Digital gardening

Digital gardens are intentionally less performative than traditional blogs. They share works that are “under construction” (work with the garage door up).

I see some parallelism between Henry Bugbee’s ethic and the values inherent in digital gardening. A work of writing is decisively done at any given moment even if it is unfinished once it is shared. Once you provided the public with a peek of it, it is done. Inauthenticity happens when you force yourself to declare “finish” what isn’t finish, when you declare “sure” what is unsure. Declare. Share me when you are. But don’t fake it. I want to know the truth.

It is clear to me by now that if my primary goal when writing is understanding, I should follow the tradition of digital gardening rather than blogging. This means I need to stick to the plan of cultivating the talahardin and optimizing how that cultivation happens. By doing so, I am actually giving myself permission to explore different genres: notes, poetry, vignettes, and essays, and, therefore, play more.

That said, the problem with digital gardening is that digital gardens, unlike blogs, are not as conducive to sharing. For this problem, here are publishing strategies for digital gardeners.

Principles

• Externalize your thinking.
  • writing facilitates thinking
• Make your workflow motivating and sustainable.
  • a workflow must be motivating
  • combine curiosity with a note-writing system and practice
  • a flexible working scheme prevents losing interest
• Take notes about what you read.
  • write permanent notes about what you read to test understanding
• Remember note taxonomy.
  • confusion over types of notes result to less productivity
• Aspire for quality over quantity.
  • notes should not be added indiscriminately to the talahardin
  • Avoid collecting information
• Work on multiple projects at the same time
• Use a standardized workflow.
  • a standardized workflow facilitates ease

Benefits of Zettelkasten

• talahardin improves your thinking and vice versa
• working on smaller tasks develops intuition
• working on smaller tasks creates a sense of control
• numerous feedback loops produce expertise and intuition

Guides

Collecting fleeting notes and writing literature notes

• consume information selectively
• how to write literature notes

Writing evergreens

• how to convert literature notes to permanent notes

Retrieving notes

• how to use an index effectively in talahardin

Writing using permanent notes

• a note-writing system makes writing easier
• Write using permanent notes

Tools

• keep the talahardin simple
• tools should be embedded in a system to be effective
• use a reading inbox to capture useful reading materials
  • my reading inbox

Workflows

• my note-writing practice

References

Appleton, M. (2022, September 30). Digital Gardening Tools and Resources. Github. https://github.com/MaggieAppleton/digital-gardeners (Original work published 2020)

A garden is something inbetween a personal blog and a wiki. It’s a collection of evolving notes, essays, and ideas that aren’t strictly organised by their publication date. They’re inherently exploratory – posts are linked through contextual associations. They aren’t refined or complete - posts can be published as half-finished thoughts that will grow and evolve over time. They’re less rigid, less performative, and less perfect than the personal “blogs” we’re used to encountering on the web.