Oh, it’s such a good book. I’m taking my copy on the subway with me this morning. Thanks for the reminder, I totally forgot about that part!

Everybody’s been recommending that book to me for years too. Perhaps it’s time to finally get to it.

It worth his reading… it also worth his rereading each years. You get stock with your writings? You need inspiration? This is the book ;)

I blogged about it a while ago and wrote some quotes from it: Other quotes from Bird by Bird

You finished to read the book and need more? I can suggest you “Page after Page” by Heather Sellers. The book is in the same trend with another voice and other tips and tricks.

Good reading,

Salutations,

Fred

Index cards are good … or the contemporary alternative could be to use your PDA/smartphone ;-)

Merlin, it’s one of my favorite books of all time. Index card synergy is excellent, but the book certainly stands on its own merits.

In the same vein, Annie Dillard’s The Writing Life is extraordinary, as well.

Anne Lamott lives near SF and was on a KQED show last week, talking about faith and politics.

She seems like a fascinating, unpredictable person with a natural gift for musical language. The archived interview is available in Real format.

(I love the idea of a “jukebox” in your head that plays the greatest hits of what you think you’re good and bad at. Great image.)

Bucky Fuller and his chum, E J Applewhite, obviously knew a thing or two about index cards:

E.J. collaborated with Bucky on Synergetics 1 & 2, and he compiled – on a typewriter not a computer – one of the oddest books in philosophical history – The Synergetics Dictionary, a 4-volume photocopied collection of 22,000 3 x 5 cards used during their work on Synergetics. On the cards he abstracted Buckminster Fuller ‘s thoughts on hundreds of topics from letters, books, tapes, published and unpublished papers, and thus “introduced Bucky to himself” on all these subjects. And too, in the process, he gave Fuller scholars an annotated resource beyond price.

I just can’t imagine how much fun it must have been to type up 22,000 of them, though.

Another non-fiction writing book that extols the virtues of the index card (at great length and depth) is A Writer’s Time: Making the Time to Write by Kenneth Atchity. It is one of my favorite writing and time management books. A 2fer.

That’s the thing—like the Buckminster Fuller example, what do you DO with them when you’re done? Anybody can create a bunch of stuff, but that doesn’t help anyone by itself.

Thanks for the tip o’ the hat, Merlin!

Bird-by-bird stands for zenlike concentration on the immediate task…eating the elephant one bite at a time. So very GTD, you know.

This is good advice. Much more efficient than trying to teach your dog English so that you can tell her these things and ask her to help you remember them. Even if you manage to overcome the whole canine-human speech barrier, there is no promise that she’ll be agreeable enough to help you remember all these things, or that her memory is not already as bad as yours. In which case, you’ll probably come to the end of your walk around Phoenix Lake and find yourself asking the dog, “What was I talking about just now?” To which she will only be able to respond, “I love bacon,” because, after all, that is all she is ever thinking about.

That is a fantastic book :) I didn’t think I’d like it until I got it and then I couldn’t put it down to save my life.

I so did not need another book to read. :) But I’m buying this one, along with The Myth of the Paperless Office. Thanks, Merlin!

Index cards are all about collecting all the random scraps of thought and observation, and doing so on an atomic format, so that you can casually chuck them into the proper piles. It’s the living embodiment of the principle that you should never have to do things twice; record it, and if there’s a ready bucket, you’ve captured a tiny atom and put it in a place where it can do some good, later.

I’ve been doing this for years, but it’s only recently that I realized that I was capturing into dead storage; spiral bound notebooks that have so much useless information on them that it takes more effort to extract the good stuff than the good stuff is worth. Thus, the GTD collection bucket, and from there my vast army of tiny folders, manila tabs, magnets, magnetic whiteboards, etc. The C2 Wiki is an incredible resource on index cards. Were I not defying doctor’s orders by typing even this much, I would add it to the 43f wiki.

In Danny’s Notcon04 lifehacks presentation, he talks about Kent Beck flinging index cards at the Xerox PARC group. “Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair!” That image warms my heart.

And now I retreat and pretend I didn’t really touch a keyboard….

A fantastic read even if you have no aspirations of ever writing anything longer than a grocery list.

For the true 3x5 card enthusiast, may I recommend the Levengers International Pocket Briefcase? It holds credit cards on one side of the wallet, and on the other, 3x5 cards. There is a slot for a mini-pen in the middle. One warning - it is almost 6 inches long and sticks out of the top of back pants pockets. As a purse-carrying girl, this isn’t usually a problem - it fits well enough for runs to the grocery store. It does fit nicely in inside jacket pockets.

I get compliments on mine all the time. And I like being able to jot things down quickly. I have a PDA, but shopping lists and such tend to go in the wallet.

Last December, I posted a list of what I called, “accidental books about blogging,” and included Bird-by-Bird. Here’s what I said then, “I will tell you what I’ve told countless others for well over a decade. This is the single, best book ever written on the topic of writing and one of the best ever written on the topic of living. Sure, Elements of Style is the bible, but this book is about the soul. It is about giving oneself the freedom to write. It is about having a purpose to write other than to pen the great American novel. It is about the writing one should do on a weblog.”

Merlin, this book is for you.

I’ve read it twice and enjoyed it immensely each time - I think you’ll like it! How could you not, really? It’s lifehacks and creativity all rolled into one!

Obligatory soul-quenching post to say I’ve been doing this for years and it is indeed every bit as helpful as is claimed. Also if you have some way to record voice memos (cell phone, mp3 player), that can be used while in motion. I just found this blog today and I am definitely throwing this one in NetNewsWire. I’m gonna love this.

Amazing! I would never have thought of that - carrying around a piece of paper and a pen to enable me to write things down! 43 Folders: Helping mouthbreathers the world over. No doubt Lamott’s ‘Bird By Bird’ contains such unique and pertinent writerly advice as “Keep a dictionary and thesaurus handy”, “Read a lot” and “Practice, practice, practice!” At only ten dollars, it would still be a steal at twice the price!

The best part of Bird By Bird is that it’s easy to read and it’s funny. Of course, it’s full of information about writing.

Another book that’s superb for any kind of writing is Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones. It’s the best book on writing I’ve ever read. It’s one of those must-have books if you’re interested in writing.

In fact, now that I’ve got started, I’ll shamlessly post a link to a blog entry that I’d written a few months ago thanking writers for their books on writing. Warning, post may contain gushy language.

PS: Love 43 folders by the way.

Bird by bird

Anne Lamott’s book Bird by Bird, “Some Instructions on Writing and Life,” is one of my all-time favorites. Focused on writers, the book’s got more than a few life hacks in there as well. From the back cover: Thirty years…

Bird by bird

Anne Lamott’s book Bird by Bird, “Some Instructions on Writing and Life,” is one of my all-time favorites. Focused on writers, the book’s got more than a few life hacks in there as well. From the back cover: Thirty years…

April Power Hacks

Hack your way out of writer’s block

It’s been a while since we looked at a fun list of ways to smash your block quickly, so here’s one I enjoyed from Merlin Mann’s www.43folders.com.