How To Deal With Information Overwhelm - Tiago Forte

1. 0:00 – 1:47

   Intro

   1. TFTiago Forte0:00

      You can just imagine someone with 100% creativity and 0% productivity. They might have the most brilliant imagination and ideas, and no one would ever know, and it won't ever matter because not one piece of work will be finished. And then you have someone full of productivity, no creativity, they're basically a machine just churning out identical widgets. Productivity is about getting it done. Creativity is about getting it right.

   2. CWChris Williamson0:22

      Tiago Forte, welcome to the show.

   3. TFTiago Forte0:24

      It's great to be here, Chris. It's been a while.

   4. CWChris Williamson0:26

      Three and a half years, it's been. A very long while.

   5. TFTiago Forte0:31

      Yeah. I'm, I'm excited to ... I don't ... (clears throat) In fact, I very rarely do follow-up episodes, so I'm glad we can have a part two.

   6. CWChris Williamson0:37

      Me too. Are you ... Would you consider yourself the new David Allen now of 2022?

   7. TFTiago Forte0:43

      (laughs) S- Other people have said that. I, I try to be modest, but I mean, that's my, that's my aspiration, to be honest. If I can make even half the impact he made on the world, I'd be, I'd go to my grave happy.

   8. CWChris Williamson0:56

      Why? Why is he a hero?

   9. TFTiago Forte0:58

      (clears throat) I think just the way he did it. There's a lot of thought leaders, a lot of productivity authors, a lot of people who have created methodologies, but I think the fact that he, he took it to its full potential, I think is the main thing. It's so ... It would be so easy to just write one book after another, sort of roam around to different subjects, make a name for yourself, but he just spent decade upon decade really just translating his principles into every format, every medium, every channel to really make sure it reached, you know, the ends of the earth. And I just admire that kind of persistence on one thing because, because it's so important for people.

   10. CWChris Williamson1:37

       The fact that people still use the GTD method 30 years after he first wrote about it, I think kind of shows the test of time. So given

2. 1:47 – 5:58

   How to Avoid Productivity Obsession

   1. CWChris Williamson1:47

      the fact that you're someone who spends a lot of time thinking about systems and productivity and stuff like that, how do you and how can other people avoid obsessing over productivity too much? Because looking at productivity can become a task in i- like a Sisyphean task in itself, and it can end up being super unproductive because of your constant obsession about tools and techniques and tactics.

   2. TFTiago Forte2:10

      Yeah, it's a great question. It can easily become a hobby. It can become a lifestyle, right? So the way I think of this is productivity is a phase. (clears throat) There's a career in, or there's a s- a s- a phase in your career, in your job, in your business where you should obsess about pro- about productivity, if you just make it as efficient as possible. But then it's ... Productivity, it's like reading and writing and arithmetic. It's this, this foundational fundamental layer, right? Like, like if you don't have just the basic ability to like say you're going to do something and then do it, to just cl- clearly go from step one to step two to step three, which is what productivity is, nothing else you do, no other source of leverage is going to work for you. You don't have to perfect it. You don't have to take it to te- level ten, just get to like level six or seven. (laughs) Um, and then you move on to essentially higher sources of leverage, which are creativity, which are management, leadership, uh, creating content, leveraging systems. Like there's all these things that, that are much higher order, but that you need that basic personal productivity to take advantage of.

   3. CWChris Williamson3:18

      Yeah, I like that. I think, um, a lot of the time when we're thinking about the stuff that we do in life and the tasks that we have in front of us and the, um, personal development that we're doing, we look at what we're working on now and forget that we're going to complete that at some point, or at least I do. I ... My time discounting basically doesn't exist, and I just see an endless ... Uh, let's say that I'm working on my overhead position in the gym or I'm learning the Pomodoro technique or something. That's it. That's me for the rest of time. But it's not, it's not. Y- y- the ... You're right. The analogy is precisely correct between arithmetic or learning maths or learning s- something in school, right? You don't go back and learn what two plus two equals now.

   4. TFTiago Forte3:57

      No.

   5. CWChris Williamson3:57

      It's there. You now are able to build off the back of that knowledge.

   6. TFTiago Forte4:00

      Yeah.

   7. CWChris Williamson4:00

      So if you were to say, uh, if you were to create a high level, uh, syllabus, or if you were to just pick the main things that people need to know, what would, uh, your productivity driver's license, what would it consist of?

   8. TFTiago Forte4:14

      Yeah, it's great. (clears throat) I, I really like thinking about this because people always want to know the maximalist, most sophisticated, powerful, advanced version. I don't think we use-

   9. CWChris Williamson4:24

      N- Minimum, minimum viable productivity system.

   10. TFTiago Forte4:27

       All the way. I mean, in school, you know, a C, 70% is passing. Just try to pass. (laughs) Uh, I, I would really point people to code the methodology, which is the, the heart of my book and my, everything I teach, and the, the important thing is to realize it's not a, a tool, it's an, it's a, it's an activity. So you need some way that the four letters of code capture, organize, distill, express. You need some way of capturing. Doesn't have to look any particular way. It could be writing on your arm, it could be capturing voice memos, it could be bookmarking websites. There's just so many ways. Just have one, just one reliable way to capture content, you're great, right? Organize, which I would just say is some way of organizing that content. Doesn't have to be my PARA approach, doesn't have to be by category, does ... Definitely shouldn't be very meticulous, but some way of adding structure to your notes. And then the same for distill, some way of distilling, some way of expressing. It's almost like there's an analogy here to personal finance. In personal finance, you need to earn, you need to spend, you need to save, and you need to invest, right? Everyone, for the most part, who is beyond the most basic needs, is doing those four things. But y- m- I don't think most people would say, "Oh, I have a personal financial system. This is my personal financial workflow." No, they just kind of generally know that those four things are happening somewhere in their lives, and that's enough to live a financially successful life. Same goes for knowledge.

3. 5:58 – 15:06

   The Need for a Second Brain

   1. TFTiago Forte5:58

   2. CWChris Williamson5:58

      Why do ... Why does anyone need a second brain?

   3. TFTiago Forte6:05

      Yeah, (clears throat) it's funny. I often tell people, "You don't," and this is actually a good little accountability, is whatever you're trying to do, like writing or podcasting or building a business, there is someone e- out there, there is someone out there, many people who are doing that without a second brain. Like, obviously, right? (laughs) There are people writing books with no particular note-taking system, people building incredible businesses, having the relationships they wanna have, reaching their goals. So, it's not so much like, a lot of self-improvement authors or people with a system will say, "No, all of your success, your entire future rests" (laughs) "on this thing." And I, I have to just be honest and say, like, a second brain is kind of optional. Um, but what I would say is, for certain people in certain situations who are people who have to deal with a lot of information, who have to make sense of that information and make decisions on it, who have to create things, whether content or events or proposals or slides, if there's some kind of creative output, you will save unimaginable amounts of time, energy, headache, stress, and have just much greater peace of mind. It, with a more ... A second brain is really just a more rigorous approach to doing those things that you're already doing.

   4. CWChris Williamson7:25

      Is there a danger w- when you start to do the second brain thing, which I've been familiar with for three or four years, I think, since I first read your blog post on it. One of the guys, I'm very good friends with Yousef, basically became addicted to indexing information.

   5. TFTiago Forte7:40

      (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson7:40

      Um, he saw any potentially entertaining or useful thing that he ever consumed or heard on the radio or whatever as fodder to be put into his personal knowledge management system. So-

   7. TFTiago Forte7:55

      Yeah.

   8. CWChris Williamson7:56

      ... given that the sort of people that are going to be attracted to building a second brain are probably the kind of people that already have a predisposition to like indexing information and not forgetting cool stuff that they've learned or may want to use in future, what is a good way for someone to temper that, um, propensity?

   9. TFTiago Forte8:17

      Yeah, I, I feel like those people is me. (laughs)

   10. CWChris Williamson8:20

       You are these people.

   11. TFTiago Forte8:22

       Yeah, I mean, that, that's, that's my whole audience. That's my, that's my target market. Uh, I mean, if, if there was, uh, someone out there, and there are many people who have no interest, propensity, or desire to do this, they're ... I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna ... You know, im- imagine me working with, like, an elite athlete or artist or musician, being like, "Okay, you need to set aside, you know, your craft, and you really need to sit here at your computer and just, like, take notes on things." (laughs) I, I'm basically talking to people who can't help but take notes, can't help ... who, who, their, the organization of their digital life is actually the roadblock from a, a, like a psychological point of view. They can't move forward because of the clutter and the disorder. Um, so if you're that kind of person, what I would say is (clears throat) to just shift how you're spending your time from consumption to creation, right? Like, this is, this is a very powerful exercise. Just look at the time that you spend. This can be very ballpark. What percentage of, say, your time, how many minutes a day or hours per week are dedicated to consuming information, right? It's probably 100% or close to 100%. What would it look like, just imagine the possibility that you could shift 10% of that over here to the other column, which is creating things out of the information you consume. Just try it. I don't know, maybe you won't like it. Maybe you'll decide, "You know what, Tiago? I, I, I'm fine just, you know, consuming this stuff." But if you find that you start to have benefits, you're ... like all sorts of things I, I'm willing to bet are gonna happen. You will feel more confident in what you consume and what you know. You'll start to make connections with people as you share this, these things you're creating. You will, um, develop your own ideas and your own ways of thinking about this content. All these things will start to arise, and if that happens, just keep shifting hours from the first column to the second column. I feel like at this point I spend probably 70 or 80% of my time creating things. It's like, I already know enough. I've read a lot of books. (laughs) I only d- need to consume a little bit just to keep my ideas circulating, and mostly I just want to produce things that are gonna benefit others.

   12. CWChris Williamson10:29

       That is kind of like a macro version of what we were talking about earlier on. You know, you learn the foundations and then you start to implement. There's a, I, I first learned it in, uh, Atomic Habits, but I'm gonna guess it's probably, uh, commonly held productivity wisdom in your world, uh, the explore/exploit, uh-

   13. TFTiago Forte10:44

       Yes.

   14. CWChris Williamson10:44

       ... spectrum.

   15. TFTiago Forte10:45

       Yes.

   16. CWChris Williamson10:45

       And, and, uh, w- the, for the people that aren't familiar, basically that when you first begin out pretty much doing anything, but especially in a career or in a life, the goal is to explore more than you exploit. So, you don't actually know what you're good at or what's going to be effective for you or strategies and tools and stuff, and then over time you're supposed to begin to discriminate more towards exploit, i.e., you go narrow and deep on a few things that you know have the highest points of leverage and then you continue to move through there. That is something that's very attractive to me because there is a never good enough sensation, there is a, a, a feeling in the back of a lot of people's minds that they're not ready, and even if they start to create and start to see success, that there's still some sense of lack. And I think that after a while just knowing, "Look, I have enough minimum viable information to get me through." And here's the, here's the big thing, execution is so much more rare than planning is.

   17. TFTiago Forte11:41

       Oh.

   18. CWChris Williamson11:41

       The vast majority of people on the internet are people that plan and pontificate and talk-

   19. TFTiago Forte11:45

       Yeah.

   20. CWChris Williamson11:45

       ... and make, make ideas-

   21. TFTiago Forte11:47

       Yeah.

   22. CWChris Williamson11:47

       ... but don't actually end up executing. There's this interesting statistic around the fact that planning is among the top 10 words across all of LinkedIn bios and execution doesn't even make the top 100.

   23. TFTiago Forte11:58

       (laughs)

   24. CWChris Williamson11:59

       So, what does that tell us? It tells us that people are discriminating toward those that can have good ideas, but, you know, if planning is the, uh, numerator or if, if, if planning is the constant, then execution is the multiplier, right?

   25. TFTiago Forte12:13

       Yeah.

   26. CWChris Williamson12:13

       And, um, you had this great tweet a while ago, man, and I, I must have quoted it.... so many times. Um, "A paradoxal- paradoxical thing about people who consistently choose the most high leverage activity is their efforts have a rough-edged, half-assed quality because polishing things to perfection is a low leverage activity."

   27. TFTiago Forte12:35

       (laughs)

   28. CWChris Williamson12:36

       And someone replied, someone replied, some guy out of nowhere that said, "Perfectionism is a nice way to hide from shipping at a pace necessary to find what works."

   29. TFTiago Forte12:46

       Mm. I hadn't seen that reply. That's brilliant.

   30. CWChris Williamson12:50

       Seriously good.
4. 15:06 – 23:36

   What is a Commonplace Book?

   1. TFTiago Forte15:06

   2. CWChris Williamson15:06

      What's a commonplace book?

   3. TFTiago Forte15:11

      Commonplace book is the, the analog forerunner of what I'm trying to do. (clears throat) Uh, I'm a big student of history. I read... The only genre that I read more of than history is science fiction. So basically, I only read about the far future or the far past (laughs) . I'm, I'm, I, I have this, this series of tweets where I joke that presence is overrated, like the present time is like... it's so limited. There's only one present but infinite pasts and infinite futures (laughs) . I made all the, uh, the Buddhist, Buddhist Twitter crowd mad (laughs) . Um, but yeah, I just... when I can find a parallel in history for anything, I'm just ten times more confident in it. I don't think there's anything new under the sun really. It's just repeated. And-

   4. CWChris Williamson15:58

      Where did you first hear about a commonplace book?

   5. TFTiago Forte16:02

      Yeah, I think I first heard ab- I don't remember exactly. It's been out. There's been mention of it, you know, on the internet for some time. Uh, but getting... really going back to the source and, and studying it, it reoccurs throughout history (clears throat) especially during times of unusual change and uncertainty and times where things are really... where there's sort of like some revolution, right, like the, the Enlightenment, the Renaissance, uh, antiquity, ancient Greek times. It's like when there was basically too much information, information overload. At various points throughout history, someone or some people said, "Hey, let's just get the parts that matter, put them in one, usually book, and then this will be our guide and our reference and our roadmap for what to do next."

   6. CWChris Williamson16:47

      Any famous people from history that you found that had commonplace books?

   7. TFTiago Forte16:52

      I mean, so many. They... it's almost like who didn't? I mean, John Locke is a famous one, uh, John Milton, the, uh, the English writer, uh, a lot of English people, a lot of French. I think mostly we know about the European examples the most, but I also found examples across different cultures. In China, they had something similar, in Japan, in Poland, um, and a few other places. Uh, I can't think of a lot of specific names. But it's, it's really funny. It's almost like there's this secret undercurrent through intellectual history that only pops up here and there because, in most cases, these great thinkers and artists, they either were embarrassed by this kind of underlying creative process. They'll be like, "Oh, that's just something I do. I just... it's kind of embarrassing. I just write little scraps of paper and, and put them i- in the, the drawer next to my bed," or they actually don't even see it. It's, it's kind of invisible to them, right? It's like just an invisible part of their process. So I've, I've tried... I've written some posts on my blog and tried to kind of surface these examples but, uh, a lot of great, uh, a lot of great examples from throughout history.

   8. CWChris Williamson18:04

      That's a really interesting thing to talk about, the fact that the people who are at the absolute peak of their craft are often the ones that are either far too aware or far too unaware of the way that they get to it. Now, obviously what you've had over the last, whatever, 5 to 10 years has been this huge proliferation of creators that actually deconstruct these sort of structures, you know, people like you or maybe a- a, an Ali Abdaal or someone like that who their job is to look at it with a real fine-grained sort of tooth comb.... but the reverse is also true as well. And what, what you really want is to try and find someone who was unbelievably effective but had no idea what their system was. Those are the people that you want, I don't know, like a-

   9. TFTiago Forte18:46

      Yes.

   10. CWChris Williamson18:46

       ... a, a productivity anthropologist or something to go and study in the wild-

   11. TFTiago Forte18:51

       Yeah.

   12. CWChris Williamson18:51

       ... these people who are unbelievably efficient because-

   13. TFTiago Forte18:54

       Yeah.

   14. CWChris Williamson18:55

       ... by design, a lot of the people that are productivity minded and are using productivity style tools in a, um, conscious way are all using the same tools, right?

   15. TFTiago Forte19:05

       Yeah.

   16. CWChris Williamson19:05

       No one's really experimenting that much because they go and watch some of your stuff or Ali's stuff or David's stuff or whatever, and they come up with their own version of that.

   17. TFTiago Forte19:16

       Yeah.

   18. CWChris Williamson19:16

       Who are the people that are the, you know, the Patient Zeroes of the productivity movement?

   19. TFTiago Forte19:21

       Yeah, you know, (clears throat) I've noticed this too, is, yeah, this is really, this is really a missing piece. There's really a gap kind of in the market. Um, often, I'll listen to interviews by like the most well-known people, like the most famous actors, writers, directors, whatever it is, and they say these things, these little trite truism clichés, you know? Like, e- even cla- like courses I've taken on MasterClass, like, what, what is that show, the authors, the author, or The Actor's Studio, these kind of like, kind of pretty in-depth things and then they'll say like, "Well, what's your secret?" "Oh, you just got to, you know, keep persisting and endure until the end." It's like, okay, these are, these are quotes for Hallmark cards. But I, I, I also can't blame them because they literally don't remember. They do not remember. N- not only do they, are they not aware of what they do now, because it's b- becomes completely unconscious, but do you remember what your creative process was like, or, or any detail of it from 10 years ago? Like-

   20. CWChris Williamson20:23

       Not even slightly, no.

   21. TFTiago Forte20:24

       You'd be s- it's impossible. And so they're, they, they want to give something to the audience and they want to provide something, but they're basically just tossing off something from the top of their head that they know is going to get a "Ah," from the audience. And I'm just like, "This has to change." We need, like you said, to become anthropologists. Look at people who are maybe just beginning now, by the way. They might not be those super impressive celebrities, like, people may be just ahead of you, just a couple steps down the path. Deconstruct what they do. You know, we, we just did a, last week published a YouTube video on our channel deconstructing Ali Abdaal's process. It's funny that you mention him. It's our most popular YouTube video ever, and it's because of this. Like, even Ali was like, "Oh, I didn't realize I did it this way," and his team is like, "Oh, we didn't realize this happened," and then all his subscribers are like, "Wow, w- I never realized." It's like, it's news to everyone. (laughs)

   22. CWChris Williamson21:11

       That's, uh, it's, it's interesting that you could say it may be even useful to the person that you're studying. But yeah, man, I mean, the, I had Danny Trejo, you know Danny Trejo?

   23. TFTiago Forte21:22

       Nice.

   24. CWChris Williamson21:22

       The, the Hollywood superstar? He was on the show last year.

   25. TFTiago Forte21:24

       Yes.

   26. CWChris Williamson21:24

       And he, I was asking him, because obviously he'd been to jail a bunch and he definitely was not a trained actor for the Film Actor's Guild, and I was asking him about the sort of advice that he'd been given about acting, and the, there was a scene that he had to do where he had to walk in, sit down, and pick up a glass of water and drink it, and (laughs) he gets this, the piece of advice was, "You don't act like you're going into the room to sit down to pick up a glass of water and you drink it. You just go into the room, pick up the glass of water, sit down, and you drink it." I'm like, "I, I understand that to you that makes sense, Danny, but to us that sounds like someone that has a mental problem."

   27. TFTiago Forte22:01

       (laughs)

   28. CWChris Williamson22:01

       Like that, it sounds like insanity. So I, I, I do think there's something there. Before we move on, what w- give me your five most recommended sci-fi books.

   29. TFTiago Forte22:14

       I mean, I have a list on my blog of over 100 that I've read.

   30. CWChris Williamson22:18

       Don't want that. Don't want that. Want the five most recommended.
5. 23:36 – 27:23

   The Relationship Between Productivity & Creativity

   1. TFTiago Forte23:36

   2. CWChris Williamson23:37

      Give me your understanding of the relationship between productivity and creativity, because I had Chris Bailey that wrote Hyperfocus on the show. He gave me a, a very interesting understanding of this, so I'm, I'm keen to find out your thoughts as well.

   3. TFTiago Forte23:51

      Yeah, for me they're just two sides of the same coin. (clears throat) They're two sides of the same coin. They, they complement each other, they need each other. Uh, you can just imagine someone with 100% creativity and no productivity, 0% productivity. They might have the most brilliant imagination and ideas and no one would ever know and it won't ever matter because not one piece of work will be finished. And then you have someone, say, full productivity, no creativity, they're basically a machine just churning out identical widgets. So, I think, you know, productivity is about getting it done, creativity is about getting it right, and you have to sort of oscillate and, and cycle between those or for, like we were saying with explore and exploit, in a given situation or in a given moment, which one do, i- is this a, a situation for productivity or is it a situation for creativity?

   4. CWChris Williamson24:40

      I love that. I really love the idea of, of moving between the two, and this is something that Chris taught me as well when he came on the show, about how if you look at an artist's workroom, it's very messy, there's (clears throat) cigarette ends and paint and open cans of stuff all over the ... What is that doing? It's engendering a, uh, an atmosphere of creativity. Now, if that was the environment in which that person tried to submit their tax returns, it's probably going to be suboptimal.

   5. TFTiago Forte25:08

      Yes.

   6. CWChris Williamson25:08

      They want to go somewhere which really sort of infuses them with, "Okay, this is kind of structured and, and clean-"

   7. TFTiago Forte25:14

      Yeah.

   8. CWChris Williamson25:14

      "... and, and rigid." Uh, and there was never a point, there was almost never a point where I'd presumed that I would actually want less focus and less creative- uh, less productivity.

   9. TFTiago Forte25:25

      Mm-hmm.

   10. CWChris Williamson25:25

       I always presumed that just pressing harder on the pedal of productivity was the solution to pretty much everything.

   11. TFTiago Forte25:31

       Mm-hmm.

   12. CWChris Williamson25:32

       But it's not, and I think that, uh, Alex Hormozi has this great little aphorism where he says, um, "Beginners overvalue thinking and undervalue doing. Advanced people do the opposite."

   13. TFTiago Forte25:43

       Mm.

   14. CWChris Williamson25:44

       And that, again, what we're talking about is getting from, the tools that get you from naught to 50 are not the same ones that are gonna get you from 50 to 100. The explore and exploit paradigm is part of this. The productivity and creativity is part of this.

   15. TFTiago Forte25:57

       Mm-hmm.

   16. CWChris Williamson25:57

       The thinking and doing is part of this. And-

   17. TFTiago Forte25:59

       Yes.

   18. CWChris Williamson26:00

       ... this is something else maybe that we're seeing in the productivity space, is, e- everybody grows up and you get kids and-

   19. TFTiago Forte26:08

       Yeah.

   20. CWChris Williamson26:08

       ... and, you know, like, Ali starts a business and, and David gets a girlfriend and, and stuff, like-

   21. TFTiago Forte26:13

       (laughs)

   22. CWChris Williamson26:13

       ... we're starting to see, as people grow up, their requirements in life and the insights that they get from their productivity tools change as well.

   23. TFTiago Forte26:21

       Oh, yeah. That's been fascinating for me to see, is like, just like you were saying, my cohort, the people that I'm, you know, learning and growing with, going through these life stages, and suddenly the work has to change. The advice they, the advice that I give has radically changed. Like, I have probably a quarter or less of the free time that I had three years ago when we last talked. Right? I have, since then, I, I got married, bought a house, had a kid, have a second kid on the way, got a dog, two cars. Like, of c- like, how, if I'm giving this, shilling the same advice as three years ago, I'm off my rocker. It has to change. But then, of course, part of that is your audience growing up with you, which is natural, but then this creates the entry point for the new generation, which we're just starting to see, you know, which is so exciting for me.

   24. CWChris Williamson27:10

       Dude, Gen Z productivity is going to suck.

   25. TFTiago Forte27:13

       (laughs)

   26. CWChris Williamson27:13

       Like, don't, don't try and be diplomatic about it. Gen Z productivity is going to suck dick.

   27. TFTiago Forte27:18

       (laughs)

   28. CWChris Williamson27:18

       What are they gonna do? They're gonna tell you how to swipe through TikTok faster?

   29. TFTiago Forte27:21

       (laughs)

   30. CWChris Williamson27:21

       I'm not about that. Okay,

6. 27:23 – 40:22

   Become Effective at Capturing Information

   1. CWChris Williamson27:23

      right, so workflow of Building a Second Brain, high level, it's this CODE, um, the, the ... What is it? Not an aphorism. (smacks lips) Not an acronym.

   2. TFTiago Forte27:32

      It's like a methodology.

   3. CWChris Williamson27:33

      No, what's co- when, when you break something down and it's the-

   4. TFTiago Forte27:36

      Oh, acronym.

   5. CWChris Williamson27:36

      Acronym. Thank you. God. My first brain's wrecked as well. Take us through CODE. C is first.

   6. TFTiago Forte27:44

      Yeah, um, so this is basically the creative process in my, in my view, in my opinion. Um, capturing just refers to writing things down. I mean, this has been a necessity for hundreds if not thousands of years. Uh, there's a mountain of evidence that once you externalize, you have a thought, an idea, a theory, a prediction, you write it down, all these things happen. You gain objectivity. You gain distance. You can start to work with it. You can start to improve it. You can start to share it with others and get their feedback. E- externalizing your ideas is just fundamental. The only thing that I'm saying is new is, just in the past few years, digital notes apps alongside mobile devices and software in general has reached a point I think the, the balance of power with paper has shifted, that now it is worth and justifiable to take it digital in the first place rather than write it do- down on paper and then try to digitize it later.

   7. CWChris Williamson28:38

      How should people choose what they should capture as opposed to just ruthlessly indexing everything?

   8. TFTiago Forte28:45

      Yes. This is one of those things. I, I think it, people might just need to go through a phase of hoarding, (clears throat) because nothing that I can say (laughs) seems to sink in until they have over-collected way too much crap, you know, and are, are doing the digital equivalent of, like, standing in their living room with, like, so many mountain piles of things and stuff that they can't even walk through their house. Um, and it's fine, actually. In fact, there's even like a life, like, speaking of life stages, when I was in my early 20s, all through my 20s, I was collecting just everything. I was just exploring, right? I was just taking so much in. Now I'm in my mid-late 30s and it's like, okay, I have 7,000 notes. 7,000 notes that I have in- like, not en masse, but individually curated and saved. So it's like, okay, I'm gonna, I'm reading an article or something, there's a new idea. Okay. It's like, I could take a note on this, but is this, this note really gonna be the thing that, like, makes the difference? Or should I just, like, capitalize on these 7,000 notes over here? (laughs) So, I, I think people just need to learn, like, tr- like, try capturing everything, but then I think what you eventually get to is being far more picky, far more discerning, like you said. And the best rule of thumb that I know is to save something that resonates with you. Save something that moves you, like on a somatic, intuitive, emotional level, is the best rule of thumb that I've en- encountered for deciding what to save.

   9. CWChris Williamson30:17

      There's a idea from Tim Ferriss called The Good Shit Sticks.

   10. TFTiago Forte30:21

       Yes.

   11. CWChris Williamson30:22

       And that has been ... Now this might be a cope from me, because I don't have a particularly efficient personal knowledge management system. You'll be episode 500 and something in four years of this show, I'm just looking at my Apple Notes, which is what I use. 2,247 notes and-... I don't know whether it is a cope, but certainly for me, just allowing the stuff that really, really does make me think, "Holy sh- ... I can't not write that down," that's the threshold. Now, my threshold-

   12. TFTiago Forte30:51

       Yeah.

   13. CWChris Williamson30:51

       ... probably could and should be a little bit lower than that. It probably, there probably are ideas that I've read that I valued that I've let go.

   14. TFTiago Forte30:59

       Mm-hmm.

   15. CWChris Williamson30:59

       But my requirements, given the amount that I have to put out on the show, three episodes a week, three clips a week, interviews and, and guesting that I do on other shows, other projects and things that I have going on outside of that, the, uh, availability for space in terms of demand has to be matched by the supply in terms of what I'm prepared to put into it.

   16. TFTiago Forte31:22

       Yeah.

   17. CWChris Williamson31:22

       And for me, the ... I'll probably have sent it to other people on WhatsApp. I'll have probably taken a photo of whatever it is and gone, "Dude, this is unbelievable," or I've linked it to a, a few friends, and then I'll go, "Ugh, yeah, I probably should, I probably should make that going."

   18. TFTiago Forte31:38

       Yeah.

   19. CWChris Williamson31:38

       So, again, there, I, I mean, is that an acceptable solution for you, do you think-

   20. TFTiago Forte31:42

       Yeah.

   21. CWChris Williamson31:42

       ... if somebody has got a, a high overwhelm of information and not much time?

   22. TFTiago Forte31:46

       Yeah, raise the threshold. (clears throat) You know, the- there's a couple beliefs I have that are kinda metaphysical and that I can't exactly prove, but (clears throat) for some reason have really helped me with this. Maybe someone out there can find some science to back this up. I, I, I embrace confirmation bias. I come up with harebrained ideas, and then I try to look for evidence that ... (laughs) But, um, one of them is that, kinda what you're saying with the good shit sticks, that your life is convergent. (clears throat) I think we tend to think our, our lives, especially those of us interested in many things with many pursuits, many curiosities, we think life is constantly leading us on this wild goose chase divergent thing. And I, I guess I've just chosen to believe, I think life tends to be convergent, in, almost in a sense like you have a destiny. Like, there's certain interests and people and opportunities and just pathways that keep arising again and again. It's almost like reality is like, "Hey," like, "We want this." It's inviting you. It wants you to go down this path just because of your nature, your personality, your background, your history, your genetics. So, if I just believe that reality is convergent, it's almost like I only take a, a threshold that I sometimes use is, I only take a note of an idea if it's tracked me down and demanded that I pay attention to it multiple times. Like, e- only on the third or fourth encounter when it's like s- you know, banging on my door and being like, "Take note of me," then I'll be like, "Okay, fine. Clearly, reality is trying to tell me something that this is important to me." Um, and then the other, the other one is that reality is fractal. (clears throat) This is something I, I think, I think there's probably science to this, but it's like patterns tend to be repeated at all scales. So, like, your life has a pattern. That same pattern is repeated at the scale of a decade of your life. It's also repeated on the scale of a year. It's repeated in e- in each relationship. It's like the, the way that you do one thing is the way you do everything. And so there's a kind of recurring fractal pattern in your life, which, if that's true, it means you c- only have to pay attention to one level. Like, th- there's principles that you want to discover, but the same principle is probably visible from the way you do laundry, to the way you organize your computer, to the way you organize your room, to the way you organize your priorities, to the way you organize your relationships. It's like you only need to find the pattern at one level, and that whole stack gets unlocked for you. This is something I've, I've never mentioned on any podcast 'cause it's, like, really out there, but those are two kind of, uh, kind of hypotheses that I have. (laughs)

   23. CWChris Williamson34:27

       Bro, I am 100% in with you here, and I don't-

   24. TFTiago Forte34:31

       (laughs)

   25. CWChris Williamson34:31

       ... I don't adhere to the sort of woo metaphysical horse shit that much. I, I, I fell in love with, um, amor fati, right, with sort of the love of fate, and I really fell in love with that over the last couple of years because I started to see these consistent themes come up in my life.

   26. TFTiago Forte34:46

       Mm-hmm.

   27. CWChris Williamson34:46

       And obviously, you're the common denominator between all of the experiences that you have, right? Uh-

   28. TFTiago Forte34:51

       Mm-hmm.

   29. CWChris Williamson34:52

       All of my exes are, uh, bitter, resentful arseholes. It's like, "What? All of them? All of them?"

   30. TFTiago Forte35:00

       (laughs)
7. 40:22 – 45:28

   Learn to Organise & Distill Information

   1. TFTiago Forte40:22

      (laughs)

   2. CWChris Williamson40:22

      ... someone's, someone's captured whatever it is. They've got a note-taking app. They've put it down somewhere. Next up, what do they do?

   3. TFTiago Forte40:30

      (clears throat) So, after you capture for a while, it starts to pile up and you start to realize, okay, uh, search is powerful but not ... someday maybe it will be adequate. We won't have to organize anything. (clears throat) But for, for now, you need to add some kind of order, some kind of structure. Um, and I have a, a approach to this. It's called PARA, which is probably the most, single most popular technique that I've ever talked about or written about or, or mentioned, uh, which I, I think the, the main principle there is instead of organizing as if you're a library, according to these broad academic subjects, you know, business, psychology, you know, botany, as if you're trying to, you know, create a university, you shou- this is personal knowledge management. You should organize according to your projects and your goals. That's why it's worth putting in all this effort, is to move forward your projects, achieve your goals. And so PARA is basically about organizing content according to how actionable it is and when it's going to be actionable.

   4. CWChris Williamson41:29

      Mm. How do you not get lost in organizing? You've got, you know, progressive summarization and, and, and stuff like that is a- another tool that you use. How do people, if they haven't got, uh, caught up over-indexing everything, how do they not get caught up over-organizing everything?

   5. TFTiago Forte41:47

      Yeah. It's like each step of CODE has its own benefits and its own pitfalls, right? (clears throat) You can definitely ... there's traps all along the way. (laughs) Um, I think for me, it's the fact that there's only four categories. That's it. These are big buckets, right? It's like, uh, for a physical analogy, it's less like a filing cabinet where it's like, "Okay, where is the exact right little place for this to go?" It's more like, you know, imagine you're de-cluttering your garage. You just have four giant buckets. And it's just like, "This is important now. This will be important later. This might be important at some time, and this is not important." It's like these very clear-cut decis- like, uh, kind of simple decisions that you only have to make one decision, unlike tagging by the way. Tagging, you have to, like, tag all the things it could be related to. All the things that connect. It's one decision. You make it one time. You take one action related to that decision, and you're done.

   6. CWChris Williamson42:43

      When it comes to distilling, just mentioned there about progressive summarization, uh, what do you think most people get wrong when it comes to distilling and progressive summarization as well?

   7. TFTiago Forte42:54

      Yeah, so this is the third letter, the D for distill. (clears throat) I think the main thing, eh, and, and I talk about this in the book, um, we seriously underestimate how sensitive we are to the way that information is presented, the way, the format, the visual look. Uh, you know, if, if you're familiar, anyone who's familiar with web design (clears throat) gets exposure to this. You change one little headline, the color of a button, the spacing, the, the, the shade, the- these minute differences can easily produce double digit, you know, changes in how many people click, how many people stay on the page, how many people take action. So it's like, we've realized this in the public sphere, but then in the private sphere, it's just... looks awful. Like any note-taking you see, except like Notion is the big exception, is just so badly designed. It's like the- this ugly text that is all bunched up together. Everything looks like it was designed by engineers, because it was. (laughs) Uh, and so progressive summarization is really just one way of paying attention to the visual interaction. Can you look and see just the title of a note and instantly grasp at least what it's about approximately? If you decide it's relevant to you, can you scroll down and see one or two or three highlighted passages that tell you in a glance what is the main takeaway, what is the main point, what is this trying to say? And if you decide it's still relevant, you have all the other details right there in the surrounding note. That's, that's what it is. It's, it's the ability to perceive something quickly with little energy and then immediately be able to take action on it.

   8. CWChris Williamson44:32

      So is that your job now to give your future self a gift of a well-distilled, progressively summarized document that reduces everything down to their most component parts?

   9. TFTiago Forte44:44

      That's right. That's right.

   10. CWChris Williamson44:47

       There was this... uh, you mentioned there about, uh, the changes that you can do in UX and web design. I got this statistic from Seth Stephens-Davidowitz's new book. "A designer famously quit Google because it frequently ignored the intuition of trained designers in favor of data. The final straw for the designer was an experiment that tested 41 shades of blue on an ad link on Gmail-"

   11. TFTiago Forte45:09

       (laughs)

   12. CWChris Williamson45:09

       "... to collect data on which one would lead to the most clicks. The designer may have been frustrated, but the data experiment netted Google an estimated $200 million per year in additional revenue."

   13. TFTiago Forte45:21

       That is cr- I, I think I've heard of this. That is a- an insane story.

   14. CWChris Williamson45:27

       I love that stuff,

8. 45:28 – 56:13

   Self-Expression is the Purpose for a Second Brain

   1. CWChris Williamson45:28

      man. (laughs) Okay, so we've distilled stuff down. We've, uh, progressively summarized. The final, the final step, E.

   2. TFTiago Forte45:35

      (smacks lips) Yeah, so this is the, it's the finale. It's the last one. I think the most important one. Like, (clears throat) you know, the question always in the back of people's minds, especially as they get into the weeds of this is, like, "Why? Why am I doing all this? For, for what? For what purpose?" And I think it ultimately comes down to self-expression. You know, we're all, as knowledge workers today, professional communicators. Like, isn't that what we're doing all day? We're communicating through, through all these different means and channels with various people. I mean, we live in a communication-centric world, and you have something inside of you. Maybe it's your story, it's a message, it's ideas, it's opinions, decisions that y- basically, all the out- all the outcomes you're trying to create in your life depend on your ability to communicate what, what that is inside of you in a way that's succinct, that is well-supported and credible, that is compelling, that people want to pay attention to, and ultimately that they want to act on. That's... Self-expression is the purpose to create a second brain.

   3. CWChris Williamson46:36

      What if people say, "Well, I don't have a blog or a podcast or a Substack. Uh, I, w- uh, where can I express my ideas? I'm just a, a curious person."

   4. TFTiago Forte46:48

      (inhales) Yeah, this is a common thing people say. I think, eh, probably because they see me as an online content creator and many of my examples and kind of anecdotes are based on that. But I would just push back on the idea that anyone is not a creator, you know? (clears throat) I have this definition of cre- of being a creator that I love, which is to bring something true, good, or beautiful into the world. To bring something that is true, factual, scientific, effective, that is good, a story, a ch- a truth, some meaning, a relationship, or beautiful, right? Like, inspiring, aesthetically pleasing, all that stuff. By that standard, I mean, when you host a dinner party, you're being a creator. When you, you know, eh, make a schedule for your kid's summer, you're being a creator. When you lobby your local city council for funding for the par- the local park, you're being a creator. Eh, it's funny. I have a lot of these, like, suburban examples of like, being a suburban dad, because that's how I'm creating a lot these days. But even those kind of mundane everyday things are very informationally intensive. I mean, to vote in your local elections, the amount of, of information that I had to make sense of, to just even understand who the candidates were. I mean, to plan a vacation is practically a, you know, a part-time job in some cases. Um, I mean, even to get together with my friends, to get together with your friends in your 30s is like a serious project. (laughs)

   5. CWChris Williamson48:17

      I suppose as well, one thing that almost, uh, the vast majority of people are gonna have is maybe raising a kid.

   6. TFTiago Forte48:23

      Yes.

   7. CWChris Williamson48:23

      So you find out that you and your partner are pregnant and that you're going to... or you've got eight months. Okay. I don't know how babies work. Uh, uh, how do they work and what do we need for the, the room, and should we go for a wireless or a wired-in detector for the CCTV? And you know-

   8. TFTiago Forte48:42

      Yeah.

   9. CWChris Williamson48:42

      ... a- all of those things, um, that, that, that is the most normal solution or the most normal requirement, sorry, that I could think of for someone needing to express on the other side.

   10. TFTiago Forte48:55

       Yeah.

   11. CWChris Williamson48:55

       You're going to go through all of these different review sites and YouTubes, giving you the different details about, is it a pullout cot from the side of the bed or is it a fixed cot that goes on the edge of the bed? Is it-

   12. TFTiago Forte49:06

       Yeah.

   13. CWChris Williamson49:06

       ... whatever, whatever. Th- this is not from personal experience. This is my business partner, me, uh, vicariously living the pain of his three kids through him.

   14. TFTiago Forte49:14

       (laughs) .

   15. CWChris Williamson49:14

       ... going back to one thing that I can see as a potential stumbling block for people when they start to index this information, um, discoverability-

   16. TFTiago Forte49:22

       Mm-hmm.

   17. CWChris Williamson49:22

       ... uh, trying to- so there, for me to find the study from Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, I had to search Google. Now, I just put Google in, and thankfully I knew it was about Google and it came up, but, uh, th- uh, that's probably not the most... Oh, I mean, is that sophisticated? I don't know. You tell me.

   18. TFTiago Forte49:41

       Yeah, you know, I think this is a great filter, is if there's anything that Google can find fast, reliably, just depend on Google for it. Right? Like, you know, these sort of factual questions and answers, you know, what is the population of France? You know, what year did this book come out? Uh, when was this historical figure born? These kind of things that you will, you will instantly with one search, top result, find the answer. Don't use your precious human, you know, manual time and attention to save those in your second brain. What's the point?

   19. CWChris Williamson50:15

       Hmm. Yeah, I do like that.

   20. TFTiago Forte50:17

       So what, what can Google not find is first of all feelings. You can Google the answer to a question, but you can't Google a feeling, right? This comes back to why you should capture things that move you. Images, stories, metaphors, uh, you know, songs, music, paintings, things that you can't just do a Goog- you know, you can't do a Google search, "Oh, a, uh, an image that's going to inspire me in exactly this way." Uh, things that are filtered through your experience, right? Like lessons you- hard won lessons you learned from making that mistake, making that error, or you learned from a mentor, or you learned from a colleague, things that maybe everyone knows them or a lot of people know them, but will have a special resonance for you because it was through your experience. Um, I think you should not try to compete with Google. They're going to, they're going to, e- they're going to win those use cases, but fill in the gaps basically with your, your second brain.

   21. CWChris Williamson51:11

       What tools do people need or what tools do you use to get this moving?

   22. TFTiago Forte51:19

       You know, the sec- the, the central one is a, is a digital notes app. Digital notes apps are the best by far, the be- you can actually implement a second brain in all sorts of different systems. But I think what's important about digital notes apps is they're ubiquitous. You can have them on your computer, on your tablet, on your smartphone, on your watch, and soon on your glasses. Um, they're just everywhere. Uh, they're casual. This is the key thing, right? Some people, sometimes people want to have like a database with this very precise data entry procedure and all these, you know, fields. Note taking, the whole reason note taking is powerful is that it's messy, it's spontaneous, it is chaotic. It doesn't follow... it's free form, right? And digi- digital notes apps are almost like the only category of software that is that way. Software doesn't tend to be free form, right? You want that kind of open canvas and they're free. You know, you don't need to pay anything. Use Apple Notes or Android, whatever the Android equivalent is on your phone. Use Evernote, which has a free tier, use Simplenote. Uh, most of these apps, if not all of them, have a free option. Start there. You know, it's like, don't, don't, don't even com- this is the thing, it's like, maybe this isn't for you. I'm not saying digital note taking is the answer to everyone and all their problems. It might be just an answer for some people for some kinds of problems. Just test it out using a free app on your phone, and if it's successful, just take it from there.

   23. CWChris Williamson52:46

       If it wasn't for the fact that you were so heavily already invested into Evernote, would you have moved across to something else? Or is this... are you grandfathered in with Evernote, or would you be tempted by Notion if you were starting again?

   24. TFTiago Forte53:00

       Yeah, it's a good question. So it's funny, I've already migrated a couple times. I started originally on Microsoft Word, if you can believe it, then Google Docs, then Evernote. So my expectation, I mean, no technology lives forever, right? There, there's generations that mature and then kind of pass away. Um, I, I'm sure at some point or another I'm gonna have to move on from Evernote. It's gonna be, it's gonna get shut down, it's gonna be acquired, it's gonna become obsolete. Um, I've been testing Obsidian. Obsidian, because there's this kind of newest wave of very sexy, very trendy apps, sometimes called networked thinking apps or link based apps, like the three main ones are Roam, Obsidian, and Logseq that people are just raving about. They're crazy about-

   25. CWChris Williamson53:45

       What's unique about them?

   26. TFTiago Forte53:47

       They... oh man, it's really hard to summarize, but basically it's a completely new paradigm for personal knowledge management. It's ba- instead of being based on a hierarchy, folders within folders within folders, it's based on a graph much like the internet, right? It, it's not an incremental improvement, it's a completely different paradigm. But from what I've seen, it has a long way to go. I mean, I was using Obsidian, took me two hours of intense troubleshooting to figure out how to sync this note that I just took on my phone to my computer. And I'm a, you know, reasonably tech savvy person. Like, I tend to wait until a technology is mature, it's, it's been around for 10 years. So around like 2030, I think I should be adopting the new paradigm of notes apps (laughs) .

   27. CWChris Williamson54:29

       That's funny. So one thing that I wish, I'm an avid Apple Notes user. I've tried and there's some stuff that have gone in, that's gone in Evernote, there's some stuff which goes in Notion. Um, the only things that I would bring across to Apple Notes if I could right now would be, uh, linking notes within notes.

   28. TFTiago Forte54:48

       Mm-hmm.

   29. CWChris Williamson54:48

       I think that the ability of Notion to do that, where you can nest kind of visually and you can hyperlink is phenomenal. Uh, that, that's very, very intuitive and makes an awful lot of sense.

   30. TFTiago Forte54:58

       Mm-hmm.
9. 56:13 – 1:00:47

   Tiago’s 5 Most-Used Apps

   1. TFTiago Forte56:13

   2. CWChris Williamson56:14

      What are five of your most used apps when it comes to your either daily productivity or even entertainment stuff? What are the things that you rely on the most in terms of apps?

   3. TFTiago Forte56:25

      Yeah, you know, there's kind of a basic toolkit. (clears throat) I wrote about these in, in a blog post on getting to inbox zero, but there's kind of this, like, ver- it's, it's almost like you buy a toolkit and, and it has, like, a hammer, a screwdriver. There's, like, five things that if it doesn't have that, you're like, "What the heck?" It's, like, my to-do list app, which is Things, which I've used for 10 years. It's my notes app, which is Evernote, also been on there for 10 years. It's my read later app, Instapaper. I think I've been on there six or seven years. Uh, it is my calendar app. I use one called BusyCal, which is just basically a client for Google Calendar. Uh, and then it's the email app, Superhuman. Those five are like my world. They're, they're s- as second nature to me as, like, my, my ha- my arms and my legs. I, I, like, don't think about them. I just, like, operate them as, like, an extension of my nervous system. (laughs)

   4. CWChris Williamson57:17

      Convince me on BusyCal and Superhuman because I have a lot of calendar problems and a lot of email problems.

   5. TFTiago Forte57:25

      Yeah, so let's see. BusyCal, I just love that I never have to think about it. It's, uh, calendaring is this funny thing. It sh- it's kind of t- ironically timeless. Um, for a while I w- I was using, uh, Woven, which was this, like, up and coming, new, very sexy thing. Of course, like all up and coming, trendy productivity apps got acquired or something, got shut down, and I'm like, "This always happens." This is why I hate adopting new tech. Um, BusyCal, it's just made... You can tell by just, like, very nuts and bolts designers and engineers just trying to solve, like, you know, these little mundane pr- like, just stupid problems. Like, when you invite someone to a calendar entry and then you move it to a different day. Does it, like, resend something? Like, little things like that that just make your life, like, just better. Um, and I just never have to think about it. It just does its job. That's, that's the pitch. (laughs)

   6. CWChris Williamson58:14

      Okay. Superhuman?

   7. TFTiago Forte58:16

      Yeah, so Superhuman is a bit harder 'cause it's, you know, kind of expensive for a productivity app. Uh, I mean, I'm a little bit biased here because (clears throat) the founder of Superhuman, uh, he told me that my article on reaching inbox zero was one of the inspirations for the product. He said that they get that article, they, they send it to every new hire as like, "This is our philosophy." So, when he told me that and then I started using the software, I was like, "Okay, this is as if someone just custom designed an email app for me." (laughs)

   8. CWChris Williamson58:45

      Because they kind of did.

   9. TFTiago Forte58:47

      (laughs) so, I was, I was helpless. The, the, the sales pitch was... I couldn't turn it down, and so it just, it just makes the pros-... Basically, what Superhuman does is it makes the process of clearing your email into the most hyper-efficient, get-it-done, go-from-the-top-to-the-bottom process you can imagine. Versus how most people use email, which is as a combined CRM, task management system, reminder system, note-taking system, to-do list, all these things. It just is hyper-focused on that one use case.

   10. CWChris Williamson59:18

       Give me five, uh, physical items as well that you don't think that you could live without.

   11. TFTiago Forte59:25

       Ooh, five physical items. Um, I mean, a paper notebook. People are surprised to hear this, but (clears throat) there are certain situations such as conversations. When I'm meeting with someone in purpose, uh, in person, I tend to take physical notes because I've just found having a device is distracting. Uh, let's see. What else? My trusty Hydro Flask water bottle. Essential. Wide mouth, so that I can get ice in there. This, like, two or three Xs my water consumption each day. (laughs) Uh, let's see. What else?

   12. CWChris Williamson59:56

       What about the chair? What chair have you decided on at the moment? I'm currently in the market for a new office chair, and I sent Ali a text the other day asking him whether he was still with Harman Kardon and he was like, "Yeah, I am, but I've changed from this thing to this thing." What are you sat on?

   13. TFTiago Forte1:00:11

       You know what's really funny, Chris? I, when it comes to physical things, I am the farthest thing from an optimizer. I, I don't, I don't get into it. I don't have a preferred chair or pen or monitor or keyboard. Like, Ali gets into this stuff, right?

   14. CWChris Williamson1:00:25

       Yeah.

   15. TFTiago Forte1:00:25

       I have this weird thing where it's almost like I'm so in the digital world. I have these, these very specific preferences about the digital world, but the physical world, I'm kind of like... I, I don't really live... I live in the world of ideas and I live in the virtual world. I, I barely am present here in the physical plane. (laughs)

   16. CWChris Williamson1:00:43

       Yes. That's, that, that kind of rings true as well.

10. 1:00:47 – 1:03:18

    Making Productivity Less of a Chore

    1. CWChris Williamson1:00:47

       So-

    2. TFTiago Forte1:00:47

       (sighs) .

    3. CWChris Williamson1:00:47

       ... let's say that, uh, someone sort of likes the idea of this, but thinks, "Look, I've already gone through the process of having to read a book, um, that was fairly effortful, and I'm concerned about extra effort on the backend of going through and taking notes and progressive summarization and all of this stuff." What are the most important things of making this whole process, or productivity overall, less effortful do you think?

    4. TFTiago Forte1:01:14

       I think it's giving yourself permission to do what you like. Just move toward what excites you. Move toward what moves you. Um, th- this is a, this is a deep... It's, uh, it's funny. I, I teach this course, this in- s- intensive four-week program, you know, all this, all, all this material, and honestly, I think it's mostly about unlearning, not so much about learning.Like, I take people through this process. They have to unlearn everything they know about note-taking, which is all based in school and all the problems that come with that, all the baggage. It's what they learned at work, in corporations, which is a whole nother set of baggage. It's what they learned from their parents, right? And what we tend to learn from all these external authorities is, what you care about doesn't matter, what you find interesting is probably not important. You need to spend your time and attention on things that someone else has said are important. It's like we're just systematically brainwashed into ignoring our feelings, our desires, what gives us pleasure, what excites our curiosity, and a lot of being successful in this is relearning that.

    5. CWChris Williamson1:02:21

       You know that you do sound like Miyamoto Musashi or something at the moment? You know, like, this sort of old Zen master-

    6. TFTiago Forte1:02:28

       (laughs)

    7. CWChris Williamson1:02:28

       ... that's been away in a cave on the top of ... But I, I, I genuinely do agree and there's elements, you know, especially talking about the, um, repeating themes that you see that kind of spiral up and spiral down your life at different gradients, and I definitely see this starting to come through for me as well. So, I, I often wonder how many of the insights that we get around productivity or personal development or self-growth, how many of them are born of the efforts that we've gone through, and how many of them just come along for the ride as a byproduct of getting older? And I think that a big chunk of them actually, uh, are just that with a little bit of a flavoring on the top of, "Oh, well, I found this one," or, "I developed this one."

    8. TFTiago Forte1:03:07

       Oh, yeah. For sure. The real second brain is the, the things you learn, the relationships you have, the experiences-

    9. CWChris Williamson1:03:13

       The friends you made along the way. (laughs) Look, Tiago

11. 1:03:18 – 1:03:50

    Where to Find Tiago

    1. CWChris Williamson1:03:18

       Forte, ladies and gentlemen. If people want to check out all of the stuff that you do and read the blog posts that we've referenced today, where should they go?

    2. TFTiago Forte1:03:25

       Yeah, you can find everything at buildingasecondbrain.com.

    3. CWChris Williamson1:03:28

       I love it. Tiago, until next time, man.

    4. TFTiago Forte1:03:30

       Appreciate it, Chris.

    5. CWChris Williamson1:03:31

       What's happening, people? Thank you very much for tuning in. If you enjoyed that episode, then press here for a selection of the best clips from the podcast over the last few weeks. And don't forget to subscribe. Peace.

Episode duration: 1:03:50