There is no such place where you cannot have ideas.
You can have them when you’ve just woken up, when you’re at a grocery store, or freshen up in the morning while contemplating your life. Ideas flow all the time, that’s the best part about them.
Over time I’ve realised that your thoughts make up your personality.
When I used to restrict myself and read-only fiction books, my ideas were more creative and unique, ranging from the latest Ali Hazelwood to a philosophical Fyodor Dostoevsky, my ideas took different shapes and motivated me to seek more knowledge.
Then, when I started taking up more books about life and entrepreneurs, I picked up The Almanac of Naval Ravikant and Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. My mornings were better and my mind thought like a creator.
This was the time when I started my newsletter because these books developed my mind to think like a creator and extend beyond the boundaries laid down by my own underconfident self.
But, with great minds, come great ideas, and these ideas need a better place to be useful.
Don’t trash your ideas
Scientifically, your mind can hold only 5–9 ideas at a time.
No, that can’t be right. Such a low number?
Alas, That’s true. Let’s experiment, Say 5 quotes out loud that you thought you’d remember. If not quotes, then ideas you’ve had, movie names that you did not write anywhere because you thought ‘I’ll remember it’ or a book you saw someone recommend and said to yourself “I’ll read it later”
Name them, out loud. Can you get to a number greater than 9?
You are the sum of your ideas
The books you read, the YouTube videos you choose to click on, the people you talk to — all of these things make you, YOU
But what if I say you don’t retain your personality to the best? Here’s the problem I faced. As a creator and solopreneur, I read a lot and try to keep my knowledge up to date. I had no way to keep these ideas in store.
- I tried dog ears on books so that I could always go back to those pages and re-read those mind-shaping quotes.
But, I keep books in my library so until and unless I remember in which book I read that specific quote, or I pick up that book again, those dog-eared pages are lost in the dust. - I tried bookmarking articles and tweets but they were all in a specific space, when I am in a place where I want to look at those different ideas, I have to shift tabs.
- I tried saving all those quotes by copy-pasting them in Obsidion and it started to work for me (for a place)
Saving my ideas and having a visual for them was so convenient for the longest time.
- I could create different spaces for my various works like Twitter, Medium, Work, and my Newsletter. All in specific tabs.
- I could save these and have a look at them wherever I want.
I copied the tweets I liked, and the articles I wanted to read over time — everything was in one place
My idea of space was coming to life. This one time I was at the train station waiting for the train when I thought of a new poetry piece and I saved it to my notes right there and then. When I reached home, I could go back to that thought and write my piece in silence.
Let your brain breathe
Your mind is a sensitive place, and you use it a lot (I mean, all the time). You use it when working, exercising, meditating, or watching a show. Why put too much stress on it?
By having a space to keep all my ideas, I was able to let my brain have some time off. Instead of stressing it out by asking it to remember all the ideas, I was tiring myself — with an idea store, you’re able to use your brain for the conscious heavy tasks which makes you more productive.
What went wrong with Obsisian?
It was a haven at first, all thoughts in one place and I don’t have to stress too much about lost projects. But, obsidian turned out to be the same as all other existing apps.
- If I wanted to save a quote from the book I either had to type it out myself, or an external camera read the text, copy the quote and then save it to my canvas
- My ideas go lost so often. 6 months down the line, I didn’t even remember what the things I had saved. I had all my inspirations in one place but there was no way to look at them peacefully.
I had to manually go to every tab, and look for a quote/idea. Most of the time it led to minutes of scrolling and turns out I was looking in the wrong tab. - My ideas were not interlinked. Surely, I kept my ideas in different tabs because I wanted to separate my motivations but, a lot of time my tweets were related to a newsletter, or my newsletter was inspired by a medium article. When I want to look at all my saved ideas, I want to look for similar content.
These are big problems for someone who has to write a lot of content.
The revelation of Napkin
I came across Napkin and had to give it a try. Everything about the platform spoke to me — their vision, their aesthetic, and their innovation. Plus, the app solved each and every problem that I faced with obsidian.
- I did not have to type quotes from books, there was an inbuilt scanner that scanned the content and pasted it onto the card
- I did have to scroll, I could swipe cards to just read my ideas
- The best part, no idea got lost. The ideas keep on shuffling so if there is any thought you wrote down 6 months ago, it’ll be kept fresh and you can review them any time.
- I could save my favourite ideas and see my recent ones too
- Moreover, Napkin auto-tags your cards so that it is linked to your previous ideas. This was if I wrote something about ‘Meditation’, I could just click on the tag and see all linked posts to that certain idea.
A lot of people have gotten wrong with note-taking and idea collection.
It is not just about coming across something interesting and saving it. It is about making sure you reflect on them later as well.
I could save 100–200 posts but until and unless I go back to them and keep them fresh, there is no way those ideas will be helpful to me in the future.
Since I started to use Napkin, I thought of it as a very sophisticated thinking companion that keeps my ideas fresh and helps me reflect on them in a very interesting and mindful manner.
Over time, you could see the change in the way you think, with my ideas always handy, my content creation process became so much better.
I started having fewer writer’s blocks because whenever I came across good content I saved it. So when it was time for a new article or a new edition for my newsletter, all I had to do was go back to my idea library and see what has been inspiring me.
It made me forget about all the existing platforms like Obsisian, readwise, and Evernote.
If you’re someone who likes to keep their ideas close, Napkin is definitely for you!
PS: This is not a sponsored post. I truly like Napkin and they’re relatively new and I want to appreciate their effort in creating this amazing app.
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