Multiple Obsidian Vaults  ## Metadata - Author: [[Curtis McHale]] - Full Title: Multiple Obsidian Vaults - Category: #articles - Document Note: --- tags: - #Obsidian - #PKM - #VaultManagement Author: Curtis McHale Source: YouTube Reference: [Multiple Obsidian Vaults](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8) date created: 2025-08-27 20:45 --- # Title: When and Why to Use Multiple Obsidian Vaults ## Table of Contents: - [📝 Summary](#-summary) - [📖 Main Content](#-main-content) - [🗒️ Notes](#️-notes) - [📖 References](#-references) - [🗣️ Paraphrase](#️-paraphrase) - [📰 Newsletter](#-newsletter) - [✅ Action Items](#-action-items) - [🧪 Hypotheses](#-hypotheses) - [📊 Methodology](#-methodology) - [❓ Questions](#-questions) - [🔮 Future Research](#-future-research) - [💡 Implications](#-implications) - [🧠 Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment) - [📊 Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment) - [🌍 DEIB Assessment](#-deib-assessment) - [✅ Logical Validity](#-logical-validity) - [🔍 DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis) - [🔍 SEO Evaluation](#-seo-evaluation) - [🎯 Conclusion](#-conclusion) --- ## 📝 Summary: Curtis McHale explains when multiple Obsidian vaults are helpful versus when they add unnecessary friction. He shares examples of his own vaults: a **main personal vault**, a **work vault for ProudCity client work**, and a **gaming vault**. The central lesson: unless the content belongs entirely to another entity (e.g., a client) or is truly isolated, **one main vault is more practical**. Multiple vaults often lead to unused or fragmented notes, while one well-structured vault fosters consistency and engagement. --- ## 📖 Main Content: The video begins with Curtis addressing a common question: *when should you use multiple Obsidian vaults?* He argues for caution, warning that people often create too many vaults and then neglect them. Examples: - **Personal Vault**: Contains notes on writing, courses, research, client notes, projects, and code. - **Work Vault (ProudCity)**: Dedicated to client projects, WordPress themes, GitHub issue documentation, and long-term developer notes. All content here is client-owned. - **Gaming Vault**: Originally for game guides (like Hollow Knight), but this became redundant when he migrated guides to a public blog. He admits it likely belongs in his main vault. The **principle**: - Use multiple vaults only when data ownership or purpose is *entirely separate*. - Otherwise, consolidate into one vault with organized projects and tags. He concludes by encouraging viewers to avoid “vault sprawl” and instead maintain **one vault they actually use daily**. --- ### 🗒️ Notes - **[00:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=0)**: Introduction; addresses frequent question on multiple vaults. - **[00:39](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=39)**: Shows personal vault (daily notes, writing, projects, courses, client notes). - **[01:22](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=82)**: Work vault for ProudCity: client-owned content, WordPress projects, Kubernetes commands, GitHub issues, how-tos. - **[02:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=123)**: Data separation rationale—client vault is fully owned by customer. - **[02:42](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=162)**: Gaming vault—initially Hollow Knight guides, moved to “Dad’s Gaming” blog. Acknowledges redundancy. - **[03:25](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=205)**: Gaming vault could’ve been projects in main vault; multiple vaults add friction. - **[04:00](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=240)**: Rule of thumb: use separate vaults only if content is entirely independent and owned by another project. - **[04:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&t=277)**: Encourages one vault to avoid underuse; multiple vaults = “separate but abandoned.” --- ## 📖 References: - Obsidian.md official documentation on [vaults](https://help.obsidian.md/). - Curtis McHale blog and courses (curtismchale.ca). --- ## 🗣️ Paraphrase: 1. Original: *“If your content is entirely separate, owned by another project, and has no overlap—then by all means keep it in another vault.”* Paraphrase: When content fully belongs to another entity with no crossover, it makes sense to house it in a distinct vault. 2. Original: *“Otherwise, you’re probably best with one vault you actually use, instead of several you create but abandon.”* Paraphrase: Consolidation is usually smarter—better to maintain one active vault than scatter notes across neglected ones. --- ## 📰 Newsletter: 📚 **Do You Really Need Multiple Obsidian Vaults?** Curtis McHale tackled this classic PKM dilemma in a recent walkthrough. He showed how he juggles three vaults—personal, work, and gaming—but admits that only the client-owned ProudCity vault truly justifies being separate. 👉 Takeaway: Most of us are better off with **one well-structured vault**, organized by projects and tags, rather than juggling multiple silos that go stale. If you’re splitting your notes across several vaults just for the sake of separation, you’re likely creating more friction than flow. One vault that’s consistently used beats five that sit untouched. Catch the full walkthrough here: [Multiple Obsidian Vaults](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8). --- ## ✅ Action Items: - Apply McHale’s framework to **WordPress contributor notes**: one shared vault unless content is client-owned. - Use this principle when designing **GoDaddy OSPO documentation**: reduce duplication, centralize where possible. - Build training around **tagging and project separation** instead of vault sprawl. - Advocate for **clear ownership rules** in OSS vault setups—mirroring his customer vs personal distinction. --- ## 🧪 Hypotheses: - H1: One consolidated vault increases daily engagement and reduces friction. - H2: Multiple vaults with overlapping purposes result in underutilization. - H3: Clear separation improves trust when client-owned data is isolated. ### 📊 Methodology: - Survey Obsidian users on vault use frequency. - Compare retention and retrieval efficiency between one-vault and multi-vault workflows. - Track note abandonment rates across vaults. ### ❓ Questions: - Can WordPress contributors benefit from a centralized vault with project tagging instead of siloed vaults? - How does data ownership influence vault organization in open-source ecosystems? - What’s the threshold of overlap before multiple vaults become inefficient? ### 🔮 Future Research: - Explore collaborative vaults in OSS (shared contributor documentation). - Test vault sprawl vs. tagging-based organization in knowledge-heavy teams. ### 💡 Implications: - Centralization can streamline contributor onboarding. - OSS teams can avoid fragmentation by aligning with the “one vault unless separate ownership” rule. --- ## 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment: - **Visual**: Present (screen tours of vaults). Improve with flowcharts showing vault overlaps. - **Aural**: Present (spoken walkthrough). Provide podcast/audio versions. - **Verbal**: Moderate (plain explanations). Add analogies for deeper engagement. - **Kinesthetic**: Weak—no hands-on prompts. Suggest tasks for reorganizing one’s vault. - **Logical**: Strong (cause-effect reasoning on vault separation). - **Social**: Weak. Could add group exercises on vault setups. - **Solitary**: Strong (reflection on one’s workflow). - **Naturalistic**: Absent. Could analogize vault sprawl to ecosystems with redundant species. --- ## 📊 Accessibility Assessment: - Transcript present = accessible. - No screen reader descriptions for visuals. - Contrast/readability depends on YouTube UI. - Add closed captions and alt-text for visual tours. --- ## 🌍 DEIB Assessment: - Neutral tone, avoids exclusionary language. - Limited perspectives—assumes individual knowledge workers. - Could include examples from broader cultural or team contexts. - Neurodiversity: long-form monologue may be overwhelming—break into smaller segments. --- ## ✅ Logical Validity: - **Strengths**: Clear causal reasoning (unused vaults = inefficiency). Balanced counterexample (client vault is valid). Strong - Summary: In this video, the author discusses the use of multiple Obsidian vaults in their workflow. They showcase their main vault, which contains various boards, client notes, and courses. They also highlight a separate vault for work-related content, such as GitHub issues and documentation. Additionally, they briefly mention a gaming vault they have set up. The author suggests that having multiple vaults may be useful for content that is entirely separate and owned by different projects, but otherwise, it may be best to stick to one vault. - URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5LLIwkFwn8&ab_channel=CurtisMcHale welcome today we're going to talk aboutwhen you should use other vaults in yourobsidian workflow uh because I got askedthat I would ask that two or three timesrecently I thought that would be a goodvideo before we do that a few ways tosupport the channel become a member ofcritical.ca membership take a CourseCurtis mchale.ca educationall right let's dive in and the best wayto do that is actually to show you myvaults so first thing here is my mainvaultuh my main Vault here already has myboards in it I'll give it a tour of thisrecently a little bit the book lists Ihave my client notes courses these are the courses I've actually createduh right residual notes and craft that Ineed to actually go through and fix anddo something with daily notes all thatstuff this is my personal Vault for mywriting right you can also see projectsis set up here with my writing ideasright code membership stuff everythinglike thatso that's my main Vault this is for myreading my research my YouTube stuff nowthe other Vault I haveis this one so this is for work this isfor work called proud City uh where I build websites I'm just showing you oneitem right hereum and this is covering I've also showedyou this as well in my developers uhGitHub uh my developers uh obsidianVault video a while back so I'll link tothat above so it shows me uh lots ofdifferent stuff right GitHub issuesthings that I need to or have takennotes on that every issue gets in therebut a lot of them do if I really want tomake sure that a future developer knowswhat's happening all right deploy notes how to so this is how to fix orphanedevents uh in things and basicallyanytime I start to do something and Ilike look up a bunch of documentationfor it and everything I document it forusum right some of our PC Dev commands PCCube commands these are kubernetescommands we built WordPress pluginsWordPress themeslike anything really I need so actuallyI should take in here and put how toshould go in therehow to create a new releasehow to download customer databases howto set up by local environment that's good enough for nowso that's another evolved this Vaultultimately data is entirely owned by mycustomer it is separate from my regularVault I suppose there could be a littlebit of overlap when I'm researching sayWordPress command or something like thatwhere they would be you know notes in mymain Vault where I'm taking I sayprogramming notes other things like thatand notes in this one nice they sort ofoverlap but not quiteumso this stuff gets all of my work forproud City in it all of the again issue notes all the how-to stuff all theresearch I have to do anything long termgoes in here at this point we'reprobably going to move to adocumentation system for our um at leastour how-to content so that we can havethat long term for other peoplethird vaultthis is a gaming vault I say was becauseI haven't really touched it in quite awhile so this uh game guides right Istarted Hollow Knightand linked to a bunch of stuff this isreally just one big long page of likeYouTube videos and other stuff that I have you know taken as a guide toholidays when I'm playing it I can lookup stuff in one spot now I've actuallystarted moving this off to a site calleddad's gaming again which I have sort ofdone I haven't done a great job atkeeping it updated really not writing init in theory this is going to have likemy umagain uh boards or stuff to write inhere as well uh right 8 but do ultimatecontroller going to review it and TheoryJson steam deck doc build your own gamelibrary with humble Choice all these things I haven't really got to itso I'm not sure that this Vault thisVault has felt to me like I should havejust put in my main vaults uh especiallyif I'm going to say the game guides aregoing to go off on their own on awebsite where people can actually otherpeople can see themumso then I would just have my writingnotes only I'd really only worry aboutmy writing and that would go in my mainVault with my other stuff and I woulduse projects all right am I going to getthe right one let's goprojects to divide it up right I can actually say my code ones are dividedout my code writing my member stuff isdivided up as welland I could do that instead of havingentirely different Vault that I reallydon't touch and I probably should Ishould write some more gaming contentbecause I do enjoy playing video gamesand so that's what I do ultimately I saythat you probably only need one Vault ifyou have a Content that's entirely ownedentirely separate entirely on its ownright it's not a research project that'scoming from some notes in your Vault butlike my proud City content entirelyowned by another project entirely separate you really don't have a lot ofalmost any overlap then by all meanshave another Vault keep it off separateon its own otherwise you're probablyjust best with one Vault one Vault youactually use as opposed to multiplevaults that you say oh I'm keepingthings separate and you never really usethem so that's what I would say andthat's it if you like the video thumbsup below if you love to subscribe hitthe Bell YouTube lets you know stuffhappenedand it really helps actually you knowsubscribing hitting the thumbs up stufflike that let's uh YouTube know thatthis is good content other people shouldsee or share the share the evolves share the link uh on you know show your ownSocial Media stuff like that Vlog aboutit in fact blog buddy you should haveyour own blog instead of doing thisdoing social media have an awesome day, Multiple Obsidian Vaults, Curtis McHale, 01h556sygwaeyp1np60f2e0nqs.