Knowledge management
Too much effort on importing such as reading books(essays, threads), listening podcasts, watching films etc., is imbalance.
After a period you would doubt yourself if the effort is worth it because the result of it seems vague. Much of your effort runs off, and you may quit.
Yes, the retention is more important than just import. And human memory is unreliable. To enhance retention, you need a knowledge management method(or process, even a system, database).
I am one of those many people that have the above problem for many years.
I read a lot, and some of which took tons of notes. And like many people I have used various softwares: One Note, Evernote, Youdao Note, Apple Memo, TickTick, Notion, Yuque.com, Feishu.com, Obsidian…
I also tried to upgrade the export to balance the import, i.e. that write and share to public.
The method is right, but hard to implement. After three months of posting my thought on Weibo.com everyday, I come to a point that having not much thing to say. The “Thought Pool” drys up.
Although I continue reading, there seems to be a gap between import and export.
I realize that if I want to producing content on a regular pace, I should establish a complete and integrated process or system.
The key part is Knowledge Management to link the import and export. Just like a manufacture factory, the importing from various sources should go through a process including kinds of actions: note, comment, summary, outline, think, review, classification, tag, archive, link, as to distill and digest from the import material as much as possible, turning the the information into your own knowledge. That is what we call “RETENTION”.
Doesn’t mean that the actions above should be implemented all and step by step. It’s flexible according to the goal/scenario and material type. Regard them as a tool box, you can pick and combine some to reach the goal.
However, you may take at least one action to distill and to digest respectively. Distill is for getting the essential from the import. Digest is for internalising the essentials into your brain.
This is what I get while upgrading my thought on knowledge management. And I’m practicing it from now on.