second brain

concept · in 7 sources (2018–2020)

A digital system of notes outside your head for capturing and reusing ideas.

Sources by year: 2018: 6 · 2020: 1

Also known as: Building a Second Brain, PARA

Questions

• Which note-taking app should you use?

What the videos say

The most important statements of each year; all statements.

2020

• 2020-06-03 · All the Apps I Use in a Day — Ali writes in Roam Research while a piece of writing, an idea or a video plan is at an early stage, then moves it to Notion to write the final video script or the final version of an article or blog post. — 00:03:24

2018

• 2018-05-01 · First Live Hangout + Rapid-fire Q&A — recommendation: Ali writes up his notes on an iPad Pro with the Notability app. — 00:29:52
• 2018-05-07 · Live Q&A + Hangout - Bank Holiday vibes - Ali Abdaal, Cambridge medical student — Ali uses an iPad Pro with Notability for all his note-taking and is in the planning stages of a video about it. — 00:07:10
• 2018-05-21 · Study with me + More revision tips - Cambridge University medical student VLOG #34 — Ali: On a new topic Ali has no qualms about making a quick document of brief notes in Notability, the app he uses on his iPad. — 00:04:23
• 2018-05-28 · Study with Me + How I take notes - Cambridge University medical student VLOG #36 — Ali's palliative care topic was the final moments of life: he turned guidance from a hospice website into an eight-point checklist in Notability, his iPad note-taking app. — 00:04:32
• 2018-05-29 · Live Stream - Hangout — recommendation: Ali scans lecture handouts into OneNote when he is typing, or into Notability when he is handwriting on the iPad. — 00:03:18
• 2018-06-02 · How I take notes on my iPad Pro in medical school - Cambridge University medical student — recommendation: Ali calls Notability the best note-taking app for the iPad if your laptop or desktop is a Mac; it is not available on Windows, so Windows users should use something like OneNote. — 00:04:19
  • Notability's dividers with subjects inside them are intuitive, Ali says, because that is how handwritten notes are naturally split into folders. — 00:04:48
  • Ali prefers Notability to OneNote because it limits you to pages, which suits people used to paper, while OneNote's infinite canvas lets notes sprawl. — 00:05:47
  • Notability has worked for Ali for about the last four years and he has not looked back. — 00:06:45