2020-10-21 How To Read Any Book

Here, we’ll focus not on the note-taking system itself, but on its precursor, on reading effectively.

To read effectively, according to Sönke Ahrens’s analysis of Luhmann, you need two things:

1. The correct mindset
2. A pen and a paper (or their digital equivalent)

Asking yourself appropriate questions

Now that you’ve identified what’s relevant through the lens of intention, you need to excavate the nuggets of knowledge. To do that, you need to ask yourself appropriate questions. Here are some:

1. What is the application of this concept or idea?
2. How is it related to other concepts that I know?
3. How is it relevant for project X, Y, or Z?

Can I solve [insert your problem here] with it?

Combining the intention and asking appropriate questions, you’re left with a mindset change: the act of reading changes from consumption to production. As you read, you instantly generate corollaries from what’s being said in the book. You zero in on what matters to you and liberate the important parts.