Encoding · Part 4

The 12 rules that round off encoding — built around cooperating with your brain's natural organising process, with four core tactics at the centre.

Key ideas

▸Rules 1–3 — work with your brain: stop fighting it (rote memorising is “a shouting match”), prevent learning debt, don't overeat information (digest as you go).
▸Rules 4–7 are the four core tactics, done every time: simplify everything, compare everything, connect everything, group everything.
▸Rules 8–9 — get used to thinking hard, and do everything again (encoding is a recursive cycle you re-run as knowledge deepens).
▸Rules 10–12 — use better analogies (comprehensive yet simple), use note-taking as an offload, and challenge your hypotheses constantly.

RULES 4–7 · do these every time

Simplifyboil each idea down — even a rough simplification strengthens memory
Compareline it up against other ideas and prior knowledge
Connectlink ideas to see what influences what
Groupcluster by similarity to simplify the whole network

Simplify each idea first — even a wrong simplification strengthens memory (e.g. anaphylaxis = “your immune system hit the panic button”).
Compare every new idea to other new ideas or prior knowledge; connect to see influence; group by similarity to simplify the network.
Use notes to think on paper — straggly, unconnected notes flag your weak points.
Treat every structure as a hypothesis and keep restructuring as new info arrives.

“you are having a shouting match with your brain”

“even if you're not built different you can build differently”