Progressive summarization allows you to transfer ideas through time
PARA
Projects, areas, resources, and archives
Projects
Review when you work on the project
Areas
Review when you evaluate that area of your life
Resources
Review when you need to take action on that topic
Archives
No specific time required to review
Two Prevailing Organization Schemes
Tagging First
- Too fragile
- Does not focus attention on the most valuable notes
Notebook First
- Tiago Forte prefers this to tagging first approach
- Suppresses creativity by imposing 1-to-1 relationship
Alternative Scheme
Note First
- Works alongside any other system
- Survives migrations to other devices, locations, and programs since notes are more durable than structure
- Makes notes more legible to others
Notes become like atoms with their own properties but ready to assemble into more complex structures.
Need to balance discoverability by compressing and understandability by including necessary context.
The Progressive Summarization Process
Layer 1
Capture anything you find interesting. This could be direct copy/paste or an entire text or part of a text, or typing our random thoughts into a note.
Layer 2
Bold the best parts of the layer 1 capture. Look for key words, phrases, or sentences.
Do this after some time has passed.
Layer 3
Highlight the best of the best
Layer 4
Summarize layers 2 and 3 in an “executive summary” at the top of the note. Restate in your own words.
Reserve this for the most insightful notes.
Layer 5
For a tiny minority, remix them into your own work like a blog post
Sources:: Progressive Summarization: A Practical Technique for Designing Discoverable Notes