of notes on philosophy. I can index them by philosopher and subject. But if a dozen philosophers have something to note on the same topic, e.g. the nature of reality, it could make a huge chore of cross-linking. Is that another example of a project index? And do you ever use the left-hand page for anything? It seems wasteful not to. And I bet by now you're sorry I subscribed!
If you hadn't subscribed I wouldn't know your questions and therefore would be unable to answer them and therefore would have less clarity in my own thoughts. So, I'm very glad you've subscribed. : )
As to the notes on the same topic, I have three options for you, one of which you will hate me for.
Option one: insert a topic index that works just like a project index, in your notebook on a given page. The main index could be "reality" or "reality, philosophers on." Then write the page number where you write the topic index and give it some sort of identification, like an X or In or T (for topic).
Then use that page to index the philosophers and their statements. I would cross reference the books or articles in this case, unless you have written responses to them in your journals. I'll describe how to do this in a later post when we go beyond visiting your neighbor to flying somewhere else.
Option 2: create a 4th notebook: a compendium on the topic. This too will come up later, so don't tell anybody you are in on the secret. The idea here is to set aside a whole notebook devoted entirely to one topic and operate it like a journal. I have a few of these. One for teaching Latin, one for World War II, another for crime fiction, and a bunch for the quadrivium, which is a personal obsession.
Don't start a second till you've been crazy enough to do a first. These are actually kind of dangerous because you can use them to relieve pressure from your journals, but in my opinion that pressure should build until it is unbearalbe.
Option 3: Index cards. Create topic indexes on 4X6 index cards and key them to your notebooks. I suppose I should add that I'll be describing this in more detail later!
Thanks for your questions. I won't always be able to answer them in any detail, but I'll alway be grateful for them.
I'm not sure which option you think I'll hate you for but my least favourite is #3. I actually lean toward #2, because I do tend to have quite specific areas I want to make notes on. I'm really looking forward to the rest of the series.
Thank you for this. I had begun cross referencing in the body of the note, but arrow/address in lower right corner is much more visible. Re Underlining … I might experiment with this, but I got only four of the five colour/purposes: green,orange,pink,blue. What would be the fifth? Merci
You’re welcome! The fifth color is the one I started with: yellow. I use that for general flow of thoughts, but only after I’ve highlighted in pink and green.
Pretty sure Plato didn't need a highlighter and note-taking system...
I'm not sure what conclusion I am to draw from that. Please clarify.
Well, you (tongue in cheek) quoted Plato in support of your "invention" and reading your work it seems as though you believe this system is necessary for learning and understanding. So I was (tongue in cheek) responding by pointing out that, for thousands of years, better educated men and women than us have lived and learnt without highlighters or notebooks, and so I think there is something faulty with your whole premise. For someone who is so involved in Classical education, this is an incredibly modern system.
I mean, Plato wrote that one of the "dangers" of writing too much was its detrimental affect on memory and understanding. Perhaps there is a better way, or, at least an acknowledgement that such a system is a weakness and not a strength.
Andrew, isn't it time for the next notes installment? Not that I want to rush you...
Best,
Stephen
Working on it. I'm sure all my explanations will end up in the post but it has to do with conferences, articles, running a not-for-profit, and welcoming a new grandson into the world. I'm frustrated myself and with myself, but it'll come asap.
Congratulations on the grandson!! I have one, too, and he's a gift from Heaven! Write what you can when you can. Enjoy the events of your life.
Stephen
I've worked through these 3 lessons--it wasn't hard since it only required a few small yet thrilling shifts from how I already use notebooks--and I find myself anticipating with such eagerness the lesson that will explain what the 4 pen colors are for.
Coming fairly soon!
About your Confucius quote... I agree that one should have a reason for choosing a neighborhood! When we moved it was to be near family (as in across the street!). When the exiles in the OT returned home, they established a place of worship first. When we moved to our new state, choosing a church was primary. So yes, let's place thought, care, consideration, and wisdom in view when we assign relationships between things and purposes for those things. That is yet another way of bringing order to chaos.
Thanks for the insight and personal application!
Thank you, Andrew! I'm a little behind in my reading, but this is all fitting together beautifully! As a confirmed "highlighter with colors", I would encourage anyone reading this to give that a try!
What I have learned from these lessons so far:
*chaos and order are both necessary and one need not fear either.
*however, one need not remain stuck in either a state of chaos or order because that wouldn't be productive
*Just take the notes! Don't worry about how they might or might not relate to the ones before or after. That's the beauty of this! Looking for the harmony and relationships is being in a place of wonder and discovery.
*One area I want to grow in, and I do believe this processing skill will help, is my ability to think and reflect before noting thoughts. I tend to want to get the actual, literal, words/notes down in my book and then call it "good." But I can see the benefit in taking time to think and include the extra layer of my reflections about those literal words and notes. Does this make sense?
Thank you so much for continuing this series! I'm looking forward to the next steps!
Good stuff. When it comes to getting your thoughts and notes expressed with the right words or following reflection, the notebook can be the place for that reflection. As you know, the thought in your mind goes on a long journey before it reaches the end of your pen.
Thanks for this series! I’m curious what your thoughts are on pages that don’t end up full. Do you ever return to add to them or does it stay sparse? I’ve been returning to some of my earlier pages, but I wonder if there are any “processing considerations” or other ideas
Good question. The biggest issue when you return to a page is that you may have already indexed it and ticked it as indexed. In that case, I just add a circle next to the tick mark or else add it immediately to the index. I don’t hesitate to turn back to pages with more space.
Thanks for the good question!
Tick mark? Did I miss something? Are we dealing with arachnids now in our note-taking? Do we have to train them? Feed them blood? Have special innoculations? This seemed really good at the start but seems to be going in a strange direction. Too many legs...
I haven't started this process yet. I've just been writing things in a single notebook, but the question of finding things later had occurred to me. My method has been to put icons in the margin, such a a lightbulb for ideas, exclamation mark for something interesting or amazing, i for investigate further, happy faces, sad faces, etc. It's rather easy to scan through and pick out a specific icon, which corresponds more or less to different coloured highlighters. This new system has merit but I can also see it getting unwieldly. As time goes on, obviously some older notes would be related to newer ones. But what if you don't remember writing the older ones, and especially if they're in a previous volume?
Good questions. Have you had opportunity to read the earlier lessons? I show in them how to index notes.
I like your approach a lot but suspect it works better for the short than for the long term. Do you think that is right or am I missing something?
I did read them, and I like the indexing idea, but it seems like a lot of work to go back, after writing a note, to all your previous volumes and refer to their indices to add links back and forth. Also, my current notebook is a complete hodge-podge. There might be several single lines for things I want to dig into later, then 3 pages of something on an unrelated topic that just interests me, like how to build a cabin, random ideas, fun things that happened today, etc. Your method would be fantastic for studying or research, but I can't quite see it fitting into normal journaling, not that I'd call mine normal. I'm eager to read the rest of your series to see how you use it and how it helps you.
Interesting discussion; thank you both.
I’m experimenting with using the left hand side for my version of simple mind mapping/bubble chart. This helps me sort the jumble of thoughts/ideas. And yes, I have already started adding ToC and indices to project journals (e.g. all my Substack writing ideas in one place!, and an art show project I need to start visualising).
I also like the suggestions for a go-easy start to indexing old journals.
You have identified the core challenge and the central question!
The question is: what am I doing this for?
The challenge is: what do I do with all the notes already written over the (in my case) decades?
The way you are journaling makes total sense for getting thoughts out. What you might need to determine is whether you want to access some of them in the future and if so what for.
Research would be one thing, as you indicated. Another reason to access in the future might for a project, like building a cabin.
It is perfectly good and permissible to write notes about something for no other reason than that you enjoyed noticing or discovering something. We could call that “curiosity.” Those are notes you have no intention of ever needing.
If the notes are for a project and/or for research, that’s when you’ll want a way to find it in the future. For those notes, I recommend an index.
If you have lots of notes from over the years, creating an index for each would be like opening a vein just enough to make your blood drain out slowly over the next few years. It would be too awful to consider.
What you could do, however, is identify a project or topic that you have thought about over the years, create or identify a page for it in your current J or P, and then scan old notebooks one at a time during leisure moments. You could use the page in J or P as a specific project index. That way you could gather at least some of the older information without being overwhelmed by all your old notebooks.
If you find yourself wanting to index and link things, I’d start with an index for your current notebook and get some practice with it. After you feel comfortable with the idea, then I’d add the project index within a current notebook that I described above.
Thank you for explaining to me what you’ve been doing. Even if I’ve missed your point and been no help at all, you’ve been helpful to me because you gave me the chance to think closely about how to do this!
Actually, you've been very helpful. I only started making a journal about a year ago. Before that, I had random scribbled pieces of paper, some of which I transcribed into specific notebooks for art or writing. I had another notebook where I wrote how-to's for my graphics program and another for webinars I attended, whatever the subject. But yes, finding the info I need when I need it becomes a retrieval issue, so I'm definitely going to spend some time indexing those, as well as the general notebook I'm currently using. I love the idea of a summary project page as a starting point to collect the bits and pieces on a specific subject. And now another question: how do you deal with things that are somewhat related but not closely related? Let's say I have a bunch of notes on philosophy. I can index them by philosopher and subject. But if a dozen philosophers have something to note on the same topic, e.g. the nature of reality, it could make a huge chore of cross-linking. Is that another example of a project index? And do you ever use the left-hand page for anything? It seems wasteful not to. And I bet by now you're sorry I subscribed!
If you hadn't subscribed I wouldn't know your questions and therefore would be unable to answer them and therefore would have less clarity in my own thoughts. So, I'm very glad you've subscribed. : )
As to the notes on the same topic, I have three options for you, one of which you will hate me for.
Option one: insert a topic index that works just like a project index, in your notebook on a given page. The main index could be "reality" or "reality, philosophers on." Then write the page number where you write the topic index and give it some sort of identification, like an X or In or T (for topic).
Then use that page to index the philosophers and their statements. I would cross reference the books or articles in this case, unless you have written responses to them in your journals. I'll describe how to do this in a later post when we go beyond visiting your neighbor to flying somewhere else.
Option 2: create a 4th notebook: a compendium on the topic. This too will come up later, so don't tell anybody you are in on the secret. The idea here is to set aside a whole notebook devoted entirely to one topic and operate it like a journal. I have a few of these. One for teaching Latin, one for World War II, another for crime fiction, and a bunch for the quadrivium, which is a personal obsession.
Don't start a second till you've been crazy enough to do a first. These are actually kind of dangerous because you can use them to relieve pressure from your journals, but in my opinion that pressure should build until it is unbearalbe.
Option 3: Index cards. Create topic indexes on 4X6 index cards and key them to your notebooks. I suppose I should add that I'll be describing this in more detail later!
Thanks for your questions. I won't always be able to answer them in any detail, but I'll alway be grateful for them.
I'm not sure which option you think I'll hate you for but my least favourite is #3. I actually lean toward #2, because I do tend to have quite specific areas I want to make notes on. I'm really looking forward to the rest of the series.
Fatique, en Francais?
Good catch. I saw it after it was sent. But as you could see I was trying to sneak as much French in as I could…
Thank you for this. I had begun cross referencing in the body of the note, but arrow/address in lower right corner is much more visible. Re Underlining … I might experiment with this, but I got only four of the five colour/purposes: green,orange,pink,blue. What would be the fifth? Merci
You’re welcome! The fifth color is the one I started with: yellow. I use that for general flow of thoughts, but only after I’ve highlighted in pink and green.