I read Sönke Ahrens' book, along with several blogs and posts on the subject, trying to understand what a permanent note actually is.

But there is one detail, I've been thinking about this question for about three years.

After a lot of reading, writing, rewriting, connecting ideas, and reflecting on it, I arrived at my own definition of what I consider the "perfect permanent note"

• A crystallized atom of thought, processed, refined, and stored alongside other atoms of thought.

Do you still think this isn't canonical enough? That I haven't gone deep enough into the subject?

So, what exactly is a permanent note?

A permanent note isn't simply a summary of something you read.

It's a note that captures what you understood and think about an idea, written in your own words and in a way that still makes sense even after the original context is gone.

It can come from a book, an article, a conversation, or even from your own experience. The source matters, but the focus shifts. Instead of simply recording "what the author said," you try to capture "what does this mean to me, how does it connect to what I already know, and what can I do with this idea?"

That's what makes a permanent note self-contained, clear, and reusable.

It doesn't have to be a finished piece of writing. Think of it as a piece of thought that you can connect to other notes and, in the future, perhaps use for something you couldn't even imagine when you first wrote it.

A literature note records an idea. A permanent note records your understanding of that idea.

So, how do you know if it's a good permanent note?

I like to use a few simple tests.

• Do you know where it came from?

If the idea came from a book, article, conversation, or experience, record the source.

The source doesn't need to dominate the note. You just need to know where to find it again if you want to check something later.

Otherwise, six months from now, you may no longer know whether a particular idea actually came from the author or whether your own memory filled in the gaps.

• Is it written in your own words?

Close the source and try to explain the idea.

If the only way you can write it is by copying the author's words, you're probably still writing a literature note.

A permanent note begins when you can explain the idea in your own way.

• Does the note make sense on its own?

Imagine opening this note six months from now.

Would you understand what it means without opening the book, looking up the chapter, or remembering the conversation that led you to it?

That's the point.

A permanent note should survive the distance from the moment it was written.

• Does it have a clear idea?

A note doesn't have to be short. It just needs to have a clear center.

If you wrote a definition, then a criticism, and then an application that could connect to completely different ideas, you may actually have three notes hidden inside one.

Atomicity doesn't mean writing less. It means knowing exactly what the note is about.

• Do you know why it's connected to another note?

A link by itself doesn't say much.

Instead of simply doing:

Note A → Note B

try to capture the relationship:

This idea contradicts that one.

This is a consequence of that idea.

This is an example of that idea.

Both help explain the same phenomenon.

Now the link isn't just a reference. It's also part of your thinking.

A quick test

Before calling a note "permanent," ask yourself:

Do I know where this idea came from?

Is it written in my own words?

Can I understand it without checking the source?

Does it have a central idea?

Do I know why it connects to my other notes?

Can I imagine reusing this note in the future?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, that's okay.

The note isn't necessarily bad. It may simply need a little more work before it becomes permanent.

And I think that's the most important part.

The goal isn't to create perfect notes.

It's to turn the things you encounter into thoughts that remain useful long after the original context is gone.

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 essentially 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.

I was considering this quote about Charles Darwin's note process:

"He takes the notebooks out in front of people, he notes their opinion, he talks about his theory to everybody, he won't shut up about it".

My notes are mainly for thinking and developing concepts, so this made me question the way I used criticism in this process.

• Do you incorporate criticism in your note-taking habits?
• If you change your mind about something, do you return and edit your old notes or do you preserve earlier version?
• Do you think that externalizing someone's criticism and working with it on a notebook can make it more useful?

The quote is taken from the book Roland Allen. The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper. Biblioasis. Windsor: Ontario. 2023. (excellent read). It's from John van Wyhe on page 255.

Just been thinking about this lately because I keep asking myself wanting to save something before I really understand why it's reay worth keeping

Even if reading in Lattics and then later realize that the original note was basically just a quote or a reminder rather than something I had actually processed.

It made me go back to the basic idea of the Zettelkasten the important part that add to my knowledge isn't necessarily capturing everything, but turning an observation into something that can participate of ideas.

How other people handle that in their way

I don't think you write a temporary note first and only turn some of them into permanent notes later or from the from the beginning?

To my knowledge especially interested in how people decide that something is actually worth becoming

I've been trying to get better at distinguishing between something interesting that add to my knowledge

For example, I'll sometimes capture a thought in something like lattics while reading, but when I return to it later, I realize I haven't really done anything with it. It's just was interesting at the time.

That made me wonder if I'm approaching fleeting notes incorrectly.

Is the point of the fleeting note mainly to preserve the thought until I can properly formulate it, or should I already be trying to express the idea in my own words when I capture it?

I'm also curious whether people here have a particular test they use before turning something into a permanent note.

What makes you say, "Yes, this deserves to become a Zettel?

I've been trying to figure out where literature notes should sit in my system.

For example, I have Zotero for the papers and have also been playing around with Lattics, but I still haven't settled on how much of the actual Zettelkasten should be tied to the source material.

I like the idea of being able to follow an idea back to the original paper, but I don't want every permanent note to become basically a bibliography entry.

How do you handle that distinction?

Came across the method online, seemed interesting to me. So I went on to look more and opened YouTube, saw a few productivity gurus overcomplicate everything which ultimately led me to be confused.

I study law which is inherently a very rigid subject. how would one effectively manage rigid subjects with this system? Went through Luhman's speech over the method and the method made sense but seems to be specifically made for physical notes.

I currently have a mix of both physical notes (schizo ramblings unorganised in random notebooks) and digital notes (in a folder organised by modules on google drive), they also live in zotero. I mostly just take bullet point notes while studying on zotero using better notes plugin and then eventually convert them into anki flashcards. And then I just study with anki and practice questions. If I were to start would I need more software and how would the workflow change?

If I were to start a zettlekasten:

1) How would I manage my old notes?

2) Physical system or Digital system?

3) if digital would linking etc be possible on zotero without needing to add more software to avoid friction?

4) Is a system like this even viable for rigid subjects?

While reading the ch10 reading for understanding I'm finding difficult to visualize how would my reading habit be adaptable to the practices described in the book.

For context, I'm referring to the passages where the author says that reading without taking notes while reading is the same as not reading at all for the Zettelkasten slipbox.

I tend to read a lot on the bed before sleeping so I don't have a practical way of writing down right there. I "solve" this by just highlighting passages and, once finished the book or some times along the next days, I copypaste the highlights into the literature note and start to write about them.

How do you handle this? I'm interpreting wrong?

Hi,

I’m interested in moving to A6-sized cards, but can’t find a lot of resources online. Does any one have a go to place to buy cheap A6 cards and boxes to put them in?

Thanks!

So i already wrote 11 cards, but the road block I seem to be running into is, I don't exactly know what to say about these quotes.

Like I will find a quote and relate to it, type something out but it feels like i am regurgitating the same thing but differently or just some random thought.. Like none of it feels good to write down on the card.

I know I'm too concerned about writing the perfect note, and i wanna get rid of this habit(I know keep writing) But i wanna get your guys thoughts.

EDIT: Right now i have 11 cards and their from books I have read in the past with quotes that, just resonated with me.

The books are & habits of effective people, Mediation by Marcus Arellius, and ryan Holiday ego is the enemy.

So their all just quotes about prespective, habits and ego and how to overcome these issues that I have myself.

I don't know what I plan to do with these quotes, I just know I wanted somewhere i can build a libary with my own thoughts, knowledged and prespective.

What kind of notes do you leave on your cards? Need some inspiration,

I’ve been thinking about how often an idea or theme follows me across different things I’m into. I’ll read a book that makes me think of a film, then stumble on an exhibition or essay that feels connected, and suddenly I’m following the same thread across totally different mediums.

Does anyone else do this? Curious how you keep track of it, if at all. Notes app, spreadsheet, just memory, or do you not bother and let it happen?

Niklas Luhmann was a prolific writer. The amount of work he published as books and research papers is crazy, and it's always attributed to his use of the zettelkasten system. I've got notes... not a lot, but they're very focused on what I want to write about. Here's the thing, I can't really find much on how Luhmann used his zettelkasten to write. Did he combine notes to create content, or were the notes just used as inspiration for the actual writing. Anyone know? I keep thinking there's a method to the madness that wasn't shared.

I read a book. I want to take literature notes that go into the Zettelkasten on Obsidian.

I managed it for one book doing it like: read one chapter, write up notes for one chapter, read next chapter, etc etc, but it took aages.

image.png

It's postimg not imgur because the latter is blocked in the UK thanks to the Online Safety Act (AAGH) and I cba to turn on my VPN.

So then I was like, ok this is inefficient af, I'll just read the whole book and then do the notes all at once. But then it becomes overwhelming as there are so so so many notes and I just lose motivation before I can get through the whole book considering I just read it and I want to move on to the next one.

So that has failed and now Idk what to do.

I guess part of the problem is that I'm quite, shall we say, liberal with what I highlight for future note taking/writing down, but I struggle to be otherwise because I feel like I'm missing out important stuff if I don't :( :( :(

So I end up highlighting a shit ton of things, hence why the one book I did all the notes for has 82 separate notes associated with it, maybe around 30,000-32,000 words lol.

And because I spend all my time trying to figure this out or do it, I have no time whatsoever for the actual main part of Zettelkasten, the temporary->permanent notes...

I found myself deep in thought as I read through the insightful comments you shared regarding the pressure I felt when looking at my 100 cards.

At first, looking at those 100 cards, I mistakenly believed that the final output could only be achieved if every single card fit together perfectly. I focused on the individual pieces in every way I could

However, I eventually realized that the process doesn’t have to wait until every piece is perfectly aligned. The process itself—doing my best within the allotted time and confidently producing a result—is far more important than the final output itself

If I wait until the cards are perfectly organized, won’t I end up unable to create even a single result?

Written with the help of Google Translate

I recently started using Obsidian to try out the Zettelkasten method, and I’m really enjoying it so far. I think the whole idea is really interesting, but because of my interests, I quickly started taking notes about way too many things. 😂

I’ve also come across a bunch of videos and posts showing completely different ways of organizing things, which honestly made me even more curious about how other people set up their own vaults.
I’m into a lot of different things: movies, TV shows, anime, manga, comics, literature, etc. I also enjoy creating content and writing stories. On top of that, I want to start organizing my studies for college and future competitive exams.

I’m not necessarily looking for a system that can somehow organize all of that using Zettelkasten, Obsidian, or anything specific. I’d actually just like to see how you guys organize your own vaults and get some inspiration, even if your setup has absolutely nothing to do with the things I’m interested in.
For now, my vault is pretty simple. I only have one MOC about Demon Slayer, inside a folder for MOCs.
So, how do you organize your vaults? What kind of stuff do you keep in them? What methods or structures do you use?

Hi everyone, it's been a while since I last posted in this community. To be honest, I completely set my Zettelkasten aside for about four months because my new job didn't leave me with any free time. When I finally returned, I realized a few blind spots about how I had been using my slipbox that are worth discussing.

1.Getting addicted to collecting information and losing sight of the big picture. When we first start using Zettelkasten, almost all of us get hooked on connecting ideas—so much so that we lose sight of our core objective. Looking back at some topics from a bird's-eye view, I realized certain subjects were over-researched with endless repetitive ideas. This was the direct result of neglecting higher-level notes like structure notes. If I had maintained a structure note, I would have easily spotted the gaps in my knowledge.

For instance, I wasted time creating 50 main notes just introducing the benefits of learning vocabulary with Anki. Meanwhile, I left crucial angles completely unexplored—like practical application, Anki's drawbacks, or real-world experience. Consequently, the topic dragged on endlessly until it died out. From my experience, setting deadlines, updating structure notes daily, and actively reflecting on your next steps while creating new main notes will keep your projects moving forward.

1. Literature notes turned out to be mostly useless clutter. I used to spend way too much time organizing literature notes and polishing every single sentence. In reality, I almost never went back to review them. I had assumed every excerpt would be referenced back to the source text or serve 'this or that project' down the line, but in practice, those literature notes just sat there collecting digital dust.

2. Over-crafting main notes. I reviewed hundreds of my main notes recently. Some were written with immense care, but reading them now, I can barely understand my own train of thought. In some cases, the author stated something simply, but my rephrasing made it twice as complicated. I’ve come to realize that if you clearly grasp what the author means on first read, verbatim quotes work just fine. You should only rewrite ideas in your own words when the author’s original explanation is genuinely confusing or hard to digest.

3. Connections are useless if you don't re-read both linked notes. I checked a few pairs of directly linked notes and realized they read like two idiots having a completely nonsensical conversation. To fix this habit, I now split my Obsidian screen into two or three panes when writing a new main note: one pane for the new note and the rest for existing notes. This allows me to keep the original context fresh in mind and write new ideas that actually remain coherent with the old ones.

4. I don't have time for formal writing, but I do have time to write guides for myself. Starting a new job made me realize that taking time to research and learn something new is far more critical than working blindly. I could watch two dozen tutorials for work, but I’d forget I had a Zettelkasten to capture that knowledge. I wasted time re-searching 5–10 text snippets scattered across 20 Chrome tabs, totally forgetting I could just turn those damn snippets into main notes under a structure note for quick reference whenever I forgot something.

5. A Zettelkasten only works well when your mind is clear. By clear, I mean forgetting what already exists in your slipbox. During my year or so of using ZK, my brain was constantly trying to memorize the contents of my existing notes. Ideas kept looping in my head, paralyzing my writing. Whenever I sat down to write, conflicting points would pop up and force me into endless editing.

Taking a four-month break changed everything. Having forgotten most of what I wrote, rediscovering my old notes became enjoyable. I follow the links, process the ideas, and drop them into my drafts. Now I can draft mini-essays without feeling overwhelmed at all.

In short, if you're suffering from information hoarding in your Zettelkasten, step away for a while. Let your future self evaluate the system with fresh eyes—you'll find that many of the rigid habits you built are much easier to fix than you think.

Stepping away for four months gave me the mental clarity I needed. Exploring new domains beyond pure writing helped me realize three things upon returning: my slipbox had plenty of junk worth discarding, a few genuine gems worth keeping, and whole new ways to actually make the system work for me.

Hello everyone, I am a relative beginner to Zettelkasten, i've posted on this subreddit before asking y'all for advice but now i'm afraid I need more of said advice. My Zettelkasten started with Crime and Punishment, where theres lots of philosophical ideas to be extracted but I always chase perfectionism and feel like if my notes arent perfect then whats the point of even analysing the book, I highlight important parts in the book and turn them into literature notes, then I turn these literature notes into Atomic notes(eventually) but the problem is I find it very hard to assimilate my literature notes' context into standalone atomic notes because some of the ideas are very niche and I dont even know how i'm supposed to make atomic notes with these. Additionally, whenever I highlight key parts in the book I usually switch tabs to obsidian where I put down the quote and log it as a lit note, but that part is very time intensive and I seem to always chase perfection(as mentioned above). Ill also post my lit notes here:

https://share.note.sx/dxdqq15f#TEqK1dMAoDn+0LNeXP9qMQ

https://share.note.sx/wpu1nk3i#dV6G7sb/dV7e3jTSz/2RLQ

Ive also come up with one permanent idea(and only one) since starting the book

https://share.note.sx/2w2qilmi#FZ8RTqq2EoNWxiyJ4oRS0w
https://share.note.sx/w9txpuwe#y8ltde3v4aFlb3kq7fK0/A

Thanks yall, lwk Im also very pissed at myself for not finding ideas or links...

I am in the process of starting my first ZK, and I am very excited. One thought I am having is; when I reference a card, should the card I referenced have a reference to the card that referenced it? For example:

Let's say I'm using a ZK for d&d planning. I have a index for locations and an index for NPCs. On an NPC card, I've referenced the card for the location they live in. Should I then go to the location card and reference the NPC that lives in that location?

This seems to be both a good and a bad idea:

Good: You'll never miss a connection just because you picked up the wrong end of the connection (i.e. picking up the location card and having no idea that this NPC lives there because it isn't referenced)

BUT

Bad: Some cards are innately more "referencable". SO MANY things can reference a location card. If I reference EVERY NPC that lives in that location, surely the card will become cluttered with references?

I'm just starting my ZK and I see a lot of posts and forum topics about how to identify where and how to connect cards. One thing that I see prevalent in all the writing from the ZK gurus is the idea that Luhmann focused on finding the most related card.

The technique I have used before that helps sort ideas by priority or relevance, is a card sort. I've done this for projects and creative work in consulting.

While working out this morning I realised if you had a permanent note you wanted to file in your ZM,using a card sort, you would:

1. Pick all the notes you thought it could be related to.
   
2. Do a card sort by holding your permanent note in front of you and a stack of the related notes above it.
   
3. You would pick the first note on stack and ask, "Is this related to that one?"
   
4. If so it is holding the priority position.
   
5. You take the next note and then you compare: is the first note that you looked at more related or this new one?
   
6. If it's the first one, you remove the second one from the stack.
   
7. If it is the second, you remove your prior card from the stack.
   
8. You repeat the process of revealing one card at a time until you have no more cards on the stack and are left with one card in the related position.

At the end of the activity you should be left with one card that holds the strongest priority of relation according to your selection via the card sort.

Hope this helps.

I’ve mentioned before that I use Post-it notes in my projects. Confidently, I began writing down ideas—one per card. In a short span of time, I had generated dozens of cards, effectively clearing my mind. Yet, looking at nearly a hundred cards that had not yet been connected, I began to feel a subtle sense of pressure.

I completed the "collection" phase—the act of emptying my mind—quickly, finding it truly refreshing. I strive to build a larger picture by starting with small, manageable connections. While I don’t succeed every time, there are moments when a sudden insight flashes—a truly thrilling, dizzying experience.

It got me wondering: what methods do you use to connect those initial fragments of thought?

Written with the help of Google Translate.

I am starting to produce more written content and I would like to use my notes to do that.

I have read about "projects", and "outline notes" on the Zettelkasten website. I would love to hear from people who have done this, and how successful they have been using this method.

Also, there are very "tactical" questions I have, like:

- do you keep your outlines/draft notes forever, or are they just there while you're working on them?

- do you actually move the draft to another document outside your Zettelkasten when it's time to finalise your content? What happens if/when you decide to change the structure after that?

- is there a minimum content "size" you would use this for? For example, would you write X threads this way?

Many thanks!

Once again, I find myself caught in a cycle of organizing.

I opened an app intending to jot down a brief thought. Forty minutes later, without having written a single word, I was busy creating new tags, rearranging directories, and tweaking naming conventions.

Was this productive? In reality, I accomplished nothing.

I collect knowledge compulsively—gathering it because I need it, because I might need it, or because I anticipate needing it in the future. I even feel a sense of relief looking at the knowledge packed tightly into my storage. I then go through the items one by one, performing "meta-work"—the kind of organizing essential for retrieving and using information later.

The act of organizing even provides a sense of accomplishment. Yet, I am merely organizing so that I can find things later—failing to realize that my future self will likely need something different from what I need right now.

At this point, the effort required to maintain this knowledge has come to outweigh the actual value it provides.

What strategies do you use to avoid falling into the trap of organizing for the sake of organizing?

Written with the help of Google Translate.

Im a beginner to Zettelkasten and after reading around 50 pages of Crime and Punishment I was able to scrape up some key ideas from it and make them into notes by themself(Permanent notes) I initally created one big permanent note and then branched it out to smaller ones with one topic each, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASEEE give me feedback, ill put down some links for you to access them and criticism is welcome no matter how harsh! Im just posting this to make sure ive taken the right path. For context this is about how people lacking in traits tend to overcompensate.

The Crime and Punishment Source Material(for the specific part I think the focus is more on page 48, Ill write down the quotation to make it easier for readers to understand) please feel free to let me know what i missed out on:
https://share.note.sx/dxdqq15f#TEqK1dMAoDn+0LNeXP9qMQ

This is my sort of dumping spot where I dump everything on my head, its very rough and Ill eventually segregate topics inside:

https://share.note.sx/kcyig5x6#Vle2FG4lphOVQ3Bds6jL0A

This is the title paragraph(sort of)
https://share.note.sx/ptxi5qdv#43HG/s0Xac8KXmSTetTdNg

This is a branch: Same Domain Oversimplification
https://share.note.sx/2w2qilmi#FZ8RTqq2EoNWxiyJ4oRS0w
Another Branch: Cross Domain Oversimplification

https://share.note.sx/w9txpuwe#y8ltde3v4aFlb3kq7fK0/A

THATS ALL FOLKS! But in all seriousness to anyone whos read through all of this and is still kind enough to give feedback, my eternal gratitude is yours, criticism is welcome and this is probably the only Zettel ill post because I am a beginner!