Most productivity advice about note-taking is total bullshit.
It promises transformation but delivers complexity that nobody can sustain.
After a decade of trying every system under the sun — from Cornell to bullet journals to fancy apps with subscription fees — I’ve concluded: the perfect system doesn’t exist.
What does exist is a process that sucks less than the alternatives. One that works with your flawed, distractible brain instead of against it.
The most sophisticated note-taking system is useless if you abandon it after a week.
I’m not here to sell you something. I’m here to share what actually worked after years of failing at capturing information in a way that stuck.
My approach isn’t pretty or Instagram-worthy, but it might just help you remember the important stuff when you actually need it.
And honestly, isn’t that the whole damn point?
PHASE 1
I call this the “Dump Truck” phase, and it’s exactly as elegant as it sounds.
When encountering new information — whether reading a book, listening to a lecture, or researching a topic — I just throw everything into a pile without judgment.
The messier your initial notes, the more they reflect the natural state of learning. Learning isn’t neat or linear.
It’s a jumbled process of connections, confusions, and occasional clarity.
For this phase:
Use a simple - frictionless tool
Include direct quotes, half-formed thoughts, and questions
Don’t worry about organization or categorization
Focus on capturing what seems interesting, not what seems important
The beauty of Phase 1 is freedom.
You’re not committing to anything; you’re just creating raw material to refine later.
It’s like throwing all your laundry on the bed before sorting — you need to see everything before you can make sense of anything.
PHASE 2
Welcome to the “What the fuck was I thinking?” phase.
This is where I revisit my chaotic Phase 1 notes and figure out if there’s actually anything worth keeping.
Spoiler alert: about 70% is useless. But that’s fine.
The key is creating distance between capture and review — I wait at least a day before revisiting.
This temporal gap acts as a filter; the truly important stuff will still resonate, while the midnight “profundities” will reveal themselves as bullshit.
During this phase:
Look for patterns, connections, and contradictions
Transform isolated facts into a coherent understanding
Add context that was missing from the initial notes
Question the material — talk back to your notes
Good notes aren’t just records of what you learned; they’re records of how you’re thinking about what you learned.
By the end of Phase 2, you have a mess with landmarks — not organized, but at least navigable.
PHASE 3
This is the “Extraction and integration” phase.
First step: delete at least half of what remains from Phase 2. This isn’t about saving space — it’s about signal-to-noise ratio.
Information you don’t use isn’t an asset; it’s a liability.
For surviving content, I categorize it into:
Concepts: The big ideas and frameworks
Facts: Specific information that supports concepts
Questions: Unresolved issues and areas for exploration
I standardize formats across subjects, making future retrieval predictable. When I need something later, I know exactly where it belongs.
It’s like having keys always in the same bowl — you don’t waste time searching the entire house.
By the end of Phase 3, my notes transform from annotated chaos into structured knowledge units.
Not pretty, but functional — and in note-taking as in life, function beats form every time.
PHASE 4
This is the “Make it stick or don’t bother” phase.
Having notes doesn’t mean you know the subject.
I spent years deluding myself that extensive notes equaled knowledge. Nope — all I had was a digital filing cabinet I never opened.
Instead of passive storage, I now use:
Spaced repetition: Reviewing at increasing intervals
Contextual retrieval practice: Explaining concepts to others or writing summaries from memory
Deliberate connection-making: Finding links between notes from different subjects
The struggle to recall and apply information is what makes it stick.
If you’re not willing to put in this work, just delete your notes and save yourself the illusion of learning.
Information in isolation is worthless; it’s the connections and applications that transform it into usable knowledge.
PHASE 5
The final “Death and rebirth” phase is where your knowledge either proves its worth or gets culled.
Most of what we learn has a shockingly short half-life — technical details become outdated, frameworks get replaced, even “facts” can be overturned.
Every six months, I conduct a “knowledge audit” with one question:
“Has this information earned its keep?”
If it hasn’t influenced my thinking or helped solve problems, it’s probably not as valuable as I thought.
Look, at the end of the day, your note-taking system is like your diet or your meditation practice — it only works if you actually do it.
The five phases I’ve outlined aren’t commandments handed down from productivity heaven. They’re just what’s sucked the least for me after years of trial and error.
The truth is, we’re all drowning in information while starving for wisdom.
The ultimate measure of your notes isn’t how organized they are, but how they change your mind.
Everything else is just intellectual masturbation.
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