Jorge Arango in Duly Noted

Notes are not just for enhancing memory; they can be idea generators and thought sparkers.

Why did I pick this book?

I came across this book in the Obsidian Forum and since I was already familiar with Jorge Arango’s work/podcast, I decided to pick this up. Also Jorge uses Obsidian in the examples of this book 😎.

If this book could be summarised into one word, it would be Gardener.

If this book was a character, it would be a Renaissance Man figure like Leonardo Da Vinci, also famous for his notebooks filled with observations, sketches, and ideas spanning various fields. This book, like him, explores the principles for connecting ideas, visualizing relationships, and nurturing a dynamic knowledge garden.

What were the ideas that I liked and want to explore?

I had expected this book to be a recap of a few books on the same theme: How to Take Smart Notes by Sönke Ahrens and Tiago Forte’s Building a Second Brain. As I had read those books earlier, some content felt redundant, but I loved the three simple rules into which Jorge Arango had distilled the essence of the book:

1. Make short notes.
2. Connect your notes.
3. Nurture your notes.

• I was using a TiddlyWiki as a commonplace book for more than a decade. The term, knowledge garden seemed an good alternative to digital gardens, another popular term.
• I loved the idea of a minimally viable note (MVN) as a seed for notes and then adding a thick description to enhance the note. I think it ties up with the idea of gradual enrichment.
• Three different models for interacting with AI are mentioned:
  • AI as an editor: You use AI tools like Grammarly to help you polish up your notes. ¹
  • AI as a ghostwriter: You use AI to create content based on your prompts using tools like ChatGPT.
  • AI as an Amanuensis: This model lies somewhere between the editor and the ghostwriter. AI acts as a digital amanuensis, offering summaries of your notes, suggesting relevant research materials, and even acting as a sounding board for your ideas. ²
• Jorge mentions always writing for the Future You which I felt was in line with my connecting my future and past selves idea.

How did I put this into action?

• AI as an amanuensis is an idea I felt I could get behind and also put into action. That was the biggest takeaway for me from this book.
  • I uploaded my notes and highlights from this book to Google’s NotebookLM. I then proceeded to ask it questions, clarify some of my thoughts, and improve my understanding of the book. I’mm planning to do this for the currently reading ones and future books.
• In his Personal Knowledge Mastery framework, Harold Jarche advocates sharing ideas as a way to grow knowledge. I was not sharing my notes with an audience. I wanted to rectify that part and so I’m pivoting this site from a blog-style to garden-style.
• I’ve started creating more MVN notes in the first pass and adding thick descriptions in my second pass.

What were the questions that this book prompted?

• [?] What would the right sort of a minimally viable note (MVN)? Can I come up with a template?
• [?] How do I future-proof this knowledge garden? I’ve been using TiddlyWiki for more than a decade and half and Obsidian for almost four years now. What would the knowledge garden look like next: Potluck perhaps?
• [?] Knowing myself, what is the time commitment I can split between new notes versus maintenance? How much time will be meta-work/admin tax for this garden?

Footnotes

1. I used Gemini for reviewing the content for language and logical fallacies. ↩

2. I used NotebookLM by asking questions about the book based on my notes. The idea was from Steven Johnson | How To Use NotebookLM As A Research Tool ↩