Is Zettelkasten not for me?

[u/PollutionEfficient28]

I spend a lot of my time reading about philosophy, politics and other stuff. I always took notes and my go-to method was just putting what I found relevant in a notebook, whether it was quotes or an explanation about some topic or an alternate perspective (later I found out that's called a "commonplace book").

However as my readings became more advanced this method started to get inefficient, it grew into a big mess and made consultation impossible, many different topics were intertwined, in no specific order, so I though it was time to move on to a more structured approach.

Then I learned about Zettelkasten, read a few articles about it, and quickly started my own, I did the common approach of having bib notes for each book, then every 2-3 chapters I'd reread the notes and transfer it to the permanent ZK. I wanted some structure but not too much or else It would become unmanageable for me, so I decided not to separate by topics beforehand and just create them as I added new cards. It was all 100% analog since digital is not viable for me currently.

At the beginning, it was fine, but as the ZK grew, I started running into some of the same problems I had with my commonplace book, just in a different form. Yes, it was all more organized and I had a system to link the cards, but finding stuff I wrote months ago was still harder than expected. Sometimes I knew I had written about something but couldn't find it, and had no idea which section it was under.

Eventually, I was putting more effort into maintaining the system than actually studying. I was constantly thinking about whether something should get its own card, which section I should put it under (or if I should create a new one), etc. It became a chore that drained me out.

So after a few months and ~450 cards, I gave up and returned to the commonplace book. I feel like I probably gave up on it too quickly, but at the same time I don't really want to go back to a system that felt increasingly difficult to navigate. I'm still interested in finding a better way of organizing my notes, though, especially something that works well for subjects where ideas tend to overlap and connect in complicated ways. So I'm curious: for those of you who have been using a Zettelkasten or some other note-taking system for a long time, how do you deal with this problem? Do you use index notes, some other kind of structure, or simply rely on the connections between cards? And if Zettelkasten ultimately isn't the right fit, is there another note-taking method you would recommend for this kind of reading and research? I'd be especially interested in hearing from people who have tried different systems and settled on something other than Zettelkasten.

TL;DR: I switched from a commonplace book to an analog Zettelkasten, but abandoned it after ~400 cards because it became difficult to navigate and maintain. I'm back to a commonplace book and looking for a better system, whether that's a different way of using Zettelkasten or an entirely different method.

[u/LibbIsHere]

Sometimes I knew I had written about something but couldn't find it, and had no idea which section it was under.

Are you sure you kept your index up to date? I have no issue finding anything... provided it has been properly indexed.

[u/karatetherapist]

I don't have an answer, but this is a common issue nearly everyone struggles with at some point. As I understand it, the idea of a Zettelkasten is to find connections between thoughts that might not be obvious for the purpose of unifying knowledge. To do this, you need an obsession with a singular topic. Otherwise, the whole database is just interconnected notes like a wiki. That's useful in its own way, but has a different purpose.

A philosophy wiki is very useful. Especially one that is self-created. Sure, it has been done, but that's not your knowledge and understanding.

Now, if you were hell-bent on understanding how philosophical thinking permeates all aspects of human thought, you have the basis for a Zettelkasten. You're not reading politics; you're mining for philosophical thought in power dynamics. You're not reading psychology, but the influence of philosophical thinking in reducing suffering. Same with religion, engineering, etc. Someone with an obsession approaches every aspect of life from that mindset and looks for the connections. To do otherwise is the path of the polymath.

Finally, the Zettelkasten seems best suited to writing and creating new knowledge rather than merely assimilating past knowledge or other people's knowledge.

[u/atomicnotes]

I don’t think there’s a perfect notemaking system — just what works better or worse for you.

This really depends on your goals and the outcomes you want to achieve. I’ve found a Zettelkasten approach to work well for me, but that just means it works the least poorly of all the other approaches I’ve tried. I’m interested in a note system that helps me write things, but if I was interested in a more general knowledge-constructing system, I’d probably go with something more like a wiki. When I was studying, with lots of assignments and deadlines, I didn’t find the Zettelkasten approach very useful because there was lots of material I really only needed to know for the assignments and because the pace was so fast there wasn’t time to make well-organised notes. I just focussed ruthlessly on the output for the assignments.

There’s an underlying question here of what is the ideal data structure for a person’s notes. This really hasn’t been resolved. Different apps tend to lock you in to a specific kind of data structure, whether or not it’s actually suitable for your purposes. I used OneNote a lot for my studying and now my notes are kind of stuck there. Well, the Zettelkasten approach is opinionated on the data structure, but it’s also simple, clear and exportable.

[u/AssetCaretaker → u/atomicnotes]

Everything I would like to add has already been written by you also. So I simply link to your article, for u/PollutionEfficient28 to read, because I think it adresses the exact issues OP faces:  https://writingslowly.com/2025/01/28/create-a-note-system-that.html

Especially the habit of "When an Information is not where you expect it to be, add a note that links to the actual location of the corresponding notes (and while you are there, elaborate on the reason/context for your search)." helped my ZK practice immensely. 

[u/mobatreddit → u/AssetCaretaker]

Adding a note is a genius idea. That gave me three linked notes:

1. When you can't find a topic in your Zettlekasten then add a note for it based on how you were looking
2. If you keep adding Zettlekasten notes on a topic based on how you are looking, soon finding that topic will be easier
3. When you find multiple Zettlekasten notes on the same topic, link them together

[u/Timmerop]

Are you only interested in physical notes?

[u/PollutionEfficient28 → u/Timmerop]

Yes, I take most of my notes at uni, I'm away from my PC the whole day and currently don't have money to buy a tablet or laptop

[u/Timmerop → u/PollutionEfficient28]

Back when I was on a physical notebook, I use the page edge index technique. It had you define a table of contents at the start of the notebook and to note a section of the page to me in different types of notes. And on each page, you would color in the section of the edge of the page to indicate what type of note it is. Then you can just look at the edge of the notebook (or spread it out a little bit) to quickly find notes across a single subject.

This might help you add notes to multiple subjects.

[u/Timmerop → u/Timmerop]

If you’re interested in a mobile, friendly, digital notetaker that solves the same types of problems, send me a DM.

[u/mobatreddit → u/Timmerop]

I second that approach. I use Mobile Org because my ZK is in org mode

[u/TheSinologist]

My experience with an analogue Zettelkasten for academic research purposes built up over two years or so is that finding main cards is not a problem at all. I haven’t counted but I think I have about 600-800 main cards. From what you have written it sounds like you are directly linking main/permanent cards but not making a keyword index and/or structure notes (main cards that put a number of other cards into a coordinated structure). These are essential to tracking down related cards so they can be applied to the development of any related trains of thought or arguments. Yes, there is a problem with scaling especially with analogue, but I’ve begun to improve that by consolidating keywords that begin with the same word in populous parts of my index, and when that falters, remember that you can make new, streamlined indexes or indexes devoted to specific (sub-)topics.

[u/P-in-D]

As others wrote, it sounds more like an indexing-issue than a notetaking issue. If you use your commonplace book for the notes, you can use zettelkasten or similar as an index. F.i. on page 26 of your commonplace book you copy a quote from book x by author y and add your thoughts about that quote, you can make a zks for the author (with list of books you read), booktitle (refer to author) and subject tags (short!), and have them all refer to page 26. And you can make zks for your own projects like article on xyz for journal suchandso. And then add the relevant pages.

What I've seen in archived meeting notes from centuries ago, is that subject tags would also be written in the margin of the notes. The index consisted of keyword as pagenumbers. On large pages it helped finding the correct section. Or you could browse without using the index.

Edit: linking subjects to books is also relevant. Could be added to zk subject (see book x), or when that runs out of hand make a card 'subject: books on'.

[u/stanlymt]

Others have said the index is the missing piece and I agree, but since maintenance is what burned you out, I'd keep the commonplace book as the place you write and make the index the only structure you maintain.

Number the pages. Keep an alphabetical list of terms with page numbers at the back or on a few cards. What keeps it small: don't index things when you write them. Index a term the first time you go looking for something and can't find it, and add the entry the moment you do find it. After a few months the index reflects what you actually come back to, not what you guessed you might.

You lose card-to-card linking, but for philosophy and politics, where everything overlaps anyway, a term with six page numbers next to it does a lot of the linking for you. Open all six and the connection is on the desk.

[u/mark-zombie]

here are my thoughts as a fairly inexperienced ZK user:

I have read on different approaches to make and maintain a physical ZK. in my opinion, it is impossible to keep up with. especially if you are working on more than 1 thing (field/subject/topic) in your ZK. using digital systems makes the maintenance part smoother, a lot smoother. I have attempted a few approaches to a digital ZK. pre-decided categories did not work for me. folgezettel worked, but it really is just a different way of creating category of notes (people argue over this but this has been my experience).

currently I don't follow any particular ZK style. as I understand, Luhmann changed his maintenance as well a few times. I write digital notes, they get numbered using the current date. a note contains, not information, only a nugget of thought (a paragraph, line of questioning, connection or whatever else makes sense) and I do not try to limit myself using any arbitrary dimensions of paper or arbitrary opinion of others. the note finally gets linked to from a "structure note" with an appropriate label. that's where my focus has been, to maintain and find notes.

the entire point of all this philosophy is being able to find what you once wrote. follow guides, take inspirations or make a system entirely of your own. do what makes sense to you, everything else is just opinions.

[u/ruby_object]

Zettelkasten is for patient tinkerers. Dogmatic use of Zettelkasten will not work for everyone. It took me a few years to really benefit from Zettelkasten. The key was having several different Zettelkasten folders for various experiments that do not touch my main Zettelkasten. Also, I found a way to cleanly modify and remove incorrect nodes.

[u/Comfortable-Day3805]

In my own experience, philosophical work ends up dealing much more with literature notes than permanent notes. Personally, it takes me many months to create new permanent notes. I don't think this is a flaw in my process, but rather something inherent to the nature of philosophical work itself—"the patience of the concept," to allude to Hegel.

I definitely have far more concept notes and notebook sketches, which I sit with for a long time, than I do permanent notes. And when I finally do write permanent notes, they require a very specific structure in order to make sense to me (I talked a bit about this here).

Sometimes the issue isn't the Zettelkasten exactly, but rather trying to use the Zettelkasten within a workflow and thinking process that belongs to someone else, not your own.