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Building a Second Brain

| Marco Caloba

Introduction

Reading is one of the most enriching experiences that anyone can have, but finding the time to read every book that catches our eye can be challenging. Moreover, if we only rely on reading to absorb the contents of books, we are likely to forget much of what we have learned soon after. This is where book summaries can come in handy. As an avid reader, I have found that writing a summary of a book's key lessons not only provides easy access to valuable information in the future but also helps me reflect on how I can apply these insights to my own life.

This post is part of a series where I will provide my summaries of some of the best books I’m reading. I intend to offer readers an opportunity to get a glimpse of what a book has to offer before deciding whether to invest their time in it. Whether you're a book lover or just someone looking to explore new ideas, I hope my book summaries will provide you with some valuable insights.

Overall impressions

This is my favourite book to date. It’s always hard to compare books because there are just to many factors to take in account, and that would make most comparisons unfair. As an avid reader, I've come across numerous books that have left a lasting impression on me. However, this particular book has struck a different chord, providing new perspectives on subjects that are vital to my life while offering practical advice that I could easily apply. Not many books offer that.

The most impactful part of the book for me was realising that time and attention (aka effort) are precious assets that should be treated as such. By investing my time and energy into everything I do, I'm learning to work in a way that maximizes the returns of my efforts. Also, rather than relying on my memory, which tends to fail me, the book provides practical advice that encourages the capture and organisation of content in a way that can be easily used by my future self.

With time, this system will work as a compound vehicle for all the subjects I'm interested in and dedicate my time to learning on a daily basis. Whenever I start a new project, I won't be starting with a blank page and a faulty memory. Instead, I'll have a wealth of information slowly burning in my second brain, allowing me to use my first brain for what it does best: creative thinking. Building upon all the intermediate packets I stored along the way, I can create great things with less effort. It's no wonder that this book has become my all-time favorite!

Key lessons

  1. Use your attention as an asset

We all have twenty-four hours in a day, but how many of those hours include our highest-quality attention? Our attention is a valuable resource that should be treated like an investment that yields a return, which can then be reinvested for future growth. By doing so, we can ensure that our knowledge grows and becomes more valuable over time, just like a high-yield asset.

In my day-to-day life, I usually consume a lot of great information through several media like youtube, books, articles, podcasts, etc. I find these sources of information to be fascinating and enjoy learning new perspectives and insights on topics that interest me. However, the problem I face is that I lack a system that allows me to fully take advantage of all this great content. Typically, I would read or watch something and then move on without putting any of the knowledge into practice. Sometimes I would share it with my loved ones or save it for future reference, but I needed a way to actually implement what I was learning into my life. A statement made by Tiago in the book resonated with me: “What are the odds that an insight from a podcast interview is immediately actionable? More likely, some of it will be relevant now, but most of it will become relevant only at some point in the future.” I realised that I was unable to utilize the knowledge immediately despite it being great content.

To ensure that I am able to deliver my best work when an opportunity arises, I know that I cannot afford to start from scratch with research and reading. Instead, I strive to have a solid foundation of knowledge in place, with ideas already burning in the background. By taking the time to prepare in advance, I am gifting my future self with easily accessible knowledge that requires minimal effort to organise, distill, and express. This not only saves time and effort, but also helps me to be better equipped to face future challenges and opportunities.

Instead of mindlessly consuming more and more content, I've decided to establish a proper system that allows me to take a more deliberate and thoughtful approach. This means prioritising the practice of rereading, reformulating, and fully digesting ideas over time. By treating the information I consume as valuable knowledge assets and implementing the “Intermediate Packets” strategy outlined in the book, I can make the most of my time and effort. This approach enables me to accumulate reusable building blocks over time, which I can draw upon when starting new projects. Instead of starting from scratch, I'll have a collection of well-organised building blocks that reflect my long-term efforts to make sense of the world.

 

2. Organise by action, not by category

I consider myself to be quite organised and liked to keep things in order. However, I didn't have a specific method for storing information or files, so I just followed the common practice of organising them by categories. After reading this book, I learned a method that makes a lot more sense to me: organising by actionability. Rather than just categorising ideas based on their source, I will also use my organisation system to categorise them based on where they are going, such as projects or areas of life. The true value of knowledge is not in its perfect organisation or labeling, but in its ability to have an impact on something or someone that is meaningful to me.

In order to efficiently organise all types of information, I will adopt the PARA method which can be applied to any source and for any purpose. Rather than sorting notes using a complex hierarchy of topics and subtopics, I will follow a simple order:

  1. In which project will this be most useful?

  2. No current project? Then, does it fit into any area of my life?

  3. No area right now for it? Send it to the resources.

This method will help me streamline my information organisation and ensure that all valuable knowledge is easily accessible when needed.

Actionable advices

I believe that the book's most valuable insights are already summarised in the previous sections. However, the book has motivated me to create my own "second brain" system using Notion and Apple Notes. While I won't delve into the specifics in this post, it's a project that I'm excited to share more about in the future. Stay tuned for a dedicated blog post on that topic.

Highlights from the book

The best quotes I gathered from this book:

  • “We spend countless hours reading, listening to, and watching other people’s opinions about what we should do, how we should think, and how we should live, but make comparatively little effort applying that knowledge and making it our own. (…) Instead of consuming ever-greater amounts of content, we should take on a more patient, thoughtful approach that favors rereading, reformulating, and working through the implications of ideas over time.”

  • “So many of us share the feeling that we are surrounded by knowledge, yet starving for wisdom. That despite all the mind-expanding ideas we have access to, the quality of our attention is only getting worse.”

  • “Knowledge is best applied through execution, which means whatever doesn’t help you make progress on your projects is probably detracting from them. (…) To truly “know” something, it’s not enough to read about it in a book. Ideas are merely thoughts until you put them into action. “

  • “As you distill your ideas, they naturally improve, because when you drop the merely good parts, the great parts can shine more brightly.”

  • “Treat your attention as an asset that gets invested and produces a return, which in turn can be reinvested back into other ventures. This is how you can ensure your knowledge grows and compounds over time like a high-yield asset.”

Some videos about this book that I found helpful:

Resources

Some resources that were mentioned throughout the book and others that I found while browsing this topic:

  1. Books:

    • Getting Things Done - David Allen

  2. Websites:

  3. Articles:

LinkdIn; GitHub; Medium; Goodreads.

To read next

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I completed a project centered on building a Django Rest Framework-powered REST API for a road traffic monitoring dashboard. The API manages road segments, capturing crucial data such as average vehicle speed, traffic intensity characterization, and timestamps of recordings. The project includes features like interactive API documentation, data loading into the database, user management via Django Admin, and unit testing.

Daily Quotes

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In the past few years, my daily reading habit has evolved into a practice of creating comprehensive book summaries, capturing key insights, quotes, and my personal reflections. These notes represent my commitment to personal growth and being the best version of myself. However, with time, it has become challenging to recall all the valuable teachings I've encountered. To address this, I've centralised my notes and quotes in my Notion's second brain. Taking it a step further, I connected a Python script to Notion's API and seamlessly integrate these personal notes into daily quote emails. This automation not only provides convenient access to motivational quotes but also serves as a periodic reminder of my own insights and reflections.

Kobo to Notion

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In today's fast-paced world, personal development is a key focus for many individuals seeking growth and self-improvement. To ensure that I extract the maximum value from each book I read, I began compiling book summaries in Notion. I used to rely on a website to access my Kobo highlights, and manually copy and past them into Notion. Determined to automate this process, I made this Python script that allows me to seamlessly send my Kobo highlights directly to my Notion, saving time and effort while preserving the essence of my reading experience.