Nate Dickson Thinks...

Note: Transcriptions are below.

I've been thinking about all the ways I write things down, why I write things down, and how thought collection methods change the thoughts collected.

Clairefontaine Notebook and Pilot Metropolitan Pen

Field Notes Notebook and Pokka Pen

Rocketbook Notebook and Pilot FriXion Pens

Neo2

Obsidian

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Transcriptions:

Clairefontaine Notebook and Pilot Metropolitan Pen

Writing as Meditation

I have many ways to put my thoughts down. This is the oldest and has turned into a hobby for a lot of people. Writing with a pen —and a fountain pen at that— on lined paper. It's slow, it's fiddly, it reg requires you to hold the pen in a specific orientation, but it has its place. This is the way to write slower, more experimental thoughts, and to just glory in the act of writing. Everything about this method is like an offering to the Muse, from filling the pen with hand-cos picked ink to letting the page dry for a full minute before closing the book.

Field Notes Notebook and Pokka Pen

(first page)

Milk x4
Eggs x3
dog food
Stevia
herbal teas
protein bars.

(second page)

Writing as Thinking

And then there is this type of writing.

Small notes scribbled into a Field Notes notebook, quickly so they don't escape.

These either fall away or are built into some better thing later, but aren't lost.

Rocketbook Notebook and Pilot FriXion Pens

Writing as Focus

Or what about notes in a meeting?

These notes are meant to be

• Scribbled
• Photographed and digitized
• Erased

Then Rocketbook can do its magic and give me a pretty scan.

Big enough to be sectioned so thoughts have space

Neo2

And then we have digital capture. This is the simplest, cleanest, most forgotten method of digital capture I can think of. Type it here, replay it anywhere.

Obsidian

Writing as Thinking (Yes, I repeated that on purpose)

And then there's this form of Writing, the one that gathers all thoughts in unto itself, pulls them into a network of ideas and concepts, creating fertile ground from which new thoughts can grow.

docendo disco, scribendo cogito — I learn by teaching, think by writing.

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