I had no idea how much people loved notebooks, but Notebook People are passionate people. And for good reason.

I first learned about the world of notebooks through my friend Parker Settecase. (You can see my conversation with him here.) The brief back story is that Parker has a podcast and channel called Parker's Pensées, where he interviews mostly philosophers and theologians. And although he's enjoyed those conversations, the episodes have never really gained notable momentum toward getting as many views as he hoped.

But after a few years of experience, he created a channel called Park Notes that focused on learning through notebooks, and BANG. Viral. The video, “A Notebook to Save You From Infinite Scrolling and Boredom” has almost 3 million views.

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“Pocket Notebooks Can Save Your Mind” has 1.5 million views.

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And he made other videos that hundreds of thousands of people have watched. The notebook world is a force.

It took me a bit to figure out why that's the case, but if you are a lifelong learner, or interested in learning anything in particular, there’s a good chance that something as simple as a physical notebook can really make a difference.

For myself, I have started to use a few Leuchtturm1917 moleskines for keeping useful notes from health and fitness podcasts, from books I’m reading, and I take one to class when I teach to mark down anything I want to remember. I have noticed a difference in what I remember, and my overall work efficiency. And with so much of our lives taking place in the screen world, it’s nice to learn and engage through a physically-based process.

Discovering the history of how notebooks have shaped intellectual progress over centuries has been eye-opening. Thanks to Parker, I started listening to a book called The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper. It’s a fun listen or read. Once you start figuring out how notebooks can help you, you'll learn the difference between a commonplace book, a compendium notebook, field notes, etc., which all have a long and distinguished history.

And the cool thing about Parker’s Park Notes channel is that it’s full of philosophy-related videos, like “How to Journal (& Think) Like a Philosopher”

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and “Examine Your Life like an Ancient Philosopher”.

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Parker also has a Substack where he writes a ton on notebooks, philosophy, and theology, including a post where I was featured.

So if you’re in the process of learning something, or you just find yourself wanting to keep track of your thoughts, try keeping a physical notebook and watch what happens when you engage your mind through making marks on paper.

Until next time.

Jared

P.S. I'm really excited to premiere the upcoming season of the Selling Plato podcast very soon. You can subscribe here to get notified when they release.

This Week's Free Philosophy Resource:

Title: Reason "En Masse"​

Author: Eliot Watkins

Reading Level: Undergraduate through graduate

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