We don’t write things down to remember them. We write them down to forget.
My workflow for Thought Shrapnel is roughly: come across interesting article, save it to Pocket, revisit and write about it. There are plenty of articles that I don’t write about, and I sometimes go on hiatus from this blog for a while.
As I get older, I don’t really understand the desire to capture all of the things and link them together. It can become fetishistic, and obession. I seem to do alright in my personal and professional lives in terms of remembering stuff and combining them in new and interesting ways. And don’t particularly have a ‘system’. I just remember stuff that I’ve written about, and especially when I’ve written about it multiple times.
This article talks about the freedom of forgetting stuff. We’re loathe to let things go into the ether because we ascribe value to the things we’ve collected. However, I suppose because I’ve collected, written, and jettisoned so much stuff in my life, I’m very comfortable in getting rid of it. I don’t need a million tabs open, a bookmarks manager stuffed with links, or a meticulous system. My approach is based on curiosity, interest, and writing about stuff.
That’s the true value of notebooks, notes apps, bookmarking tools, and everything else built to help us remember. They’re insurance for ideas. They let us forget.
[…]
We need to forget, but we first must feel safe forgetting.
[…]
We didn’t need bookmarks and notes as much as we needed the safety of letting go. Anywhere we could save our thoughts was enough.
Source: Reproof
Image: Omar Al-Ghosson