How To Record Your Thinking?

On the benefits of collecting and curating your 6,000 daily thoughts.

How Many Thoughts Do We Have In One Day?

We have anywhere between 5,000 - 6,000 thoughts a day according to this research study.

We are constantly exposed to a continuous stream of new thoughts in the physical and digital world on a day to day basis.

So what does the Research say about our Thinking Patterns?

Dr. Jordan Poppenk and his master's student, Julie Tseng, from Queen's University, developed a novel method to detect transitions between individual thoughts, introducing the concept of "thought worms." These "thought worms" are defined as consecutive moments when a person focuses on the same idea.

In the study, which involved 184 participants with an average age of 29.4, study authors used brain imaging scans to track when new thoughts began while participants were either resting or watching a movie. By analyzing patterns of brain activity, they identified distinct "thought worms" corresponding to new thoughts.

This approach allowed them to estimate that the average person has approximately 6,200 thoughts per day. Here is a link to their 2020 research paper on this topic. He summarized his research in an interview with Anne Craig on the university website as follows:

“What we call thought worms are adjacent points in a simplified representation of activity patterns in the brain. The brain occupies a different point in this ‘state space’ at every moment. When a person moves onto a new thought, they create a new thought worm that we can detect with our methods…We also noticed that thought worms emerge right as new events do when people are watching movies. Drilling into this helped us validate the idea that the appearance of a new thought worm corresponds to a thought transition.” - Dr. Jordan Poppenk

Ah. 6000 thoughts a day. That is a lot of thinking.

I need to find a way to record my thoughts. There was too much happening in my mind and no way to sustainably engage with all these thoughts.

This can be tiring and frustrating if you often get stuck in thought loops.

Certain activities like meditation or breathing have helped me observe certain patterns in my thinking through the day.

I noticed that I often think about work, relationships, health, other people, the past, the future and more.

On further reflection I noticed that many of my thoughts were repetitive and negative.

I always wanted to find a way to observe patterns in my thinking from a young age and thus decided to record some of my thinking in a journal.

I realized that writing notes in my journals helped me notice patterns, observe curiosities and collect insights from my thinking.

I have maintained a personal journal since 2012. I moved to a digital journal since 2020 mainly due to ease of access and lack of storage space. The habit of taking notes in a journal has changed my life in more ways than one.

Here are some notes I record in these physical or digitals journals:

1. Daily Tasks

2. Weekly Plans

3. Food, Sleep and Exercise Records

4. Important Dates

5. Inspiring Ideas

6. Random Sketches

7. Passing Thoughts

8. Quotes and Passages

9. Links I want to share

10. Recommendations

11. Pictures

12. Bills and Photos

13. Book notes

14. Film notes

15. Podcast notes

After ten plus years of taking notes in a journal, I know I am a note taker. But..

What Type of Note Taker Are You?

Tiago Forte, in his Building a Second Brain framework, identifies three types of note-takers: the Architect, the Gardener, and the Librarian.

1. The Librarian (Research), excels at collecting and curating valuable information, carefully tagging, archiving, and cataloguing resources for easy retrieval, often serving as a reliable reference point for others or for future use.

2. The Gardener (Explore), by contrast, prefers a more organic approach—capturing ideas as they arise and letting connections emerge naturally over time, like nurturing a living ecosystem of thoughts that bloom through reflection and iteration.

3. The Architect (Systems), thrives on creating structured, logical systems for organizing information, often focusing on frameworks, hierarchies, and workflows to optimize long-term knowledge management.

Each type reflects a different relationship to knowledge—preserving, evolving, or systematizing it—and while most people blend elements of all three, understanding your dominant style can help you design a note-taking system that complements your cognitive strengths and creative flow. You can learn about his work on this website. He breaks it down further in this video from his Youtube Channel.

I can safely say I am a mix of all three approaches. But here is a percentage breakdown of my approach to note taking using the Second Brain Framework by Tiago Forte:

1. I am a 40% Architect Note Taker - Recording daily tasks, weekly plans and health updates to systematize my life.

2. I am a 40% Librarian Note Taker - Save quotes, passages and links for future projects or conversations. Save to be read book titles and research paper dates.

3. I am a 20% Gardener Note Taker - Record random sketches and passing thoughts

What is your breakdown? What type of note taker would you like to be going ahead?

Along the way, I came across other ideas to record your thinking. Many of these approaches aligned with the above framework of note taking presented by Tiago Forte. This inspired and challenged me to expand my practice as a note taker.

Here are some notes from that exploration.

Idea 1: The Commonplace Book

Ryan Holiday is an American marketer, author, businessman and podcaster, notable for marketing Stoic philosophy in the form of books. I first learned about a commonplace book on Ryan Holiday’s blog. According to me, his approach to note taking is archival and curatorial because he emphasizes collecting and organizing his reading and research.

He breaks down his method of using a commonplace book in detail in this article. My favourite part was his description of the concept of “marginalia” which is the practice of taking notes while you read. His notes include passages, words, anecdotes, stories and information.

He seemed like a Librarian Note Taker to me.

Here is a passage where he shares his understanding of practising marginilia in his commonplace book:

“A commonplace book is a central resource or depository for ideas, quotes, anecdotes, observations and information you come across during your life and didactic pursuits. The purpose of the book is to record and organize these gems for later use in your life, in your business, in your writing, speaking or whatever it is that you do.” - Ryan Holiday

Leonardo Da Vinci’s Notebooks served as an early model of the Common Place Book. Image Credit - Zieries Fascimiles, Christian Ziereis, Georg Ziereis, Kurt (2017)

Here are some other famous examples of people that had commonplace books from around the world and how they used these books record their thinking on a day to day basis:

• John Locke (Philosopher) - Developed a personal indexing system for organization. Recorded political, religious, philosophical, and scientific ideas. Used as a tool for structured thinking and study

• Leonardo da Vinci (Artist, Inventor, Scientist) - Sketches of inventions, anatomy, and observations of nature. Notes on painting, science, engineering, and to-do lists. Wrote in mirror script; notebooks blended text and images

• Virginia Woolf (Writer) - Quotes and passages from literature. Personal reflections on writing and reading. Early drafts, creative ideas, and fragments of fiction.

• Ralph Waldo Emerson (Essayist, Philosopher) - Favorite quotes, poems, and maxims. Notes from books and lectures. Seeds for future essays and philosophical thought

• Marcus Aurelius (Roman Emperor, Philosopher) - Stoic reflections and moral reminders. Notes to self about self-discipline, mortality, and duty. Compiled in Meditations, not intended for publication

• H.P. Lovecraft (Horror Writer) - List of story titles, plot fragments, and eerie concepts. Notes on mythologies and supernatural themes. Personal creative prompts and unfinished ideas

• Isaac Newton (Mathematician, Physicist) - Notes on alchemy, theology, and natural philosophy. Annotations on scientific and religious texts. Sometimes encrypted or hidden due to controversial content

• W.H. Auden (Poet) - Quotes, facts, anecdotes, and passages from reading. Published as A Certain World: A Commonplace Book. Eclectic entries reflecting his interests and values

Idea 2: The Kahlo Diaries

Frida Kahlo (1907 - 1954) was a Mexican painter known for her many portraits, self-portraits, and works inspired by the nature and artifacts of Mexico. Her approach to note taking in her diaries was quite artistic and visual.

She maintained her notebook as an intimate, unfiltered expression of her inner world—a space where art, poetry, and emotion intertwined. Spanning the last decade of her life, the notebook served as both a visual journal and a psychological outlet. She used it to capture her thoughts, dreams, political beliefs, and deep emotional struggles, especially around love, identity, and chronic pain. Written mostly in Spanish, her entries often included invented words, surreal metaphors, and philosophical musings, with occasional English or French phrases. You can also purchase copies of these diaries today.

She seemed like a Gardener Note Taker to me.

The pages were filled with vivid watercolor sketches and ink drawings—often anatomical, symbolic, or surreal—that sometimes merged with her text or stood alone as standalone reflections. Unlike traditional journals, her notebook was nonlinear and spontaneous, without structured dates or chapters. Each page pulsed with raw emotion, creativity, and a sense of urgency—becoming a deeply personal art object that revealed how Frida thought, felt, and coped with the world around her. You can see images of pages of her diaries on this website.

Key Elements of How Frida Kahlo Maintained Her Notebook:

• Time period: Kept during the last 10 years of her life (1944–1954).

• Purpose: Served as a journal, sketchbook, emotional release, and political commentary.

• Mediums used: Ink, watercolor, pencil—often on the same page.

• Themes explored: Love, pain, identity, death, politics, and self-reflection.

• Language: Primarily Spanish, with occasional English/French; included wordplay and invented terms.

• Visuals: Surreal drawings, anatomical sketches (hearts, spines), portraits, symbolic imagery.

• Structure: Nonlinear, undated, freeform—no consistent order or planning.

• Style: Stream-of-consciousness writing mixed with spontaneous illustrations.

• Function: A deeply personal sanctuary where she could process her thoughts and create freely.

Idea 3: The Bullet Journals

Ryder Carroll is a digital product designer and inventor of the Bullet Journal. A bullet journal (sometimes known as a BuJo) is a method of personal organization. The bullet journal system organizes scheduling, reminders, to-do lists, brainstorming, and other organizational tasks into a single notebook. The focus is on creating structured, logical systems for organizing daily tasks and optimizing workflows over long periods of time. The System focuses on What you’re doing, providing tools to capture and organize your thoughts. The Practice focuses on Why you’re doing what you’re doing, providing rituals to help you shed distractions and keep your actions aligned with your values. He explained how he uses the bullet journal in this video.

He seemed like an Architect Note Taker to me.

He wrote about his story and what inspired him to build the bullet journal method in this article. Here is a quote that stayed with me from that article followed by a short video of how start your own bullet journal:

I created Bullet Journal, because I needed it. Growing up with ADHD way before resources were readily available, I struggled tremendously with distraction, procrastination, hyperactivity, overwhelm, and from the ensuing stress, anxiety, a loneliness from being seen as the "dumb kid." I dedicated myself to finding and developing tools that would help me become what I was not: focused, organized, and productive. I did this using the only tool I had at the time: pen and paper.

I know the different approaches to record my thinking using notes in a journal or notebook. But should I maintain a physical or digital journal?

Honestly this is a difficult question to answer. I spent 8 years taking notes in a physical journal. I then spent 5 years taking notes in my digital journal.

A physical journal helps you build your writing skills and experiment freely with notes. A physical journal is also cumbersome to carry around and store over time.

A digital journal helps you add links, videos, songs and more. A digital journal can become hard to manage and organize over time.

So they both have their benefits and flaws.

I would recommend trying both approaches. Choose the approach that gets you more excited about note taking. And then build your own process from that point onwards. It can also be a creative and balanced mix of both approaches to note taking.

But…

How to maintain a physical notebook/journal to record your thinking?

This video from @NotebookOverloadd on Youtube provides some guidance on maintaining a physical notebook or journal. She defines a commonplace book as a “collection of quotations, thoughts, passages or knowledge that isn’t your own but you consumed and considered worthy to keep”. In this video she shows us notes in her physical notebook that includes quotations from a non fiction book, youtube advice, pinterest quotes, notes on Tutankhamun, notes on Physics, affirmations and more. At the end of the video she mentions how she also writes down notes about her personal reflections and thoughts on the media she is consuming in her physical common place note book.

And…

How to maintain a digital notebook/journal to record your thinking?

This video from @AliAbdaal on Youtube provides some guidance on maintaining a digital notebook or journal. He has spoken about how taking notes in his digital journal has helped him become a better thinker. He started this practice in 2015. He described journalling as a process of writing down notes about the things that happen during the day, the feelings we feel during the day and the decisions and actions we want to take in the future. He also talks about his experience to find the perfect note taking app in this video. He references the Architect, Gardener and Librarian frameworks to note taking in this video as well.

If you enjoyed this essay, here is another essay on how creative people build communities that includes many stories and ideas you can add to your notebook or journal.

Until next time,

Happy Note Taking.

Abhishek