14 Reasons to Love Obsidian as a Note-Taking Tool for my PhD

Just a small collection of the reasons why I love Obsidian for research and maybe why you will too.

Screenshot by author from the Obsidian vault-opening screen

In many ways, Obsidian has become my happy place. It’s somewhere central I can collect my thoughts. I don’t have to worry whether they are isolated ideas or whether they are an expansion of something which already exists. They don’t even have to make sense at the time.

In the line of George Orwell; all thoughts are created equal, it’s just some are more interesting than others…

… but only at any one time.

Random thoughts might be useful and help connect something together several years down the line; I just don’t know. Or they might never surface again. All that matters is they are written down and made findable, ready for when I need them. I find it shocking how many ideas and little thoughts I completely forget.

“The meaning of a thought, insight, or memory often isn’t immediately clear. We need to write them down, revisit them, and view them from a different perspective in order to digest what they mean to us,” said Tiago Forte in his book ‘Building a Second Brain.

Many we need to leave a while to simmer.

Obsidian came at a time of overwhelm in my PhD. I’ve never been particularly…