Keywords:: PermanentNote
Reference: R: How to Take Smart Notes by Sönke Ahrens
Experts agree that writing is one of the best tools to improve your ability to think.
Externalizing your thoughts on paper forces you to express them in your own words. You have to commit to one, optimal sequence of words. You won't be able to do it unless the ideas you try to express are precise and complete.
To achieve that you must dive into the depths of your mind to find the most fitting expressions, facts, and concepts. This forces you to connect your thoughts to the knowledge you already possess, thus showing how much you understand (or don't understand).
This, in turn, will compel you to fill the gaps in understanding through reading, learning, and experimenting.
Furthermore, writing things down enables you to literally see your thoughts. Suddenly, the ideas you've held in your head become more tangible. You gain more clarity about what you know and don't know about them.
Moreover, when you put things on paper you loosen up your working memory. As we consciously can only hold around 7 things in our minds, space previously occupied by the idea you've just put on paper can be filled with new thoughts. This, in turn, increases the depth of your understanding .
It's like with tools. You can't use the hammer and chainsaw simultaneously. You have to first put down one to use the other. It's similar to your mind except your mind has more slots for the tools.
Relevant notes:
PN: Understanding facilitates remembering: If writing facilitates understanding and understanding facilitates remembering, then writing facilitates remembering.
It's Feynman technique
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One of the best ways to understand, and therefore integrate an idea is to write.
PN: Writing is the best facilitator for thinking: Writing is a form of externalizing theory can make your ideas more complete and precise.
Writing is a form of internalization because to write something down you need to put it into your own words and into a proper context (otherwise you're just copying). You must make sense of them in your subjective context and this requires active work, which leads to internalization.
PN: Writing is the best facilitator for thinking: The best way to understand a concept is to write it down. This will show you the gaps of your understanding and compel you to express it in a clearer way.
In writing, if you 'hit the wall' don't try to push it. Leave it unfinished. Your mind will be working on it all the time. Ultimately it will figure things out and let you finish it in a better way.
PN: Writing is the best facilitator for thinking: Writing is an activity that helps internalize new concepts.
PN: Writing is the best facilitator for thinking: Writing aids your thinking process
As said in the beginning, to create you need to at least be able to express the book's ideas in your own words —and writing is the best way to achieve that. Writing gives ideas clarity and tangibility (especially if you combine it with first principles thinking or the Feynman technique). Clarity because to be able to write about something you must explain it in your own words, which requires connecting it to what you already know. Tangibility because when you put things on paper (or monitor screen) you can finally see your thoughts. This lays the foundation to start putting knowledge into action
PN: Internalization leads to expertise; PN: Writing is the best facilitator for thinking: what can help overcome that is putting the theory into practice.