How I'm Organizing My Autism Research With Obsidian Canvas 

Bought the Unmasking Autism audiobook yesterday and then serendipitously came across your video in my feed. As for Obsidian I have about 3,000 or so pages and growing. But I haven't got into Canvas yet even though I have been mind mapping off and on for a number of years. Just haven't fired it up with this Obsidian. Thanks for sharing. Some good motivation.

I discovered your content at the perfect time! I’ve got my autism diagnosis a few months ago. I started reading "unmasking autism" and went through an obsidian and zettelkasten-method rabbit hole last week lol Thank you for sharing!

WOW - overwhelmed. Deep breath. You have motivated me to up my Obsidian game, explore Canvas and better use other features for my research including integrating with Zotero. Thanks

I love this! I'm autistic, too. Got diagnosed a decade ago now, and haven't really done any reading about autism since then 😅 This workflow video really address what I struggle with the most when it comes to PKM, project management, productivity, life design, whatever; I need to see everything at once, or else I feel like I don't know what's going on, so I don't know what to do, or how to deal. That's been really hard to figure out how to do... Once I have everything laid out in front of me, then the path forward becomes clearer, for some reason. Now, I suspect I may also have ADHD, because I hobby hop like a bunny crossing a field during a storm, and I tend to also hop between tools... I've had zero interest in Obsidian for months, but now I'm interested again. Of course I've forgotten shortcuts and they've added new features, so I almost feel like I'm having to start all over again... It can be overwhelming. Your videos help ☺ How, exactly, do you link the highlighted sections into the canvas cards? I'm not very techy so I don't even know what to search for in the command palette, and trying to scroll through every command just overwhelms me... I think I've tried some kind of embed in the past, but that didn't work.

Thanks Bryan! As always, I really enjoy this content. What you’ve shared has given me some ideas on some things I can add to my workflow. Really appreciate it!

Hey Bryan, Watching your Linux tutorials has been great! I am also autistic and worked in quite a few laboratories throughout my undergraduate degree. Unfortunately, I have used Windows for 95% of my life, so I never really dove into the various tools and workflows that I could have had at my fingertips. Vim, Zathura, better LaTeX options (Compilers, distributions), terminal-based workflows, and overall higher computer literacy helped me keep my workflow more focused! I loved when you said so nonchalantly, "I have many other books... and I **keep acquiring more**..." describes viscerally whenever I discover a new topic that I'm interested in. The amount of time it takes to dive into the citations, backgrounds of the authors and funding entities, as well as the myriad of other details and analytical techniques to grasp the field is legion. Reading syntopically, synthesizing new knowledge from the vast corpus of notes you've assembled from hours of obsession and thought chasing is tough. Linux makes it seem so much more achievable with all the simple tools you can combine! Keep up the awesome content! :) -Dylan

Thanks for speaking about your way of researching, very insightful.

Hell man! These plugins are just I need! It's just nuts what you've shown dude!

I feel an odd sense of kinship for having highlighted many of the same passages from "What I Mean When I Say I'm Autistic" - sending some big internet appreciation your way for being you

I am fairly new to Obsidian and just starting to read about autism. I really appreciate your enthusiasm and passion. For sure I will learn more in coming videos. Thanks for your help.

Wow !! This is THE perfect workflow for research. I have only got into obsidian a few weeks ago, and it was the CANVAS that sold me and pushed me to learn markdown etc. Its been a challenge for someone that knows next to nothing on coding etc. but I am embracing the learning curve, and so far enjoying it. Bryan, I have only just found your channel, and fell in immediate LOVE with your theme, customization, and of course your explanations, workflows etc you show in your videos. I recently joined your newsletter and downloaded your Obsidian Vault. Oh boy, it's a lot for a newbie so guess what? I made a CANVAS and called it BRYANGRUV and have been taking screenshots of all the settings and plugins, all of the templates etc, so I can understand how it's set up so I can then add my own flavour to it. Btw, I have watched most of your videos, and now just need to take the snippets of some of them, as it helps explain certain settings you have - and then add them to my BRYAN CANVAS. ( as I am still getting used to how to navigate obsidian itself ) I made your canvas before you made this video, so uncanny timing and this is why exactly I can relate to this workflow. PERFECT. Thank you Bryan for sharing what you do, its inspiring ! and really is starting to help the mind map in my brain, come to life and be able to express that through my notes. BTW - a cool tip I learnt with Canvas this other day - I embedded a webpage article, and its displayed in the canvas, I can left click and highlight part of the article, and then PULL that highlight out of the article and put it in a box on the canvas. You can also do that with any of the pics in the article page also. Just sharing if you or somebody else didn't know. But I find it very useful for breaking down an article. Oh and, I noticed in a part of this video that when zoomed out to certain frame, you cant see whats in the boxes? In CANVAS settings, the last setting "Zoom threshold for hiding card content" I changed that dial to the far right as far as it can go. I like it better this way, esp if I am working with a bigger canvas. Oh and I changed the default mouse wheel to ZOOM. For me, its so much easier to navigate quickly.

Wonderful video. Like all the others, very useful to academics and students. All of us have to find their way through the maze of information.

came for obsidian, stayed for the awesome notes. feels good to read that other people do t-rex arms too, even if the note was empty :D

Omg I'm showing my millennial here, but your tats are sick

This process would be effective for so many other topics. I am inspired to create a canvas for each category of my blog. I tried to set up Zotero but ran into problems, I’ll have to give it another go as you can include things like videos in it. I’m currently using Omnivore but that only works with blog posts etc

Cool font, it looks like the one used in the movie of Hercules by Disney!

Nice! I am very similar when I am concept mappying something.

I really need to start using Canvas more, especially with my uni studies and main areas of interest.

Nice! I could use this to include the Family Recipe in the analysis. What types of behavioral conditioning were present during childhood development? What behaviors were modeled in the environment and in what various ways did the children respond, and how did their experiences differ even though they were raised in a somewhat similar'ish environment? Just something to consider adding. For example, a fear-based parent with control issues who smothers their child to fulfill their own need to play the role of master provider, and isolates the child from social development during the critical years when the mind is being organized and harvests the child's struggles as their own to solve as the selfless martyr hero. Then gets to plant the seeds, along with the medical industrial complex, that shape the narrative of interpreting the results using externalized labels such as ADHD, bipolar, ASD, BPD, neurodiverse... drapetomania... etc. I'm projecting here since I can only speak from my own observations and experiences so thanks for the platform. The family recipe gets replicated subconsciously through the intergenerational replication of unhealed trauma and each generation gets to chalk it up to whatever externalized label evades accountability and self-awareness which are often too painful for people to tear open their inner wounds of repressed memories and too sensitive to deal with since the parents are often still involved in their life since they created a dependency. Big pharma loves it like I love on run-on sentences.

I didn't know searches could be bookmarked. o.O

So very useful and apposite for me at this time of using/building my vault. Much appreciated Bryan. You're looking tired, maybe grab some early nights?

Ha! As a fellow autistic you made me laugh pretty loud at the beginning. Definitely peak autism. Of course have an austism section in my Obsidian as well. 😂 also just read Devon Price’s book last most. I also recommend Living in a Bubble by Anthony King. No information per se but rather just a personal perspective of discovering you’re autistic as an adult. Also On the Spectrum by Daniel Bowman was okay. I enjoyed the perspective of the artistic autistic as o am autistic. The religion part wasn’t for me but there isn’t a ton of it. Have you discovered any other great books? Please share. I’ve heard Neurotribes is great.

Very detailed and insightful, as always! One thing I kind of missed: things start as a plain card and eventually turn into a note, is there a pattern for when that happen? As soon as there's work done on it?

Did not really think about using canvas as a "messy tabletop" in the starting phases of an interest. This is a great way to get in there. Do you think it still allows for serendipitous connections between things or is that more part of "later once they're evergreen notes"?

Hey, thank you so much for the demo - Quick Q: how did you make the canvas dots to disappear of the background? I'm looking how I can stylise Canvas, but not finding any plugins except doing custom css...?

This is great! I especially love your explanation of how you do research. I was discussing this with my wife about how people say "do your own research" and they really don't understand what that means. They normally don't have any peer reviewed studies to cite and they normally don't have multiple sources. Then they start claiming "facts" based on their "research" 🤣. Also, definitely going to check out Unmasking Autism. My son has a formal ASD diagnosis and I'm pretty sure I'm on the spectrum too. Every test (like actual legit tests) I've ever taken has me somewhere in the middle to highly likely that I'm autistic. I just haven't pursued a medical diagnosis. Not sure what it would change at this point.

Bliss... well should be. Deep diving, and wandering the forest, etc., etc. What seemed to be missing (Obsidian user - but haven't yet also added Canvas) the reflowing of the links structure to redraw to let the zooming in and out to give a 'new' picture... given the visual links oft throw somethings that aren't clear in text. Also not apparent - when starting from a single text - Price's book - how much using the book's structure, i.e. sections chapter, etc., initial at least influence the taking of notes - especially assuming a simple sequential read and not a hopping about read - if it was more of the 'textbook' rather than a flowing narrative. Simialrly... 'quotes/ highlights and initially comments for me always seem to 'stick' together, and when expanding the comments with my own thoughts and pulling maybe from a second source - "that" - new note over rides for the current project the initial highlight/comment - in Readwise/Zotero. Anyway - thanks again for the 'show' of the flow, great stuff. Be well be safe and enjoy! 🐄🐮 🐄 🐮 🐄... and no - fail on the drinking game. : )))))🐮 🐄 🐮 🐄🐮

Such a great workflow! I'm sold! One thing is totally new to me: How do I create transclusions? Has this anything to do with the Outliner Plugin? And do I need to create referenced blocks like one would do in Logseq or Roam? How does this work in Obsidian?

what plugin did you use to let those folders colored on the right in your obsidian?

I can only admire the enthusiasm! It reminds me of Michael Becker talking about Tinderbox: www.youtube.com/@privacyshaman I sometimes wonder what you would be doing if you had started using Tinderbox instead of Obsidian. On the subject of canvas, I wish it had other shapes and not just rectangles. That would add another layer to the visual encoding.