You can agree with me that two truths can co-exist. There is an overload of information and there's also poor information diet. It is true that we have an endless stream of content being pushed out on a daily basis but we have to be weary about how we engage or consume those content.
The same way there's a ton of food variety to pick from but you choose to eat only unprocessed food and farm grown food is the same way you can choose to curate the kind of content you consume or capture. Quantity is no longer a problem due to the overload, the issue is now about quality.
In order to be able to select quality content to capture, it is ideal to keep a list of things (I suggest open ended questions that you need answers to) that you are interested in or need answers to. This will help you filter what you should be consuming from what you shouldn't.
Writing is like weightlifting for the brain. Just as you’ll improve your food diet if you start cooking, you’ll improve your information diet if you start writing. - David Perell
When choosing what to capture, we should pick the things that resonates with us. Listen to your intuition when it speaks as it will guide you on what to capture.
Does it inspire you?
We have so many capturing tools like Pinterest, Cosmos, Savee e.t.c. A number of social media platforms even have bookmarks features that helps you to save only the best content that inspires you. The bookmark/save button is different from the like button because while you might like a content, it might not inspire you in any way. Therefore, saving the content helps you to be able to refer back to it easily without having to embark on a time consuming search.
Is it useful?
While the information you come across might not inspire you, can it help you with anything you’re currently working on or plan on working on? Will you it come in handy? If the answer to all of these is ‘No’ then you most likely don’t need to capture that information to reduce the risk of cluttering your collection with too many useless things.
Is it Personal?
Does it reflect your own thoughts, ideas, feelings, experiences or memories? Then capture it, this is the most valuable piece of information you can collect and it is advisable to capture this on a daily basis. Doing this daily helps you document your own life. Capture beyond words, you can capture pictures and videos of yourself and those closest to you. Capturing moments you share with them will allow you to remember and relive those memories even when someone is no longer alive.
Is it surprising?
Sometimes the information we come across aren’t necessarily inspiring or useful to us but it sparks a certain sense of curiosity, excitement or surprise. This might be something that is contradictory to something you already know, something that has the potential to change your perception or viewpoint on a particular subject or topic. It is always good to be open minded to information like this and embrace them. Change is constant and if a content you come across has the ability to change your view point on a matter, then you should capture it. This trains us to take be open to ideas from different perspectives which will help us to broaden our views and horizons.
References
- "Building a Second Brain" by Tiago Forte
- Choose Reading
- The Conscious Information Diet
- Swimming