Why you should take notes if you use AI

If you use AI and you don't have a note-taking system, you have to start one now. And the reason lies in the

one now. And the reason lies in the clear trend that we're moving away from prompt engineering and the increasing importance of context engineering and

having used these tools for two plus years I can really say that having the right context having the right notes to be able to set up what you actually want

and what you want these LLMs whether it's chitty claude Gemini whoever to be able to draw upon the quality quality of

the output is going to be different as well as the quality of thinking you can put into it. Everyone's complaining that you know we have to outsource thinking.

It doesn't have to be that way. But if

you don't have notes then yeah there's no choice. I've talked about this in

no choice. I've talked about this in another video that you can explore here which is it is so important to turn tacit knowledge knowledge that just exists in our head and we cannot

articulate into explicit knowledge so that we can share with other people which is the source of why note takingaking came into place right before level one was just us in our brain we

have things swirling in it and because we kind of know what they are we say okay that's fine right don't need to write anything now until the second iteration we developed writing systems

and we realized okay there are things that we need to unload in order for her brains to do more. So that's why we started to translate this tacet knowledge into explicit knowledge

because then we can work with other people right so as we're talking about on this channel it really is very important to recognize that

communication is not about performance of course for for some people who are I don't know motivational speakers or whatever I guess the performance side is also important but for people who are

working on ideas knowledge workers right why we need to communicate clearly is not to look good but to get the tacid knowledge into explicit knowledge and to share with other people so they can

understand and we can take action together with as little friction as possible right and vice versa when they're saying something we can process it and understand it which is why

frameworks are really important but that is the core of communication and now we're adding on another layer of it's not just us and other people but there's also an AI that has access to other

kinds of information so we can put it together all move forward and having a note takingaking system that has the important information that the LLMs can

use makes everything better. it then you can use it to work on the things that take you a lot of time. And I'll show you an example in just a moment. But

just want to have a note-taking system and have information downloaded from your brain onto something that LLM can read and

then use is superpower to be able to summarize, to be able to spot patterns, all of those good stuff. Okay, so that's part number one. Now what do we actually

put into the notes then? What kind of notes do we need to have? Well, luckily

there are just six categories we have to think about and I'm drawing straight from context engineering because uh to be able to communicate with AI, we might

as well use its rules and its way of thinking. So we mentioned three already

thinking. So we mentioned three already that mostly are covered in prompt engineering which is we have to give it a role and then give it some general

idea about the goal and the audience uh that is going to use that output. Then

also we want to give it some constraints around style or format and these kinds of things. Most people know this part

of things. Most people know this part already. Now the next three things are

already. Now the next three things are more covered in context engineering and also notes that we want to have which

are about the inputs the source of truth as well as judgment. Okay. So by input I mean for the LLM you know what's the

data just in general that it can use. So

for example for me everything in my vault in my obsidian vault it can use or maybe it's okay maybe there are some personal things or sensitive things or confidential things I don't want it to

use then I can also say okay use everything in my vault except for these tags right you want to be able to tell it explicitly what's the input it can

use number two is the source of truth so what kind of documents outrank it generic information Right? So for

example, when you have a do not use, it means yes, you have these things in your general information, but I I don't want you to use them. That's a source of truth. So that it knows, okay, I'm not

truth. So that it knows, okay, I'm not going to rely on those. I'm going to f focus specifically on these um these documents. And the third one is

documents. And the third one is judgment. So how does LLM judge what is

judgment. So how does LLM judge what is good, what is bad? Right? This is

especially where we need to take task of knowledge into explicit knowledge and luckily there are frameworks to do this and frameworks help us better articulate what's good and what's bad. So that's

the type of notes that we're going to take. A quick note on frameworks. I

take. A quick note on frameworks. I

think if you've used AI for a while then you probably noticed it has several frameworks that it keeps on using right for example for formatting it uses the

heading options. So that as it goes

heading options. So that as it goes through it organizes things by headings or it likes to say a lot like it is not this, it is that. Right? A great little

via negativa there. But the problem with its frameworks is it keeps on using the same ones and it keeps on using very

generic ones when it produces output.

But to be able for you to judge what's good or what's bad, a lot of the time a simple way of doing that is to say, "Okay, write me a sales letter, right?"

And mostly the LLM might use ADA, like something that's very basic in copywriting, but if you have a different framework you would

like it to focus on, then just share that one, right? And this way you are inherently building what's good into uh your prompt and your context so that you

don't have to worry about how does a judge I don't know like intuitively I look at it as pretty good right instead what you can do is give it a framework or if really you don't have any

frameworks but you have examples of what's good and what's bad it would be great to have you know the good and the bad so that you can get your LLM to

figure out what is the what is the framework underneath. And the good thing

framework underneath. And the good thing about LLMs is they're great at distilling, right? As long as you give

distilling, right? As long as you give it information, it's pretty good at distilling. So, what you can do is if

distilling. So, what you can do is if you have 10 examples of things that you think are great and 10 examples of things that you think are terrible, get the LLM to create that framework for

you, right? help me articulate what

you, right? help me articulate what makes these examples great and what are the patterns of the bad ones. Right?

Then you've got your own framework that we you can use next time consciously. So

that is a great way of injecting framework in a way that helps you get the outcome that you want. All right,

I'll give you an example from my actual obsidian vaults so that you can see how not only the quality of the output changes uh also the quality of the

thinking changes and I really believe that yes working with AI can absolutely make us dumb and studies have shown

right if we just outsource our thinking then yes as we go on quality of the output drops also we are disengaged from the thinking experience. But that's not

the only way to use LLM. And studies

have also found depending on how you use it, right, you can deeply engage and actually think deeper and access things that you didn't have the mental capacity

to do before. And really what is holding us back from being more engaged in the thinking process is have we downloaded the context out from our brain and into

the LLM. So when we have a conversation,

the LLM. So when we have a conversation, it's intelligent one. It's one that's based on the information that we wanted to work with, right? So if you feel like, okay, I'm just getting dumber by

the day using CHBT or whoever, then you have to also ask yourself, am I also just consuming and not processing it,

outputting documents that I can feed my LLM? Because if you're not doing that

LLM? Because if you're not doing that process right then there is not much context to share right because it's difficult you not every single time you're there you want to start typing

out the context it's very timeconuming there's a lot of friction which is why taking notes as a habit that help you just drag and drop the context into the

LLM and your conversation with it right so if you feel like okay this is what I'm missing then let me just show you how significantly things can change. For

the example, I'm going to use a problem a lot of us on this channel face, which is I'm multi-passionate. I'm interested

in a bunch of stuff, but I feel so scattered all the time. All I know is I don't want that singular track career or, you know, life goals that other people have. But at the same time, I

people have. But at the same time, I don't know how do I focus in order to get to where I want to go. Like, there

must be something that can tie everything together. So let's talk about

everything together. So let's talk about that and let me show you the difference between talking to I'm going to use

TAGBT here in incognito versus using your own context. So I'm going to share my obsidian vault in a moment but let's

give this a try. Okay. So what we can do with chai is I'm interested in

creativity and frameworks.

So the choosing contra contradicttory help me see how to combine these two interests together

into a career. That's that makes sense.

Let's see what it says. I haven't really shared anything, but let's see what it says.

Uh, blah blah blah blah blah blah. Where

is the design thinking, product strategy? Okay. Creative

product strategy? Okay. Creative

direction with systems, creative director, brand strategist. I

mean, I guess, but you know, for example, the career I'm thinking about is not like these roles, but of course, I didn't tell it. So, okay, makes sense.

It's saying something like this.

Yeah. Okay. So, I'm kind of in this category, the framework builder, thought leader kind of uh learning design. I mean, these are

things I'm interested in. Um, but just seeing this list doesn't really help me say, okay, so how do I know which ones for me? And I guess they all sound good,

for me? And I guess they all sound good, but how do I prioritize them?

Uh, let me ask it. How do I prioritize this?

The emoji.

Okay. Rule of thumb. Prioritize the

intersection, not the options. Okay, I

like that.

Does this compound? I don't know. Like

already I feel not so energized looking at this list. I mean, I get it. It is very

this list. I mean, I get it. It is very generic like this is best practice so to speak but at the same time you know is it could also just be I glaze

over everything. So you know just as a

over everything. So you know just as a demonstration I think it's going to give some good ideas. I mean in the end I do mostly

three and four and a little bit of five as well but um not so easy to get from this list to

finding what I want to do. Okay so that is the you know lack of context example.

Now we can see with claw code what does it look like when I actually share my thoughts unfiltered straight in my

Obsidian vault. Let me show you. All

Obsidian vault. Let me show you. All

right. I'm using clawed code here.

It looks pretty intimidating, but it's actually not that difficult to set up.

Anyway, um I can share the instruction with you maybe in a different video, but the best place is actually Claude has a website. I'll link it right here that

website. I'll link it right here that you can go there and it's quite easy to set up. All right. So, what I'm going to

set up. All right. So, what I'm going to do is go go into my obsidian vaults

and help me understand what exactly am I interested in with creativity and framework thinking.

Help me understand what is that intersection.

Okay, I'm going to find the length. One

second.

See, it'll take some time. So,

>> a few moments later, >> what does a find? I am fundamentally interested in building the case that creativity and structured thinking are not opposites. They are partners. My

not opposites. They are partners. My

notes consistently reject the false dichotomy of logical and creative thinkers. Okay, it just articulated that

thinkers. Okay, it just articulated that better than me cuz I was thinking about this. I was like, okay, yeah, I know

this. I was like, okay, yeah, I know it's a paradox that I'm interested in, but actually I've said this many times in my notes and the key ideas or constraints enable creativity and that

creativity is a refined refined mental models and I really believe it's a proxy for intelligence. So, it's captured that

for intelligence. So, it's captured that word note. Uh framework thinking is

word note. Uh framework thinking is creative. I haven't really talked about

creative. I haven't really talked about this on the channel that much because I feel like oh you know are people interested is in this. I really think creativity is at the top of Maslo

hierarchy but I know a lot of us you know analytical people we're like creativity who's that for I think we're not quite understanding the word and I

have a problem with the word itself but you know it's really the polymathy connection right creative thinkers are

often highly logical right like Einstein was a great violinist They did some study where most of the Nobel laureates had a very creative part

of their life that they delic dedicate a good chunk of their time and energy to and cross-disciplinary thinking I really

is a core at what I do. So all right what I seem to be building towards is a unified view where frameworks are the tools that break down complexity

creativity reassembling pieces into new holes is interesting. I

interesting. I like this analysis and synthesis contrast. I didn't put that

synthesis contrast. I didn't put that thought in anywhere explicitly in my vault. So, just having it go through,

vault. So, just having it go through, well, I went through 39,000 tokens, but having it going through all my notes and

being able to just extract this is gold, right? My incognito conversation is

right? My incognito conversation is never going to get me to this level.

Uh would I like to dig deeper into any specific notes? So, um can you list down

specific notes? So, um can you list down what parts of creativity

I'm actually interested in? If I had a research uh question of what would that

be? Give me a few options.

be? Give me a few options.

Let's see what it'll say. I'll let it think for a bit.

>> A few moments later.

>> Okay, here we go. Uh, based on my notes, logic, creativity, unity, rea. Yeah. So,

you know, rejecting the left brain, right brain. Well, I mean, I don't

right brain. Well, I mean, I don't reject it, but I do think that both work together, and we all have a left brain

and right brain. Um,

okay. Constraint as creative fuel structure input. I feel like this is

structure input. I feel like this is already pretty overdone. So

that's probably not yet I think is the the so what of that and being able to explain this for those of us who are analytical and to understand that okay

constraint the the the so what of having constraint is then we can be creative.

Uh okay.

Intense learning, refining models and creative output. Oh, interesting. Again,

creative output. Oh, interesting. Again,

I did not put this specifically in, but now that I see it articulated this way, it's giving me some ideas. This is, you

know, this is the context that can get you what you are working on. Like, I'm

like a kid in the candy store. Even

though I these are all my notes, but I wasn't going to go through each note one by one and come up with this, right?

What I can say is, okay, here's everything I'm interested in that I've documented in my own words. Now, can you summarize it, synthesize it for me? And

that's a LLM strength. So,

this is I'm I'm just a very happy girl right now. Okay. Cross-disciplinary

right now. Okay. Cross-disciplinary

thinking. I think I will what I will do next is push it further. Okay. Actually

I'll do it with you here. Okay. So based

on these, can you suggest some sources resources

to go deeper on books uh or author's schools

of thought so that I can build this out?

also consider my other interests um

put it in my vault so that I'm exploring the intersections of my interests. Okay, let's see how it goes.

interests. Okay, let's see how it goes.

>> A few moments later. All right. So, five

minutes later, here is what it shared. I

already recognize a lot of these books, but

uh I mean, it's good to know that they're aligned. I wonder if it saw my

they're aligned. I wonder if it saw my book list. I assume it did, but

book list. I assume it did, but I like that it broke down some of the authors to follow and you know I already follow them in this case.

Okay.

Process philosophy. Oh, I didn't know Whitehead. I do have Whitehead's book on

Whitehead. I do have Whitehead's book on creativity but interesting process philosophy. I have

to look into it. Um

I feel like the recommendations now kind of um you know it's averaging down to what's very common. So I have to

probably push a little bit here more.

Maybe in claw code maybe I will go to elicit and look at more academic research or use research mode and get

some of these as well. But uh here is interesting.

But these these are good. I mean

definitely know some of these the recommendations. I've read them. But

the recommendations. I've read them. But

um all right that's good to know. I

would now come back to the question of the career. Right. Okay. So knowing

the career. Right. Okay. So knowing

you know about my interests and questions for creativity and frameworks.

Help me uh design my career path. I want something that is

path. I want something that is not that is practical and

pushes forward our understanding of how to do knowledge work meaningfully

and get paid for it.

Okay, let's say something like this and see what kind of recommendation it would come up with.

>> A few moments later.

>> Okay, here we go. Um, it's mentioned.

Okay, so first of all, the positioning.

It knows what I'm doing.

I'm glad this uh showed up as NA. Great.

Um, the gap you could fill productivity influencer.

There is a missing voice in the knowledge work conversation tactics without theory. Academic theory without

without theory. Academic theory without practice.

Yeah, these are great. The gap is someone who can articulate how knowledge work actually works and translate it into teachable

applicable methods. Honestly, this is

applicable methods. Honestly, this is how I feel. I mean, I never really mentioned this in my notes, so it's kind

of crazy that uh it articulated this building intellectual property for writing. I am writing a book currently.

writing. I am writing a book currently.

I don't know about the book to speak into corporate workshop to advisory type revenue stream. Yes, I know these are

revenue stream. Yes, I know these are awesome people do it. Okay.

The educator builder.

Uh okay.

Okay.

The applied researcher work inside AI companies. I don't really want to do

companies. I don't really want to do that. Hybrid phase one. Continue content

that. Hybrid phase one. Continue content

but shift towards original frameworks not just explaining others. Then

productize. I don't know. I think this framework is very boring and actually I need to find some good examples of

people I find interesting and actually let me do that. I find

okay before I continue I just realized now you're just indulging me in my me figuring out my future plans. So, if

you're not interested in that, honestly, you can stop right here because uh I'm just going to continue doing this uh for the next little bit, but the point is

bring me back for having a note-taking system, right? What really continue to

system, right? What really continue to surprise me is how good LLMs are at taking information and being able to pull out some really great ideas and

being able to identify, especially with connected notes, the core notes that matter to you. So, what it's able to do is without me needing to re review all

of my notes, it's able to pick out things like this. So if you are working on something and you want to build on top of it, you want the ideas to

compound and not just build sand castles then you have to document it. It has to be explicit so that AI can work with it and help you see the things that you as

a human being have you know natural weaknesses like digesting a lot of information in a short amount of time, right? So being able to engage in that

right? So being able to engage in that and have your curiosity and your questioning mind and your judgment mind and your editorial mind come instead of

just say hey you know give me something and then now oh this is not that great right so let me move on and have that task sit in its current state is going to be so much more different than if you

had these context so you can go deeper.

So with that in I hope you enjoyed this video. If you have any questions, let me

video. If you have any questions, let me know down below. I will link um the cloud code setup information down there as well. All right, I'll see you in the

as well. All right, I'll see you in the next video.