does my zettelkasten make writing... harder?  ## Metadata - Author: [[morganeua]] - Full Title: does my zettelkasten make writing... harder? - Category: #articles - Document Note: Abstract: This article explores the use of the TuttleCast knowledge management system and note-taking system as a tool for writing academic articles and books. The author, a PhD candidate, describes their experience using the system to organize their knowledge and explains the issues they have encountered when attempting to use it to write linear texts, such as having difficulty adapting their notes to the required tone of voice or style of writing for the paper, and having difficulty deciding the order of thoughts. The author proposes to solve these issues by first creating an outline of the paper, adding links to notes from the TuttleCast system, and then rewriting the paper from scratch. 1. How can I use my zettelkasten to make writing easier? 2. What advantages does a zettelkasten provide for writing? 3. What challenges arise when using a zettelkasten to write? This article discusses the advantages and disadvantages of using a Zettelkasten system to assist with writing. It explains that the system can be beneficial for organizing ideas, helping to make connections between different topics, and aiding in the process of writing. However, it also notes that a Zettelkasten system can require a significant amount of effort and time to create and maintain, and can be overwhelming if used improperly. Additionally, it may be difficult to search through the system and find the relevant information quickly. Overall, a Zettelkasten system can be a helpful tool for writers, but it is important to be aware of the potential difficulties associated with it. - Document Tags: [[obisidian]] [[zettlekasten]] - Summary: A chatty video in which I tell you my issues with writing using my zettelkasten and suggest some solutions. Your advice is welcomed in the comments section! Try the book summary app Shortform using my affiliate link for 5 days free and 20% off an annual membership: https://www.shortform.com/morganeua Nicole's video on writing a book in Obsidian: https://youtu.be/NosD77WX7qM ✨TIMESTAMPS✨ 0:00 - intro 0:59 - what is zettelkasten? 2:21 - how I use zettelkasten 4:16 - here's the thing... 4:43 - problem 1 - style/voice 5:43 - problem 2 - discovery writing 6:54 - problem 3 - linearity 9:16 - how to write with a zettelkasten 12:00 - rearticulating my problems 12:30 - solution 1 - make a choice 13:06 - solution 2 - rewrite in new doc 14:06 - solution 3 - indirectional note storage 15:44 - conclusion #zettelkasten #phd #obsidian - URL: https://youtube.com/watch?v=wQPvrcksjUA&feature=share is the subtle casting system good forwritingI am conflicted and you folks have beenasking me for a video explaining how Iuse obsidian and my title cast and towrite an article or a book or writeanything and it's coming I swear butfirst I wanted to like air out someissues that I've been having with tryingto turn my knowledge within my knowledgemanagement system of the tuttlecaston in obsidianI've been having issues trying to turnthat stuff into linear texts so I wantedto have a chit chat about the problemsthat I've been having turning my notesand knowledge into say academic articlesor even my dissertation and I've triedto really understand what these issuesare and why this has been so difficultfor me because personally My ultimategoal with the subtlecast and system isto produce written content very quicklyif you are unfamiliar tuttlecast and literally translates to slip box andthat's because this is a knowledgemanagement system and a note-takingsystem that was originally developed onlittle slip cards little note cards cuecards I call them and they would beplaced in little boxes in a cabinet andeach of these little note cards wouldhave metadata on it so it would have aunique identifier that locates it withinthe box and there might be an index ofcards so you know where to findeverything and the Order of the noteswere in had some kind of relevant order but ultimately all these no notes wereinterconnected because every time youstuck a note inside of your slipbox youwould put the unique identifiers ofother notes on that note that it wasrelevant to so anywhere you went in yourslipbox you could connect across theentire slipbox and Nicholas Lumen thesociologist that this system has beenattributed to he used the system towrite tons of texts and I am veryhopeful that I will be able to use my tuttlecast in in exactly the same way towrite tons of texts to become a prolificwriter that's my goal but to become aprolific writer you need a method oftaking down the knowledge that you arein taking and then you need a method oforganizing that knowledge for easyaccess so that when you actually go towrite something you know where thatknowledge is and you know where you gotthat Knowledge from and so in my opinionthat subtle Caston is the absolute bestway I have ever seen to organizeknowledge so that that knowledge is usable and that that knowledge can Aidyou to build new knowledge and thatbuilding of new knowledge is likeparticularly relevant to me as a PhDcandidate because my main goal as a PhDcandidate is to produce an originalcontribution to knowledge and the waythat I do that is by connecting acrossvarious fields and Nuggets of knowledgesome of that knowledge comes from theinterviews that I did some of thatknowledge comes from the books that I'veread some of that knowledge comes frommy own experience and I need to captureall of that information so that I can see it in one place and see where all ofthat stuff interconnects my researchcontribution will be a synthesis of allof those locations of knowledge and whenI connect them all together in a waythat they've never been connected beforethat's what I'm contributing in part andI am so much better at that with thetitle cast in because I Can Only Hold somuch in my brain at one time forinstance earlier this week I was tryingto connect the ideas of the jugglingCommunity as we call it with the idea of of Community Theater which I was a partof growing up on the community theaterside of things I had like threedifferent Scholars who discussed amateurtheater and Community Theater in littletheaters in Canada and then on thejuggling side of things I had theinterviews that I had conducted and Ihad a couple quotes from podcasts andvarious other places where people talkabout juggling in my own experiences andthe way that I ended up developing myargument was through a synthesis of allof that information but it's really hard for me to hold all six sources in myhead at one time and then alsoextrapolate from there so the subtlecasting has been invaluable in thatrespect I don't even remember how I cameup with ideas before I had the subtlecast in it is that important to myprocess now however coming up with theideas is only the first part of doing adissertation the other part is writingthem down so that you can actuallytransmit that knowledge that you areproducing and this is where I've come upagainst some issues in my Tuttle casting system and ultimately right now I amwriting my physical dissertation inMicrosoft Word not an obsidian because Ihaven't found like a really good way todo that in obsidian but that's not themain issue the main issues are threefoldfirst of all I write notes in adifferent style of writing than I writepapers what's more I write in adifferent style depending on the paperthat I'm writing I will write in thetone of voice that is required for thatpaper and so I can't literally copy andpaste notes from my subtle Caston into my papers nor would I want to because Idon't want to risk plagiarizing myselfas I continue writing into the futurebut personally once I have written aboutsomething I find it very difficult forme to write about that thing in adifferent style or a different tone ofvoice or focusing on slightly differentthings because something is alreadythere in other words sometimes I find iteasier to write something starting fromnothing than starting from something Ihave this issue when I try to get chatGPT to help me write things as well somaybe Chachi PT isn't as useful as everyone says it's going to be so that'sissue number one is just style and toneof voice and actual like the practice ofmaking sentences becomes more difficultwhen sentences already exist the secondissue that I have is that writing for meis also a process of discovery so evenif I have a bunch of notes and I alreadyhave an outline of exactly what I'mwriting that I have constructed from theexisting notes in my subtle cast in evenif that's the case as I'm writing I will discover new things to say like I amvery much what they call in the fictionwriting World a discovery writer or apantser in many respects I really enjoythe process of writing and so when I'mwriting I find things out about what Iam writing sometimes I'll literally makenew knowledge in the process of writingand so in that moment sometimes I derailthe outline I've created in obsidianplus I have now New pieces ofinformation that I want to capture in mysubtle cast in as I am in the writing process so so do I stop writing and putthose notes into subtle casting and theninto my outline for my written projector do I keep writing and risk notcapturing that in the larger obsidianproject but also potentially derailingthe entire outline I had created withinobsidian and we'll get to outlines inobsidian in a second and the third andfinal problem which is the reason Iwanted to discuss this in general is the issue of linearity which I saw I thinkChristian in the title cast and Forumdiscuss as hierarchical versusnon-hierarchical thought and in obsidianthought is non-hierarchical there's nolike correct order to put thoughts inbecause you're supposed to captureinformation on these little note cardsand so it has to be a complete thoughtand it has to be a small completethought it's supposed to be an atomicunit of knowledge so all of the notes inmy Tuttle casting in obsidian aretotally complete within themselves and non-hierarchical like you could readthis thought and understand this thoughtwithout accessing other thoughts yesother thoughts within my title cast andwill help contextualize this thought forsure but this thought will also help youcontextualize those other thoughts sowhich comes first who is on firstand ever since adopting subtlecast andspecifically within obsidian thatliterally makes it look like this graphwith a bunch of nodes and interconnections so that nothing reallylooks like it's coming before or afteranything else since making my brain workin that way it has stopped working inthe linear way of argument point pointpoint argument that supplements thefirst argument point point this linearway that we are taught to write essaysin school and I can hear many people inmy own life who would say well we shouldwrite differently we should experimentwith different forms of writing in factNicole vanderhoven is about to start a book project in obsidian and wasdiscussing this idea of potentiallywriting the book in a different format Idon't know if that would be non-linearlyin her case if the book is only going toexist on the internet why couldn't youjust have links throughout the textsthat you could jump around or write itlike a Choose Your Own Adventure novelso that it doesn't have to all comeafter one another you can choose yourown way through the argument so thatevery piece of the argument is somewhatcomplete in itselfhowever personally I do really like linear writing I really like beingcarried through a text by an author andI really like writing that way myselfand so it has been very frustrating forme to not understand which order Ishould put my thoughts in in a piece ofwriting anymore I apologize because thisvideo is going to be more me identifyingproblems than it is me giving youSolutions which I do like to do and Ilook forward to hopefully seeing all ofyour solutions to my problems in thecomments section below but I do want to offer some ways in to using obsidian asa writing tool not just a research tooland maybe Point towards some of the waysthat I'm going to change how I approachwriting now that I'm using subtle castin because as much as I'm conflictedabout subtlecast and as a writing tool Iam not conflicted about it as aKnowledge Management tool and also as aresearch tool a way to find new thoughtand create new ideas and clearly for forme the creation of new ideas and the writing down of those ideas really gohand in hand and sometimes change placessometimes it's the writing that gives methe ideas and sometimes it's the ideasthey give me the writing so how wouldyou write something with obsidian in aneasy way that is linear and hierarchicaltypically the way that's gonna go islike this first you make an outline ofyour paper it can be a loose outlineit's probably going to develop as youfill it with ideas and those ideas aregoing to come from your subtle casting and so at first you're just going totake the links for the notes where thoseideas are stored and you're going toswap those links into the outline and tomake this hierarchical you might havegroupings of notes so you'll have likethe parent note and then it's littlechildren notes after it in theappropriate order for how they should becontextualizing each other and then youcan always move that grouping of justlinks around in your outline so asyou're playing around with the outlineyou can still move things around becauseit's not a bunch of text yet you've just got like the nodes of ideas and this iswhy I name all of my notes after thecore thesis of each thought because nowmy outline essentially looks like all ofthe topic sentences of the essay thatI'm going to write so once you've gotyour outline and you've got all of yourlinks in there then you're going topaste the actual content from the linksinto your essay outline so now you'vegot the zero draft or the shitty firstdraft or whatever you want to call it ofyour article or book chapter or whathave you there's no transition sentences yet because each of these notes thatyou've pasted in is like Atomic it'scomplete in itself so it's nottransitioning between anything it mightnot make a whole lot of sense but you'vegot something you've got a shitty draftnow presumably all you have to do iswrite some transitional statements writean introduction that summarizeseverything you've got in there you knowtweak some of the sentences so that theysound like they're in your writing voiceand voila you have the first draft of apaper that you can send out to people tolook out as well so that's the generalidea obviously you can already imagine where all of my problems come when itcomes to this system first of all in theoutline how do I decide what should gobefore what in my arguments because itreally feels like every single piece ofknowledge needs to happen first becausein my brain I'm I'm experiencing themall at once and I can't imagine givingany one of them to a person before theyunderstand all the others but I can'tgive them all of the pieces ofinformation in my headall at once so I have to find a way to create an order and the best situationthat I've found for this so far issimply to make a choice and even if itlooks like it doesn't make any sense atfirst make a decision about the linearorder that these ideas are going to comeand even if you're like wellthat first idea it would actually bereally good if they already knew thethird idea before they knew that firstideadon't worry so much about that just makea decision and start writing and theissues with the order you've chosen will come up in the writing process andyou'll be able to move things aroundlater it's not an ideal solution butit's the one I have right now secondlythe issue that I have around notes notbeing in the tone of voice that I wantfor this article and also already havingtext there being an issue for merewording it because I can't think ofanother way that it could be said mycurrent solution for this is to finishthat zero draft that is just copy andpasting notes and then to completelyrewrite it so not even to live in thatdraft to push it off to the side and sometimes even close it entirely and nowthat I have a sort of like understandingof how the paper might go I write ablank like from a blank page I startwriting a new draft and hopefully itmirrors the other draft but at least nowthat I have that other draft in my headI know in order of how it might go and Ican imagine this entire paper I startwriting from scratch and that way I canjust let the style of the writing andthe voice of the writing come out in myDiscovery writing even though I've really already discovered everything I'mgoing to write aboutstill gives me that opportunity to sortof start fresh and then finally theissue where I am a discovery writer andsometimes I will discover new notes thataren't in my subtle cast and as I amwriting this paper from the notes thatwere in my subtle casting in 2014 Sashaon the subtlecast and Forum made a postwhere he differentiated betweendirectional and indirectional notes andlike Sasha most of my notes areindirectional meaning I didn't write them for any purpose except to storethat knowledge so they were note takingfor note-taking sake directional noteson the other hand are ones that you makefor a project like a book chapter sayand you're doing research for this bookchapter so you are creating notes thatare relevant to that research and Sashasays that either way he has a folder inhis subtle Caston which he calls themesand outlines where he will store all ofthe outlines for potential future textsthat he is going to write sometimes whenhe's doing directional note-taking he will put those notes directly into theoutline where where they belong and Ithink that's great and I do somethingvery similar the really cool part is howhe uses the indirectional notes andevery time he puts a note into hisentire system he will examine hisoutlines folder to see if there'sanywhere in any of his outlines thatthis note could belong and he'll put itthere so now all of those outlines ofpotential future writing projects areliterally filling themselves up overtime and I love that idea and I am going to start employing that idea I only justfound out about it when I Was preparingto have this little chat with you soI'll let you know in the future how thatgoes but I really like the idea of textswriting themselvesof course what writer what I think thatis everything that I wanted to say inthis video if you are having problemswith writing and your title cast in andI haven't addressed those in this videothen please let me know in the commentsection below because maybe I'm havingthose problems too and I just didn'trealize it or maybe other people are or maybe other people have had a solutionto those problems and they can help youout I have found a lot of solutions tomy problems from this community here onmy YouTube channel so I reallyappreciate it when you write things inthe comments like in my previous videosomebody gave me a keyboard shortcut andI've been using it every day so thankyou so much for watching Everybody videoabout me writing an article usingobsidian coming soon in the meantime youshould totally watch Nicolevanderhoven's video on how she is goingto start a book writing project anddocument that on YouTube because I'm so excited for that project it's sovaluable when we see other people dotheir work as they're doing it and seethem struggle through these problemswhich is also why I wanted to tell youabout my struggles with writing using mysubtle cast in here today so thank youfor creating such a supportive Communitythank you for 20 000 subscribers haven'tmentioned that and I'll see you inanother video soon bye everybody, does my zettelkasten make writing... harder?, morganeua, 01gwhj2nfand9ahwb082wsa84k.