How To Expand Your Curiosity With A Simple Note-Taking Habit

There are always things that we have to do in life that we don’t like.

The smartest and most ambitious are trying to figure out “hacks” or ways to solve those problems.

Don’t like taxes? File online.

Don’t like walking or driving yourself to a restaurant? Delivery service.

However, many of us kind of float by not thinking about if there’s anything else, and only pursuing convenience.

I love delivery services and people doing taxes for me, but if you’re trying to find the easy way out of every situation, your character and perseverance suffer.

You will lack mental toughness.

When difficult times come, you’ll have no experience of forging through.

Sure, but how does this relate to curiosity & note-taking?

Here’s how it relates:

If you’re only taking in the surface answers, the quick hacks, and not poring through any harder material, you won’t have any new ideas.

You won’t make any new connections.

You’ll only be repeating what the Twitter thread bros have told you was acceptable.

You’re subbing in their thoughts for your thoughts.

This is why it irks me when I see the same stories repeated over and over again…

….the same Elon Musk, Naval Ravikant, and Warren Buffett quotes.

All three of those people are worth learning from, but there are tons of others out there.

No one is doing the work of finding those other thinkers.

No one is doing the work of refining their curiosity.

Instead, we’re content to recycle the same ideas.

It’s like the delivery service or online taxes. It’s convenient.

Instead, those quotes and stories should be a jumping-off point for your curiosity.

Taking notes from what you read and hear helps you get there. It can become of your daily routine.

How to expand your curiosity

You need to do 2 things regularly:

• You need inputs to increase the quality of your outputs.
• You need to remix the ideas that you find.

But what’s the glue between these two actions? What binds them together?

Note-taking.

Taking notes from what you read and hear helps you expand your curiosity while also tracking what you find interesting.

It can become part of your daily routine.

You read a book, and then you underline important points and write something in the margin.

You now have a few fragments.

Next, you need to move these notes to your own paper or digital note-taking tool, such as in Notion.

If you’re interested in this, here are some note-taking templates to help you get started.

Here’s an example from a recent book that I’ve been reading:

You can also get your own copy of this reading journal template.

Watch your notes multiply…

Now multiply this note-taking process throughout several books or articles that you read.

You’ll have a bunch of notes, and then you’ll need to combine those thoughts into a cohesive narrative.

You can craft together insights on productivity, spirituality, creativity, or underwater basketweaving or whatever you’re into by deriving a unique perspective from an amalgamation of ideas.

I wrote more connecting ideas here.

5x your curiosity

But then how do you take your curiosity to the next level?

You share it.

Formerly, you’d need to be an academic or newspaper columnist or an author with a book deal to to this.

Similarly, to do a lot of research in the past, you’d need to live in New York City or London to access the best libraries and talks.

But no longer, and you already know this.

Online platforms are one of the (many) advantages in the digital age.

You can communicate quickly and you can receive quickly.

You can greatly expand your reach and your curiosity.

You learn, you give, and you repeat that process.

However, for the most part, we’ve used these platforms to dull our curiosity rather than enhance it.

But we can take from those platforms, and give back to them as well.

Sharing and receiving is an easy way to 5x your curiosity.

WIP? No problem

Work in progress is no longer a pejorative, but something to do together. It becomes a collective experience that others can share in with you and encourage you along the way.

I’m not going to dive into the pros and cons of the platforms right now, there are a ton of other articles for that.

But the point is that the sharing builds accountability into your curiosity. That’s what I’m doing here, to a degree.

Then, the flywheel is created. Your audience not only keeps you accountable, they have the potential to share your ideas, too.

From hacks to curiosity

To become a connector of ideas, shift from seeking hacks to pursuing curiosity.

It’s not really worth gaining a bunch of followers if you have nothing interesting to say.

It may be in the short term, but then what?

Even the easiest-going musicians are spending hours in their living rooms and studios developing new material.

Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they aren’t doing the work.

You won’t use every note you take. You won’t share everything you read. A lot of the work you do may get thrown out. That’s part of it.

Tactical tools like note-taking templates help you, but the crux lies in your own authentic curiosity pursuit.

Did you like the article? Clap for it, because it helps other people find it.

If you read this far, you deserve something free. Here’s my quick note-taking cheat sheet and template.