It seems like the recommendation above is a really six weird tips. Here it is, summarized as one all encompassing tip: Assign each entry in your notebooks a unique entry in an index.
If you do the things above, then you will already be in the 99th percentile of notebook organization. Don’t worry about linking your thinking, or building a second brain1, or literature notes versus fleeting notes, or whatever else the PKM hive mind has dreamed up. It’s fine to be in just the 99th percentile of organization.
There are basically two problems that indexing solves: locating things and inter-linking things. (Really, these are the same problem viewed in two different ways.)
The first problem comes down to this: It is really hard to keep track of stuff in un-indexed un-dated sketchbooks. Where is your list of ideas for possible art projects? Or that reference to a cool thing you heard about that time? In a book somewhere. The one with the sticker, maybe? That’s all you know. If you might ever want to find that thing again, your only recourse is to look through all the books manually. This is an issue when you get to +10 volumes, especially if they all look the same. If you have an index, you can look for the thing and (usually) get a bunch of places to check. To see what this looks like in practice, here is some of an index.
| Pages | Title / Description |
|---|---|
| 1 | SF: Pseudo – Chishago |
| 3–10 | B41: HW #1 Fall 2025 |
| 11–14 | B41: HW #2 Fall 2025 |
| 15–16 | CTL: Active/Engagement Ideas |
| 17–20 | B41: HW #2 Fall 2025 |
| 21–26 | CMESG |
| 27–38 | CMESG: Work Group – Zak Magic |
| 39–46 | CMESG Wg: Zak Magic – Friend A’s Address |
| 47–53 | CMESG Wg |
| 54–55 | Writing Advice: XXXXX – Friend B’s Address |
| 56 | CMESG: Gord vs Federic |
| 57–59 | CMESG: Images of Math |
| 60 | CMESG: Zack Magic |
| 61–62 | Tri-Campus Meeting |
| 63–64 | SF: Bokola / Ornstein |
| 65–66 | Doodles – Pen testing |
| 67–69 | SF: OPAE (Shrimp) Hawaii |
| 70–71 | SF: PUNANA (Nest) Hawaii |
| 72–74 | SF: NOHO PAIPAI (Rostrum) Hawaii |
| 75–115 | NASK |
| 83 | – Vivo k morto de Weiderboren |
| 95 | – Babaĉa kolĉeno |
| 106 | – Nudelmanĝanto |
| 113–114 | – Dimensioj |
There is something really magical about checking your index, finding an exact page and volume number, looking there, and precisely thing you want is right there. It’s almost a magic trick if someone else happens to be in the room.
What’s the second problem: inter-linking? If everything has a unique identifier, then entries can refer to other entries. For example, if I’m working on a problem, I almost always have follow-up questions or things that I don’t understand. In my sketchbook, on page 37 of volume 5, I write: “Why is this true?” Time goes go by, I have some more insight, and I’m able to solve the problem. Let’s say that I write it up on page 63 of volume 7. If it’s important enough, I look up the problem in the index, find the spot where I asked the question, and add a little note: “See SB 7:63 for solution.” Usually, I’ll add a little note in the current volume pointing backwards: “For previous work, see SB 5:37.”
You can do other stuff with linking too: make a list of all the pages related to a particular class, all the meetings with a specific person, or entries can break off and connect up again. With unique identifies, the sky is the limit.
In short: If everything has a unique entry in an index, then you will have an easy way to look things up and you will be able to be able to point to things in the same volume or other volumes. You go from having one notebook after another to having one continuous multi-volume notebook.
Now that I’ve got the One Weird Tip out of the way, and sung the praises of indexing, here are the parts of paper ecosystem:
Jotter: This is a bunch of index cards in a leather cover. I use it for quick disposable things through out the day: shopping lists, to-do items, names of references. Ideally, I throw these out at the end of the day. Usually, they hang around for a week or so. I prefer loose index cards to little pocket notebooks like Field Notes, because there is no point in keeping most of this information once its processed. I always carry my jotter and a four colour Bic pen in my pocket beside my wallet.
Journal: This is a series of small 3x5 sketchbooks from Art Alternatives. I’m currently on Volume 63. The index has been running consistently for about ten years. I wrote elsewhere about how that process works. Briefly, each entry is dated and I underline words to add to the index under that date. Almost all of the journal is stream-of-consciousness rambling about life. What I ate for breakfast. Things I saw around the city. Reflections on the stuff I’m reading and teaching. Recently, I’ve been drawing. The size of it plays a decisive role in its use: each page is about the same size as an index card. I can’t write anything too long or do any mathematics on such a small page. And so, it is almost all short prose, brief lines. There is rarely any inter-linking. This is intended as a permanent collection, but I rarely refer back to it. Usually, I do so when a friend passes away. Indexing, which usually happens around New Years, is always a pleasant trip down memory lane, and revives my memories of the year before. Mostly, the journal is a pleasant place to practice writing. The journal lives in my backpack, though I usually use it at home.
Sketchbook: This is a series of 8.5x5 sketchbooks from Art Alternatives. The index has been running for about five years, currently on Volume 13. (There are a bunch of un-indexed un-dated volumes before the indexed ones.) The index is a Google spreadsheet. Each entry has a date, and often a title. These are where I do all my work related stuff. Research. Writing drafts of material for classes. Notes from meetings. This gets referred back to often. Lots of inter-linking of entries. I index the volumes as they’re completed. The sketchbook lives on my desk at work. I’ll occassionally bring it home with me.
Cardfile: This is a bunch of 8.5 x 5.5 pieces of paper2 in cardboard boxes. Initially, I started keeping a card file when I was pulling together all the material for Jayne in Brief. I had a lot of single page things scattered across a dozen notebooks, so I photocopied them all out, and plopped them in one place. It turns out that a cardfile is very helpful for writing a new course. I use the half-pages to draft up questions, lecture notes, and so on. I also cut half-pages out of research articles and plot them in the box. This is sort of self-indexing3. It is absolutely not portable at all. Sometimes, I pop a section out of the card file, put it in to the cover of my sketchbook. Also, I carry around a few blank 8.5x5.5 sheets in my sketchbook. Otherwise, the card file lives on a shelf in my office at work. Here is a picture of the setup while drafting a new course using my sketchbook and cardfile.
Zoe Loukia shared this fantastic quote about ecosystems.
A notebook ecosystem refers to the interconnected collection of physical and/or digital notebooks that a person deliberately curates to serve different aspects of their intellectual, creative, and personal life. Like a natural ecosystem where diverse species fulfill distinct roles while contributing to a balanced whole, a thoughtfully designed notebook ecosystem assigns specific functions to different notebooks (journaling, planning, idea collection, etc.) that complement one another and collectively support the individual’s thinking, creativity, and productivity. — Issue 116: My notebook ecosystem (as a book nerd)
And so, I think it’s worth describing how my ecosystem works. If I were more artistically capable, I’d draw a little web diagram of how all the “species” of paper feed on each other.
Briefly, the jotter feeds my computer and journal. Sometimes a note in the jotter will lead to an entry in the sketchbook or the cardfile, but it is rare. The sketchbook and journal sometimes refer to each other, but there is not much cross over. I often journal about my research and writing, but I don’t do much in the sketchbook related to my journal. Once in a blue moon, I use the sketchbook as a journal if I’ve forgotten the journal or am between volumes.
The sketchbook and card file have become tightly linked. If something seems especially important, I’ll photo copy it out of the sketchbook and plop it in the cardfile. These two refer to each other heavily. Sometimes, I lend out cards from the file to students working with me.
The computer indexes the journal (as plain text) and the sketcbook (as a spreadsheet). This choice of different formats a bit of a mistake; I made the decisions about five years apart from each other. Oops! At some point, I’ll merge these systems but that’s a project for another day.
One aspect of the ecosystem that I like is the symmetry of the scales. The journal and jotter are both the size of 3x5 index cards. The sketchbook and care file are both 8.5x5.5 half-pages. The size of each format really limits — in an enabling constraint sort of way — my use of each one. There is also a pleasing duality: loose-leaf versus bound. All four combinations of size and bounded-ness have some use to me.
Zoe Loukia wrote a nice post against the journalling ecosystem, which inspired all this thinking about my ecosystem. Various bits of this system were inspired by Dave Gauer and Soren Bjornstad.
I tend to feel that a second brain would be a terrible nuisance. I have a hard enough time using one brain, let alone too. ↩︎
Don’t look up the word zettelkasten. See p1k3’s brilliant quip: “I guess nearly any practice can disappear up its own asshole under the right conditions, but some [such as note-taking] are extraordinarily susceptible” (p1k3 :: Thursday, January 11, 2024 - a concise theory of notes about notes) ↩︎
“Self-indexing” is a polite euphamism for “I have a vague hunch about the order of the stuff in here. It’s actually a total mess.” ↩︎
Published: Apr 25, 2024 @ 16:17.
Last Modified: Nov 2, 2025 @ 16:30.
Home / Now / Blog / Notes / Reading / Office Camera / Tags / Bookmarks / RSS Feeds / Top of Page
Thanks for reading! If you have any comments or questions about the content, please let me know. Anyone can contact me by email.