I’m an engineer, do marketing/consulting on the side, am creating a Bible app at the moment, and have 7 kids. Physical sticky notes are overwhelming, checklists pads and graph paper are fine for simple rough notes, and excel just doesn’t cut it. After doing some research for a “second brain” system, notion is everywhere but it didn’t click for me. I finally installed Obsidian and fell in love with it. Great review! I enjoyed the details and real world use cases which are very similar to mine.
Thank you for a great video. I am thinking to stay on both for the moment and see which one will become daily tool for my second brain. I am using as well Xmind to mindmap ideas. As I've seen from your video there are templates in Obsidian helping to build tree map. Will try that. Thanks again
Thank you very much, this is very informative and helpful! I'm in the process of leaving Evernote, so I'm currently testing different software, including Notion and Obsidian.
Thank you, that was my biggest learning point making this video. Audio Compression. I have recently upgraded my Microphone and also learnt how to compress audio. Any future videos will have better audio ;)
I've recently given up trying to do everything in one program. I was using notion exclusivly for years and I still love it, but I need obsidian for notes and journal stuff.
I think that’s a good way to be. Notion definitely shines with relational databases, project and task management. Obsidian is great for notes and learning
As a 3+ yrs (Maybe 4?) notion user, I like the DB connections but there's tons of content in so many pages that just collect dust and aren't really connected to much. It can be REALLY slow compared to anytype, coda and capacities, especially for mile-long DBs, even when filtered. Every obsidian user really likes the organic way of connecting things. I'll dig into it.
Hi... I'm from Brazil... I loved your presentation of ideas... I believe you could do a more detailed explanation of each step... from capturing the notes from the e-books, how to go through "Blinkist " and "Clibre", then moving on to "Obsidian" and "Canvas"... I believe I could dedicate a video to each step of your workflow... I would be one to closely follow each video of your process...
Hi Productivity, Heptabase is a paid SaaS service which doesn't appeal to me. I tried XMind to start with which was ok. Scrintal looks interesting but also paid SaaS. Nice to see a Lifetime offer but it must be all hosted on their servers?
This is kind of fascinating in a way. I've gone down the pipeline of Evernote >> Notion and now Obsidian. I got into PKIM via Tiago Forte, then took August Bradley's course. I use Notion for a general purpose wiki, task/project and as a content management system plus it helps in all manner of IT and information handling scenarios. Ultimately, now I'm at Obsidian and thinking I really don't want to end up in some other online platform that controls my data and lacks privacy.
This looks super useful, but as someone who is neurodivergent with ADHD, just thinking about trying to do all of this daily gives me anxiety. I can't imagine documenting this level of detail and then actually sticking to it day after day. I'm very jealous of people capable of doing this kind of digital organization, but my brain actively works against me. My Notion is just a random jumble of sporadic notes. Usually a result of whenever I get some temporary burst of interest in trying to write things down, but it fades pretty quickly.
Brother...there is no need for this kind of organisation... Just two things... 1. What are the stuffs you need to remember/ find later? ... Write those Down..or record those, or take a picture.. 2. What are the things/ keyword you will need whole looking for those info? Use them as Titles or keywords... And Boom! You have a second brain..It's just that simple.
Absolutely, you really only need to start with a tag, a link, a topic, heading and the note text and you’re good to go. Worry about the organising later
Hi Rilock, Obsidian can be as simple or complex as you want it to be. Check out Bryan Jenks on youtube, he is an advocate for ADHD and his channel has some great content. I’m going to make an upcoming video talking about some of his stuff so stay tuned for that
Please don't be discouraged. I am AuDHD asf & years ago when Obsidian first appealed to me, all I could do was watch other ppl organize their vaults bc I couldn't wrap my head around how to efficiently use Obsidian in a way that would not overwhelm me daily. Bc who has time for that? Lol. I continued to kick it w Notion. But now I've grown into the type of person who could benefit from the concept of a second brain. I love learning but I can hardly arrange my day to day thoughts bc I am thinking at the speed of light or I can't remember simple words. I have grown so tired of my social media addiction & I am learning about the concepts of field notes & such. I also have art & hobbies I would like to learn & teach myself so I'm sure I could benefit from organizing my notes like ppl do in Obsidian. Notion was/is my girl for taking math notes & quick coding notes but I'm able to apply what I've learned from Notion to Obsidian. TLDR; All that to say, omg 😵💫 that maybe Notion is what benefits you most right now, but you could certainly apply what you've learned from Notion to Obsidian later bc they are two sides of the same coin. Just do what benefits you the most. :D
Use it to improve my questioning and answering. Its pretty powerfull to improve selective thinking/dealing more effective with anxiety. Maybe in that lies the secret to memorise more effective by turning notes into questions and answers.
I enjoyed the video. You seem to mostly use cards. Great for small items. For larger items and things you might want to link to elsewhere; you can drop a note instead of a card. You can control what part of the note is shown in the canvas block - with some effort. This idea can be taken too far but there are situations where it is quite useful. Thanks.
Hi tsbob, great to hear you enjoyed the video. I usually use a combination of both cards and existing notes but I really like your suggestion. Positioning the information to show on a note would be easier to find, recall and link information. Thank you for leaving a comment
Great job on the video Paul. I think the Canvas drawing board is a great opportunity for mind mapping data and for showcasing ideas. We analyze so much information, that sometimes it's hard to fully recall. Obsidian is awesome for memory retention as you can find the information by keyword searching.
I was avoiding Canvas because it's not portable. Despite being an open format, for now only Obsidian understands it. But seeing how you use Canvas and how it facilitates your learning process, I'm inclined to try using it. Thanks for sharing.
Hey Douglas. I started with Xmind but ended up working more in Obsidian as I could link my notes or build out my ideas. Most of the Mind Maps tools were SaaS. Let us know how you go and whether you stick with it.
Do you have or can you point me to information on how to set up Obsidian? Everyone, including you, tells us that you use Obsidian but NEVER tell us how to set it up.
There are lots of videos about setting up Obsidian. I won't post links to avoid being marked as spam; I'll post the title and channel of some videos, and you can use the search bar. - "The least scary Obsidian guide you’ll ever see" by "A Better Computer" - "Hack your brain with Obsidian md" by "No Boilerplate" - "Obsidian: The King of Learning Tools (FULL GUIDE + SETUP)" by "Odysseas" - The playlist "Obsidian for Beginners" by "Linking Your Thinking with Nick Milo" (or you can search for the video titled "Obsidian for Beginners: Start HERE - How to Use the Obsidian App for Notes") And many others.
Thanks for the video, one option to get Kindle highlights is to use Readwise and the Obsidian Readwise plugin to feed those into Obsidian. Readwise is a bit costly, though.
Thank you @gavada. That's definitely an option as well. Agree, with all the subscription based services these days another $9.99 per month could be costly if you weren't using it to it's full potential.
@TheRaininBlock. It really is quite amazing how many talented people there are in the world. The best thing about Obsidian is the community. Hope you found a few plugins to make your workflow smoother.
