§Inboxes and attention management

• Close open loops

  • Inboxes only work if you trust how they’re drained
  • Triage strategies for maintaining inboxes (e.g. Inbox Zero) are often too brittle
  • Spaced repetition can lower the stakes around destructive inbox-maintenance operations
  • Inboxes shouldn’t be split into multiple places

• Spaced repetition systems can be used to program attention

  • Evergreen note maintenance approximates spaced repetition
  • Spaced repetition may be a helpful tool to develop or change habits
  • Spaced repetition may be a helpful tool to incrementally develop inklings

• A reading inbox to capture possibly-useful references

  • My implementation of a reading inbox

• A writing inbox for transient and incomplete notes

  • Evergreen notes permit smooth incremental progress in writing (“incremental writing”)

• Setting up my reading inbox

• All my inboxes