Information Architecture for Personal Knowledge Management — As a professional Information Architect, I’ve helped some of the world’s leading organizations classify and organize knowledge in systems serving as many as 400,000 international employees, each with their own unique needs for personalized information. Today, I’m going to share a simple trick I’ve learned from my work that can…

Information Architecture for Personal Knowledge Management — In my previous IA for PKM post, I introduced the role of concepts in human cognition and language. I wrote about how concepts are formed in a process that involves both differentiation and integration. Being conscious of that process can help you become a better information architect (IA), which regardless…

A poor choice of words for describing the weather. We were at a memorial service, for crying out loud! I was filling the silence of sadness with idle chit-chat about the weather when this young woman I’d just met stopped me abruptly to suggest, I guess, that I’m not “woke” when it comes to words. …

Information Architecture for Personal Knowledge Management — We are all information architects. It’s just what we do. It’s what makes us human. Our ability to organize and classify information, to conceptualize and abstract — they’re what differentiate us from all other animals on the planet. It’s no wonder that information architecture (IA) is fascinating; it goes…

Here are two “rules of thumb” and two magical numbers that can help you manage and improve your digital notes. They’re from the field of Information Architecture and are considered good practices for designing user-friendly websites. …

Do you want to make a big change in your life? Do you want to lose weight? Ditch something or someone that’s toxic? Change careers? Finally write the novel you’ve been dreaming about? Start a new side hustle or a business? …

A Plan for Transforming the Mere Concept into Something Genuine — Gratitude wasn’t working for me. I tried the daily gratitude journal. I sat down and forced a list of things I was grateful for, but it was all very cliché. I would start, of course, by acknowledging the obvious things: family, friends, health, wealth, food in the fridge, a roof…

Momma cranked the car window down with one hand and spun the steering wheel frantically with the other. I was eleven years old and hadn’t hit puberty yet, so the g-force of the turn slid my tiny body clear across the backseat behind Momma. Fresh air was now blowing out…

A Reflection on My First Encounter with Human Death — I was barely six when I saw a person dead for the first time, but dead bodies had been common in my boyish imagination up to that day. I imagined them mostly around water — on the banks of creeks, half buried in mud, and with all the color drowned…