How Can We Benefit From Taking Notes? (+ 3 Useful Strategies)

Are you a note-taker? Do you find yourself constantly surrounded by journals, notebooks or applications that allow you to track your thoughts and write down important points of what you read or learn? Or are you more of a person who believes that taking notes is a waste of time and you have found other valuable ways to learn and gather all the needed information?

In today’s article, I’d like to focus your attention on the act of taking notes – you may be surprised to know that it in fact adds tremendous value to the whole process of learning, working or even engaging in whatever experiences. It does more for our minds than just helping us later find whatever information we are looking for. In fact, many people suggest that taking notes is an act similar to journaling but while it shares some similarities with this exercise, it also greatly differs in terms of areas of implementation.

So without any further ado, let’s hop straight into the subject of note-taking and explore how this method can benefit both our productivity and time management.

The Act of Taking Notes and What It Does To Our Minds

You can effortlessly implement the act of taking notes in pretty much every area of life.

When asked, people often share that they have their notebooks by their sides each time they study, work or simply plan their day-to-day. In some sense, taking notes is strongly connected with our memory – most of the time we write things down in order not to forget them once our schedule becomes too overwhelming and filled with tasks and duties. However, many people share that they in fact find more and more advantages to taking notes other than increasing their memory. Of course, relying on your notes each time you need to quickly remember some important aspects of what you’ve last read, studied or viewed is an exceptional benefit – no one’s denying that! I’m just saying that there’s even more to it. Let’s explore how in fact taking notes is able to help us in a plethora of ways.

• When we are taking notes, we are prone to pay more attention – when we study or attend a seminar, for example, it’s only natural for our mind to start to wander or distract us with whatever thoughts. In cases like these, it’s likely for us to lose our concentration and miss valuable information. However, when we’ve decided we are going to take notes, it’s like we wire our brain to pay extra attention and choose the most important pieces of information worth mentioning in our notebooks.
• It also increases our ability to decide what’s truly important – even though every single piece of information could be beneficial, there are certain pieces that require plenty of attention and shape the entire essence of what’s been taught. When we are ready to take notes, we subconsciously pay extra attention in order to grasp the most important concepts in order to write them down for further work. Basically, that’s half of the learning process as a whole.
• Taking notes helps you gain a different perspective on things – when we choose to write down what appears to be of the biggest significance to us, what happens is that we subconsciously manage to gain a better perspective and view problems, situations and issues from a different angle. Essentially, this develops our problem-solving abilities and helps us come up with better solutions and strategies in the long run.

The truth is you can choose to take notes in various scenarios – students often opt for taking notes during classes, entrepreneurs and business owners find this strategy to be the best in workshops, meetings and seminars, employees, on the other hand, see this process as a helpful tool for keeping track of their tasks, etc. As we can see, the act of taking notes could be easily implemented in various scenarios – having in mind all the benefits it offers, I couldn’t think of a reason why anyone would skip giving their notebook a chance to shine.

Sharing 3 Useful Strategies That Could Come In Handy When Taking Notes

Up till now you’ve probably already decided it’s about time you give note-taking a chance to showcase its plethora of benefits. If that’s the case, then I congratulate you – you are about to witness so many advantages that you’d start asking yourself why haven’t you begun sooner.

However, you might be in need of coming up with useful strategies that could potentially make the whole note-taking experience a lot easier and more fruitful. I chose to share with you today 3 methods I personally use in my day-to-day in my professional and personal endeavors – give them a try and see whether they manage to work wonders for you as well.

1. Try handwriting. Yes, I’m aware of the fact that we are surrounded by the digital world and we spend our entire time online. Of course, there are numerous online journals and note-taking software that are quick, easy to use and always in our pockets wherever we go. However, research says that writing your thoughts and what’s important by hand helps rewire the brain faster and thus creates new pathways faster and more efficiently. 
2. Use summarizing as the ultimate remembrance strategy. Sometimes we are not capable of taking notes right on the spot. However, once we settle in and find the time, we could always go back and write down the most important highlights of what we’ve read, witnessed or learned. This is in fact a great strategy to remember the most important aspects, as well as to understand them better since you’ll have to write about them in your own words.
3. Often trace back your learning success by revisiting your writings. This way you’ll always be aware of what you’ve learned so far and would be able to determine your success rate.

As the act of taking notes is proven to offer quite a lot of advantages and benefits, I believe it’s high time you implement it in your day-to-day. I’d be curious to know how it all worked out for you so don’t hesitate to leave a comment and tell me all about your writing journey!