0:01 There are three main things that if you
0:03 care about them make picking Obsidian
0:05 over other note-taking apps a great
0:07 idea. First, if you want near zero
0:10 friction to capture your own ideas.
0:12 Second, if you value connecting those
0:15 ideas using links and back links. And
0:17 third, if you want to improve your
0:19 thinking, learning, and writing while
0:23 using an offline local first format you
0:25 can take with you anywhere instead of
0:27 being stuck in one app or format. If
0:29 that's you, I'm about to share the
0:31 essential 80% of all those features in
0:33 Obsidian and how you can use them to get
0:36 the most out of Obsidian in the shortest
0:37 time. Let's start with what Obsidian
0:40 actually is, which is just a vault, a
0:42 folder of notes on your computer. Here
0:45 it is right here on my desktop. It's
0:47 that simple. Inside this folder, your
0:50 notes are just individual text files.
0:52 These files are in a futurep proof
0:54 format called Markdown. Open those files
0:57 in Obsidian and they look like this. But
0:59 you can also open them in any other app
1:01 that reads markdown. Here's the same
1:05 note in text edit in VS Code, Ulyses,
1:08 IIA Rider. So even if Obsidian
1:10 disappears, as long as there are
1:12 computers, you'll have a way to open
1:14 your notes because at the end of the
1:16 day, Obsidian is just looking at a
1:19 folder with notes on your computer. You
1:21 own your data. But if you want to sync
1:24 Obsidian across devices, there are ways
1:25 to sync your vaults. You just connect
1:28 Obsidian with any cloud storage service
1:31 like Dropbox or Obsidian Sync, which is
1:34 one of Obsidian's few paid official
1:37 services, allowing you endtoend
1:39 encryption and version history of all
1:42 your vaults. Obsidian is so secure that
1:44 no one on their sevenperson team even
1:47 knows how many people have installed the
1:49 app. Though their CEO estimates that
1:52 it's between 5 to 10 million.
1:54 So, how does Obsidian work? Once you
1:56 open Obsidian and create your first
1:59 vault, you'll be here. Now, over on the
2:01 left, here's a list of all the notes in
2:04 your vault. Create a new note here. It's
2:05 called Untitled. Let's go ahead and
2:07 throw it in the folder. We can go ahead
2:09 and create a new folder here. If we want
2:12 to sort, we can click this and sort by
2:14 file name or modified time or many
2:15 others. If you lose where the current
2:17 open note is in the sidebar, go ahead
2:19 and click this and it will autoreveal
2:21 the current file. And this button
2:24 expands and collapses your folders. You
2:25 go a little bit higher. Here's the
2:27 search button where you can search
2:29 across your entire vault of notes. If
2:31 you click over here, there are bookmarks
2:33 where we can bookmark different files
2:35 that are important to us. or click back
2:37 here and we're back to the file folder
2:39 structure. And then click on a note to
2:41 see it in the right. You can
2:43 commandclick or control-click on Mac or
2:46 Windows to open notes in new tabs. Once
2:48 open, you can click and drag a tab and
2:51 move it anywhere into different panels
2:53 for your unique type of multitasking.
2:56 Obsidian has a crazy amount of plugins
2:59 and themes, folders, and metadata that
3:01 you can add to your notes. It can be as
3:03 simple as a note like this with a couple
3:05 sentences and a couple links or
3:07 something as complex as this with tons
3:11 of property, images, embeds, and
3:12 personal details. There's a steep
3:14 learning curve if you try to do
3:16 everything at once. So, let's start by
3:19 making the simplest possible collection
3:21 of notes. So, let's go ahead and create
3:25 a new note and let's say do things the
3:29 right way. Then I can tab and start
3:32 typing. Now already you can see a new
3:36 dot, a new node in our idea verse in the
3:38 graph view on the right. Now let's add
3:41 some content. Now the beauty of Obsidian
3:44 is you can create and connect notes at
3:46 the same time. We'll think of something
3:49 this reminds us of. So do things the
3:54 right way. This reminds me of
3:59 believe things better than you found
4:02 them. Nice. And how we link in the first
4:04 place is we hit the left bracket twice
4:06 and then we start typing. How about a
4:11 new one? Family phrases to live by. And
4:13 for me, I'll now hit the right bracket
4:15 twice and then period. And over on the
4:17 right, we can see in the graph view, do
4:18 things the right way, connecting to the
4:21 two new placeholder notes. But what's
4:23 wild is these notes, even though they're
4:25 not created, will still show up in any
4:27 type of search that you do. But if you
4:28 do want to make it a new note, let's go
4:31 ahead and commandclick on it on Mac.
4:33 That would be a controlclick on Windows.
4:35 And boom, now it's its new note. If we
4:37 look at the graph view now, we can see
4:40 it's a darker dot. it's been created as
4:43 opposed to the family phrases idea which
4:46 has not been created into a note yet. By
4:48 the way, if you close this graph view,
4:50 which is a tab over here, rightclick,
4:52 hit close, you can always reopen it with
4:54 a little ribbon button here. So, we can
4:56 reopen the graph view and now we see it
4:59 in all its glory. You can adjust all
5:01 sorts of graph variables, especially as
5:03 your graph grows to this. This is idea
5:04 verse pro. There are links below if you
5:06 want to learn more about it cuz here you
5:09 can see all sorts of surprising
5:12 connections. Not all those who wander
5:14 are lost. We can learn from nerdy
5:16 discussions on maps of content,
5:18 evergreen notes or things or statements
5:20 about things. And we're off to the
5:22 races. Who knows where this will lead?
5:24 You can jump into any note and simply
5:26 highlight some text and then hit the
5:29 left bracket twice. When you do that,
5:31 you'll notice the new dot has appeared
5:33 on the graph view. to see all mentions
5:35 of a linked note. In the bottom right,
5:38 there are back links to the active note.
5:40 You can go ahead and collapse linked
5:42 mentions. So, you can see all those. You
5:44 can expand to see exactly what it says
5:48 as it links to the active note. Speaking
5:50 of links, before we go further, there's
5:52 a few crucial settings that will save
5:54 you massive headaches down the road.
5:58 Open settings. Go to files and links and
6:01 turn on automatically update internal
6:03 links. Now, here's why this is
6:06 important. If you rename a note to a new
6:08 note name and then click away, do see
6:11 that notification updated links in two
6:13 files. With this setting, the links
6:16 updated automatically to point to the
6:18 renamed note. Without this setting,
6:20 renames will break links and you might
6:22 end up with a bunch of broken
6:23 connections. Let's change some other
6:25 quick settings. So, if you click over
6:27 here, we can now change the default
6:30 folder for attachments to a new folder
6:32 for attachments. This is really
6:34 important to avoid cluttering up the
6:36 sidebar whenever you want to add a new
6:38 image or other documents to a note.
6:40 While we're fiddling with settings, I
6:42 want to recommend changing your theme to
6:45 know how to do it. So, just click
6:48 appearances, then manage under themes,
6:52 and select Anapuchin. A nu. There it is.
6:54 Install. Now, this is a very popular
6:58 theme that acts as a base for the soft
7:00 paper theme that I recommend for
7:02 Obsidian. Check out this video next for
7:03 all those details, which I'll speed
7:05 through right now to get us all the soft
7:08 papery goodness.
7:10 Next, some quick gotchas and mistakes
7:12 that trip people up with Obsidian. The
7:14 first gotcha, don't import everything
7:17 from your old notes app. I see people do
7:19 this all the time. They dump thousands
7:22 of other old notes into Obsidian and
7:24 then they wonder why they can't find
7:26 anything. Start fresh. Link your own
7:28 thoughts. Don't drown in old clutter.
7:30 Second, keep it simple with plugins.
7:32 Avoid starting with things like advanced
7:35 tables, canban boards, data view
7:38 dashboards, and a lot more. I know it's
7:39 incredibly tempting, but don't chase
7:42 plugins on day one. I'll link a video on
7:44 essential plugins below if you want to
7:48 peak, but focus on linking first. Third,
7:50 don't overfolder your ideas or knowledge
7:54 notes. Structure must be earned. We'll
7:56 get into all that in a second and the
7:58 level of structure that I do recommend,
7:59 but when you're dealing with ideas and
8:02 knowledge, categories get so fuzzy and
8:05 ambiguous that standard hierarchies
8:08 become brittle. Keep things in big
8:10 buckets until patterns naturally show
8:12 up. Finally, don't put off learning
8:15 hotkeys. The faster you can do work in
8:18 Obsidian, the more you'll enjoy it.
8:20 Speaking of, let's talk about how to
8:23 make our notemaking faster. First, you
8:25 can do everything with your mouse if you
8:27 want by right-clicking and selecting
8:30 formatting. But trust me, you want to
8:32 learn to use hotkeys. Here are a few
8:34 essentials. Now, I'm going to be saying
8:36 command and option for Mac. So, think
8:39 control and alt if you're on Windows.
8:42 CommandB to bold. Command I to it
8:45 atalicize. Add the pound symbols at the
8:47 beginning of a line to create headings
8:50 of different sizes. Surround text with
8:53 two tildas to strike through and two
8:56 equal signs to highlight. A greater than
8:59 sign will create a quote block. A dash
9:01 will create a bullet list. Numbers
9:04 create numbered lists. Dashes plus
9:07 brackets start a checklist and three
9:09 lines on an empty line will create a
9:12 divider. One back tick for inline code
9:16 and three ticks for a code block. Again,
9:18 link to notes with double brackets or
9:20 you can link to an external site. To do
9:22 that, put the link text here and the
9:25 link in parenthesis. Command option left
9:28 or right keys will navigate back or
9:30 forward instead of clicking the icons here.
9:32 here.
9:35 Command F to find text on the page.
9:39 Command T will open a new tab. Command W
9:41 closes it. And if you add an exclamation
9:43 point before a link to another note, you
9:46 can embed that entire note inside
9:48 another. And adding an exclamation point
9:50 before an external link will display an
9:54 image if it is one. Finally, command P
9:56 will open the command pallet where
9:58 you'll find reminders of these shortcuts
10:01 as well as many more advanced shortcuts.
10:03 Combine these tips and you can create
10:05 beautiful notes in Obsidian.
10:07 So, can we get around Obsidian and
10:08 organize these beautiful notes
10:11 effectively? Yes. Command O opens the
10:15 quick switcher to find or open a note
10:17 fast. But the standard way to navigate
10:19 is through your sidebar. As you make
10:21 notes, they'll populate here. So, if you
10:23 want to organize things more, create
10:25 folders in the left sidebar and put your
10:28 notes into them. Don't just do this
10:30 making folders with random topics
10:32 because if you do this long enough,
10:34 you'll realize it's pretty hard to find
10:36 your notes or remember where they are.
10:38 That's because a lot of notes can exist
10:40 in five or 10 different folders. So,
10:42 there's all sorts of decision fatigue
10:44 just to place a single note. So, what I
10:46 suggest is building a folder structure
10:49 only as it deserves it and making the
10:51 biggest picture folder categories
10:53 possible. You can then use your quick
10:56 switcher links between notes and even
10:57 the graph view to get a better sense of
11:00 where notes live. Over time, you can
11:02 create a more sophisticated structure.
11:03 Now, I've built a free template called
11:06 Ideverse, which you can get by scanning
11:08 here that can get you started building a
11:10 solid foundation. But hey, right now,
11:14 let's walk through the basics. Ace AC
11:16 atlas is for your timeless ideas and
11:18 knowledge. Calendar is for your
11:20 timebased notes like a journal or a
11:23 daily note. Efforts are for timebound
11:25 things, things you're working on,
11:28 projects, tasks, anything productivity
11:30 oriented. This is a great simple way to
11:32 organize your vault and then create
11:35 subfolders under each as necessary. Some
11:36 other ways to organize your notes
11:39 include bookmarking by hitting the three
11:40 buttons and seeing it in the drop down
11:42 or hit command P and pull up the
11:45 bookmark command. You can tag notes by
11:47 using the pound key to bundle and filter
11:49 by types of notes wherever they are in
11:51 Obsidian. More often than not, I
11:53 recommend instead of tags, creating maps
11:55 of content. These are notes that
11:57 organize and link other notes together
12:00 by topic or theme and create really
12:03 strong connective hubs in your graph
12:05 view. And if you're capturing quick
12:07 thoughts in Obsidian, creating a daily
12:09 note structure in the calendar section
12:11 of your folders is a great way to
12:13 capture daily thoughts on the fly and
12:15 then link out to the rest of your idea
12:18 verse as needed. Okay, let's talk
12:20 Obsidian's different note formats.
12:22 Standard notes in Obsidian are textbased
12:24 markdown files, but you can add in all
12:26 sorts of things. First, you can embed
12:29 images directly into your notes. Just
12:32 drag and drop an image file right there.
12:34 You can attach PDFs, audio recordings,
12:36 and a bunch of other documents. You can
12:38 turn on the audio recorder core plugin
12:41 for quick voice memos or embed YouTube
12:44 videos and even tweets. Tables are easy
12:47 to build by hitting command P, typing
12:49 table, which will give you insert table,
12:51 then hit enter. or try the templates
12:53 core plug-in which lets you create and
12:57 repurpose notes in reusable formats. To
12:59 get even more sophisticated organizing
13:02 and filtering notes in your idea verse,
13:04 you can add properties to notes like
13:08 created date, checkboxes, links, text,
13:10 numbers, all this to your notes without
13:13 cluttering the content. Just hit command
13:16 semicolon to add a new property. Then
13:18 set up as many as you like. Air
13:20 properties with Obsidian's basis feature
13:23 to create really cool organizational
13:25 formats that can be sorted and updated
13:28 by note type or visualize your notes
13:31 with Obsidian's canvas, a virtual
13:34 whiteboard to drag in notes, images, or
13:36 new cards for brainstorming. By the way,
13:38 more details on setting up bases or
13:40 canvas in the links below. Finally,
13:43 let's talk about how Obsidian does AI,
13:46 which is easy enough since Obsidian
13:48 doesn't have AI. Instead, you get to
13:50 decide how much AI and what ways it
13:52 integrates. Pick based on how private
13:54 you need your data to be and how much
13:56 you're willing to do to preserve that
13:59 privacy. Right now, I'm using Claude, an
14:01 AI that allows me to do things like ask
14:04 questions, and talk to my notes, do deep
14:05 research, and instantly populate
14:08 properties in Obsidian. I always back up
14:10 my notes first before trying anything
14:12 new with AI. And I create a separation
14:15 between my idea verse, my original
14:18 thinking and any AI generated notes so
14:22 that Obsidian stays a sacred space for
14:24 my notemaking. If you want to set up my
14:26 note-taking system, try my free idea
14:28 verse by scanning here. Once you do, you
14:30 can get a step-by-step guide to set up
14:33 your own vault in Obsidian in minutes.
14:35 And check out this video next for how to
14:37 install my favorite Obsidian theme, the
14:39 one you've seen throughout most of this
14:41 video. Thanks for watching and happy
