Category Archives: Taking and Filing Notes

Chapter 14: Taking and Filing Notes

Why Take Notes?

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Reference has been previously made to the taking of notes on index cards. This will now be elaborated as it is of much importance.

Actually the first step in creative thinking is note taking. Let us see why it is such a vital procedure. It is impossible to visualize ideas in logical sequence unless you write them down. As all of us know only too well, ideas are very tenuous affairs. Writing them down is the only effective method for the idea searcher to clarify his contributing elements. It is necessary to bring them out into the open, to look at them and to see them for what they are. What may be indifferent little things as you think of them flitting about in your mind may prove of real worth when you get them out in the light of day, safely anchored so that you can really go to work on them. You have to be able to see them in relation to other things, and relate them properly to all the other factors concerned in your chief objective. This you cannot do with a miscellaneous lot of stray thoughts wandering through your mind.

It is a sad fact about the human brain that it seems to be unable to really think more than one step ahead with any degree of efficiency. What makes this so unfortunate is the fact that the majority of the problems confronting us that are important enough to determine either our success or our failure, usually are problems which involve not one, but two or more mental steps before they can be solved.

Nothing so relieves this premature brain fatigue as much as pencil applied to paper at the right time and place. You write the first step, and thus temporarily get it out of your mind. This then frees your mind to think ahead to the second step without at the same time having to keep the first step under control. When you have written down step two, you can repeat this with step three. This method enables people of average intelligence to appear as super-men to others by virtue of what seems to be unusual ac­complishment. They will give you credit for being a wonderful concentrator, when all the while you have merely devised an efficient way for not concentrating at all. You see how easily it is done?

The Importance of Organizing Information

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All you do to develop an idea is to decide on the subject or object, select one of its dominant qualities or attributes, then change, add to or subtract from it, and you have some-thing new. This does sound like an over simplification, but in essence it is true. Test it out in a few cases—even in some of the instances previously given, and you will see that it is a basic process. Of course the things you combine must have something in common. You won’t get far adding tomatoes to harmonicas!

It may be stated here that it is perfectly proper to utilize ideas from other fields for the improvement of your own. This has been shown over and over in the examples given throughout this book. It is not plagiarism or infringement of anyone’s rights to do so. In fact, all the progress which civilization has made has been accomplished on that principle. Plagiarism is sitting down and simply copying what someone else has written. You don’t take the idea of a competitor in your own field, as that does injure his success. But if you take an idea from a different field, a different period of time, a different place, or a non-competing activity, such an application of ideas does not hurt the originators and it is an entirely legitimate and customary an even inevitable procedure. For this reason, it is well to learn to adapt ideas purposefully instead of in the usual hit or miss fashion.

You run across an immense amount of miscellaneous information which can prove valuable source material in your idea seeking. Such things as newspaper clippings, magazine articles, and of course always original observations, can be truly useful to you provided they are not merely fleeting memories. They must be not only permanent, at least until used, but they must also be decently organized so that they can be found when required. From such things it is possible to build a valuable file of suggestive matter.

Why You Should Write Down All Ideas

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So let nothing stand in the way of filing ideas as the come to you. And, too, let nothing stand in the way of doing all you can to make the path of their journey to you easy as possible. As you go about, you see suggestive thoughts everywhere. Not only are the advertisements in newspapers, catalogues and magazines prolific source, shop windows are fertile also. And so too are books and movies. When you have seen a movie, ask yourself what suggestions it held that would be worth recording. Examine everything in the events and experiences of your day-to-day living for its value in connection with your interest.

The very fact that a certain thing interests you makes it worthy to be written down. Even if it is apparently un- important, it may prove valuable when added to another thought you will get. There is always time enough to throw away something that proves useless. But no one can tell at first what he may be able to do with an inter­esting fact or idea, except to know he can do nothing with it unless he remembers it.

An idea does not always turn out to be for the purpose for which it was originally considered. Should it not be suitable for the salable novelty you hoped to develop, it may be used in another direction. Perhaps you may be able to make a good publicity idea out of it. This reminds me of the mother who asked her little boy what he was draw­ing, and he replied, “I started to make a picture of Daddy, but I think I’ll add a tail to it and have it for a dog.”

In the same way, you may have hoped to develop a real invention. If the idea you have produced is not good enough, don’t destroy it. You might use it for a toy, and meanwhile do some more work on the major idea for the invention.

A Willingness To Exchange Ideas

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When you get a bright idea that is not good enough, share it. This does not mean to let it drip away from you before it jells. It does not mean to waste it or be careless with it, as we point out later. But ideas rubbed together with other people’s ideas can be highly productive. If I have a dollar and you have a basket of fruit and we ex­change, I will lose my dollar and you will lose your fruit. There will be a mere exchange—no increase. But if I have an idea and you have an idea and we exchange, I will lose nothing and you will lose nothing. I will then have two ideas and you will have two ideas. There will be an ex­change, but also an increase in values, at no cost to anyone. Instead of limiting and narrowing opportunities for others, the creator of new ideas expands and enlarges opportuni­ties for others.

A completed idea rolling around in your head only takes up attention and room that should be occupied by another one. There is little point to producing an idea and not utilizing it. Don’t be too money-minded about it. Increase your sphere of influence, your prestige and other by ­products even if you don’t actually sell it. Give it away rather than let it go out of date or lose its chance. You’ll have other satisfactions and meanwhile will have developed your creative ability by that much practice. However, you don’t ordinarily do this until you have exhausted the possi­bilities of your idea by your own efforts.

Always have little slips of paper with you all the time and make notes of any and everything of even remote interest. Don’t trust to memory. These slips are to be organized, and you can’t organize stray thoughts. (Editors Addition: Today, it is so easy and inexpensive to have some sort of digital recording device for this purpose. If you have a smart phone, you most likely have a recording device on it, or can download one for free or very inexpensive.)

This method of note taking has a number of advantages. Obviously one of the chief of these is that of bringing order to your work, and everyone knows that any kind of a job is greatly simplified and expedited when orderly methods prevail.

This method is also valuable for the reason that it dis­closes gaps in your knowledge. When you have made lists of your chief divisions and have distributed your notes under them, you can see at a glance that some divisions are but sparsely covered. You can then take measures to add to such sections by doing more research. In the absence of such a plan, your total picture is only too apt to turn out unbalanced and incomplete.

Another value in this method is the fact that it does not permit you to neglect the task of assembling your material. The difficulty most people have in trying to produce ideas is that they want to do it out of nothing. The only thing that will produce ideas is ideas, or at least idea seeds. Just as you cannot get corn from thistles, you cannot produce ideas from wishes. People ordinarily do not need new ideas as much as the brains, gumption and get-up to make use of old ideas.

Your Pencil Has a Mind of Its Own

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Another value in this method is the fact that it does not permit you to neglect the task of assembling your material. The difficulty most people have in trying to produce ideas is that they want to do it out of nothing. The only thing that will produce ideas is ideas, or at least idea seeds. Just as you cannot get corn from thistles, you cannot produce ideas from wishes. People ordinarily do not need new ideas as much as the brains, gumption and get-up to make use of old ideas.

In thinking with your pencil for the purpose of discover­ing the prime factors or essential elements of your problem or purpose, you must strive to get down to the bottom of the subject—to reach the center of the thing. Once having found this, you may work backward and forward in any direction from that focal point. The focal point may be discovered by determined pencil thought upon the follow­ing two questions:

  1. What is the obstacle which I wish to overcome; what is the nature of this thwarted purpose; what is the gist of this difficulty
  2. What is the first and main factor or element of my purpose in this matter; what is it necessary for me to accomplish; what is the gen­eral end to be accomplished; what is the big idea which I wish to make real?

Thinking with your pencil is one of the most valuable of practices. Only if you write down all of the idea factors concerning your project, can you compare these for the purpose of selection and development. You have to elimi­nate the non-essentials, cancel the duplications, examine contradictions, and arrange the selected items in a logical and orderly classification. This type of organizing can only be done if the material is written down so it can be handled. This plan, as compared with that of merely piling your ideas and concepts in a miscellaneous heap is akin to the scientific method of filing away correspondence in a filing cabinet as compared with simply throwing the letters to­gether in a barrel.

You must therefore find a way of making yourself gather source material, and by putting things down in writing, you have the best thing to help yourself actually generate the idea you need from the materials you have provided your­self. A dressmaker cannot make a dress without a pattern, some material, “findings” and “notions.” You need the same to create in the realm of ideas. It cannot be done, as someone has intriguingly put it, in “seven easy thinks.” Nor even in eight.

Trapping Ideas With Index Cards

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Card Indexing

Whenever you have a sizable amount of specific material gathering to do, it is well to adopt the card index method of doing it. This is simply to get yourself a quantity of those little 3×5 inch white cards and use them to write down the facts of information as you find them. (Editors Addition: I personally find it useful to add the dimension of color to the organizational process and use multiple colors of index cards during the phase.)

Be sure to write only one item to a card. This is most important. When you have a sufficient number, you can begin to classify them by logical divisions of the subject and ultimately you will have a good file box of them well organized for use. That is why there may be only one item to a card. It is impossible to make an accurate classification otherwise.

This system of note taking has been aptly called an “idea trap” and that expresses it exactly. Keep a supply of 3×5 inch cards or sheets within reach every minute for the rest of your life, even when you’re not playing F.B.I for an idea. Write on them at least one idea or observation every day, from any source. This practice will stimulate your observation by the very virtue of the search. And you are bound to increase your alertness and your recognition of the “makings” of an idea.

Sheets or cards these sizes are handy and convenient for desk or pocket. When you have a special interest, you tend to see things in relation to it, and soon have a collection of possible elements from which usable suggestions may be derived.

Since ideas are extremely elusive, it is well to write then down quickly. You may be so pleased with an idea when it first occurs to you that you’ll think you never could forget it. Yet it can evaporate into thin air before you turn around. Without a steady “idea trap” you may find yourself in the sorry situation of a pious man who is said to have had such a wonderful idea that he went out into his garden to thank God for it. On arising from his devotions he found that he had forgotten what the idea was.
So write it down. It is always easy enough to throw it away later if it proves unrewarding. If it seemed good when you got it, perhaps it can be used in another collection some time. Ideas are priceless, so do not be careless or wasteful of anything that seems to have idea possi­bilities.

One of the advantages of this type of an index is the fact that it permits of free and indefinite expansion under proper classification control. These little blank sheets or cards are so easy to carry around that there is no excuse for missing idea opportunities. When anything is found or thought of, just jot it down on one of these cards, and file or future reference. If the matter wanted is too long to copy in full, note the book or magazine, with volume and page, where it may be found, together with a line or two of the gist of it. You will be agreeably surprised to find low soon you can have a useful collection of references, clippings, and all sorts of material that can be drawn upon for various subjects at a moment’s notice.

A file may be variously divided for general topics into large classifications such as science, art, biography, economics, education, women, children, the home, transportation, war and peace, government and politics, and so on. In each case, utilize provocative illustrations when possible, as these too help conspicuously in stimulating ideas.