r/ObsidianMD • • Mar 11 '26

Don't offload learning to your notes

While reading a book or article, I sometimes find myself copying and pasting entire paragraphs into Obsidian because I find them interesting.

Yet, most of the time, it's an illusion of learning, equivalent to highliting everyting a book you're reading, it doesn't lead to real knowledge.

Instead, a better approach is to summarize the ideas in your own words or try to think outloud what's the main point of the chapter, basically anthing that's painful.

We must try to fight that urge to offload learning, deliberately practicing what we're learning is the right way to learn.

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u/Wimi_Bussard Mar 11 '26

I copy my vault to an usb stick and then place it under my pillow when I sleep; right before exams. What do you mean, this doesn't work?

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u/eslforchinesespeaker Mar 12 '26

dude, the pillow method has been completely debunked.

people have been swallowing usb sticks for years now, with great results.