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My buddy told me I was overcomplicating my notes after I showed him my 47 tab system
Last week I sent a screenshot of my note taking setup to a friend who does deep dives on stuff for his job. He called me and said dude, you have 47 tabs open and three different apps running just to track one topic. He said just pick one place and dump everything there, even if it's messy. I switched to just using one simple text file for everything I wanna dig into. It's been 5 days and I feel like I actually find my thoughts now instead of hunting through folders. Has anyone else had someone call out their system and it actually worked?
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gracethomas3d ago
That 47 tab system was keeping you busy looking at your system instead of actually learning anything. When I dropped my own 30 tab workflow for a single notebook it was a mess for a week but now I actually write down my thoughts instead of just moving files around.
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linda_reed3d ago
Having 47 tabs is not a bug, it's a feature. You lose all the context and connections when you flatten everything into one file. I went back to multiple apps after two weeks of trying the simple approach because I kept forgetting why I saved something in the first place. Your brain naturally organizes by category and format anyway, so fighting that with a messy dumpster file is just making more work for yourself later.
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anthonynelson3d ago
Highlight your file is still digital though. I moved my deep research into a physical binder with those tabbed dividers and handwritten notes. Gets me off the screen entirely and I remember way more because writing forces my brain to slow down. Only downside is you cant ctrl+f a binder but surprisingly I have never needed to search because I just flip to the section I wrote the thing in.
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