Consuming Content and Keeping Track of Inspiration

I’m bookmarking content from my devices to read later all the time. In the past 2 years, I’ve especially been reading more and noticed I would benefit from creating a system to keep up with all the links. I was using a variety of products at this point, but nothing quite stuck with me in my daily workflows. I often didn’t keep notes on deeper topics, and it was near impossible to find links later.

So I set out to create a system that would help me retain knowledge, and serve as an archive for future reference.

Requirements of my system

Multi-device

It’s attractive to me to use the same exact products and workflows across devices. I want this system to be easily accessible on any device (and ideally the web).

Robust tagging & filtering of long-term bookmarks

The most useful part of this system is creating a formal archive of interesting links, sorted into categories and tagged. This helps me refer back to links of interest when I need to.

Easy elevation of bookmarks to reading list

I have a dedicated To Read list that contains bookmarks to dive into when I have more time.

Simple archive of notes from reading list

As I review To Read items, I should take notes, highlight, and add whatever else that would serve as my knowledge to store.

Don’t make this feel like too much work

If the process feels heavy, or takes too long, I’m more likely to not follow it and return to my packrat ways.

Past solutions

Here’s an overview of the tools I’ve used over the years to semi-achieve some of the goals above:

• Delicious (Used in 2006-2010) Delicious was a way to stash and tag URLs. As I found interesting things, I could add them and tag them accordingly. This was the standard at the time and there wasn’t another tool I could find. Often, I never revisited links, or forgot why I added them to begin with.

• Instapaper (Used in 2010-2012) I had just graduated college and was commuting for the first time. I didn’t have wi-fi, but I really loved Instapaper and all it offered at the time. I could easily add things to Instapaper to “Read Later”, and the app would download local copies for when there was no service or wi-fi. As I was on the train, or bus, I could easily access it. It had a great feature set and is still a contender today, but I ended up falling in love with Pocket more.

• Pocket (Used in 2012-2019) Pocket was my go-to standard for adding things to my reading list. Any time I had free time, I would read through all of my saved URLs. Once complete, I would archive the link and move on. It worked for a long time, and what really sold me was the sidebar view, that allowed you to quickly navigate to the live URL you saved. I often had to revisit each link to remember why I saved it.

• Notion (Used in 2019 - Present) Notion is a tool I use daily to plan and execute projects. Inside of Notion, I kept a To Read page that would add each new URL to a database. This was achieved through Notion’s browser extensions and the share sheet.

Notion ended up being a bit too… bloated? The experience felt heavy, and as a place to store 100s of links, alongside each link’s content, it got hard for me to organize and traverse this information later. Also, Notion inspires me for some reason to build systems that are too complex or wieldy.

Working system

It took a few rounds and adjustments, but here’s how I use Raindrop & Notion to create long-term storage of links, content, and notes.

Step 1: all Links in Raindrop

Raindrop is a fantastic bookmark manager. What really sold me was the tagging, and ability to add collections, which are essentially folders. As my links grow, I can adjust my structure and tags. This helps me find content I’ve checked out.

I use raindrop on all my devices to save interesting links to check out later. As I find and share links with Raindrop, I follow this process:

1. New bookmarks get added in the Unsorted area.
2. Once I read through a bookmark, I then:
   1. Archive it in a topical folder for reference later
   2. Decide whether to add it to my Resonance Log (detailed below)

If I decide to archive the bookmark, I will usually add it to a folder, and then add tags to help me find smaller topics I’m focusing on (like react, css, styled-components, etc).

Raindrop makes it really easy to maintain links, with lots of views, downloading hard copies of URLs, and more.

Step 2: add interesting links to resonance log in Notion

Using Notion, I have a Resonance Log. This is a branch of Ali Abdall’s Resonance Calendar idea. The goal of this page is to maintain a log of content that inspires and resonates with me. If I decide to add content here, I am dedicating to reviewing the content and taking notes.

Once I decide to elevate a bookmark to the Resonance Log, I then revisit the URL and use the Notion Web Clipper. This will add all of the URL’s images and text, directly into a Notion database of my choice. From there, I can write my notes and highlight any passages that stand out to me (I just wish Notion’s search was faster).

Step 3: make notes & highlight passages

To close out a resonance log item, I complete the following:

• Review the content. Highlight passages that stand out to me.
• Paraphrase in my own words the broad strokes of the article.
• Leave a note on how this item may influence me in the future. Are there any opportunities?
• Mark the resonance log item as Read

The log serves as a library of content that has prompted me to read it and align it with where I am at. This is a fountain of ideas that I reference when I’m not feeling inspired.

Bonus: current system for visual inspiration

The above system works well for articles, videos, or individual URLs that have knowledge. Where it falls short, is providing any sort of Designer Inspiration Images/Gifs/Videos. Raindrop is great for URLs, and Notion starts to get heavy to use when there’s a lot of database entries (thousands).

I discovered Eagle, which is essentially a much friendlier and faster version of Adobe Bridge. Its blazing fast, and allows me to add snippets, gifs, and other visuals. Then, much like raindrop, they have fantastic ways to group, sort, tag, and even view items by color.

Primarily Eagle drives my ideation/discovery workflows. When I start new projects, I usually start in Eagle. I’ll collect screenshots of fonts, colors, interactions, etc. It’s intuitive and fast to create folders and tag each image.

After the discovery phase, Eagle isn’t as vital. I do make the time to review monthly my Raindrop bookmarks to document the smaller details I may find inspiring. It’s been neat to watch my library evolve.

What’s missing

The system shines for web content that has a URL. Where it falls short, is synchronizing with my kindle highlights. As I read books, I wish there was a more intuitive way to transfer those highlights into Notion, in a book within a database. I’m currently exploring a few different alternatives, now that Notion’s API is available.

Closing thoughts

This system has worked really well for me. If you find yourself having the same challenges, I hope this was helpful and inspires you to consider yours!