Practical Introduction to Across-Time Thinking

Or How To Start Creating Knowledge Base with Obsidian?

One of the hardest things with Knowledge Bases is simply getting started.

Many readers have expressed that they really want to begin their journey with Knowledge Bases and Obsidian, but even though they understand the benefits, the entry point seems too high. In this post, I'll guide you through how I would start with Obsidian for the purpose of creating a personal knowledge base. Moreover, this guide serves as a practical introduction to Across-Time Thinking that I discussed in my previous post.

In our example, we'll tackle a topic suggested by a reader - Product Launch. It's a great starting point as I don't know much about that area so I won't have any advantage. Moreover, it nicely fits my interests in product management and start-ups.

If you haven't done it yet, download Obsidian here.

Create a new Vault, click through the welcome screens, and let's begin our journey!

Welcome!

⚙️ Configuration of the Obsidian

We need to begin with a few steps of configuration which will help us efficiently navigate the process.

📒 Zettelkasten Folder

Let's create a single folder to house all our notes. While storing everything in one directory may seem counterintuitive, this approach is actually a crucial design choice that enables significant scaling of your knowledge base (I've personally grown mine to over 1,700 notes). I'll explain later how we'll effectively navigate this seemingly flat structure to access exactly what you need, when you need it.

At the top left corner, click the button “New folder” and create a folder in which you’ll have all your notes.

Having created the folder, let's make sure that new notes will always land in this folder.

1. Click Settings in the left bottom corner.

   

2. Find section "Files and links"

   

3. Change "Default location for new notes" to "In the folder specified below" and select your newly created folder.

   

You can now test if it works by creating a new note by clicking "New note" or using the shortcut Cmd + N (Mac) or Ctrl + N (Windows).

🧱 Templates

Before we move on, there's a very useful concept of templates. Templates enable you to quickly insert pre-defined text into your notes. Let's configure this feature:

1. Start by creating a folder called "Templates," the same way as you created the Zettelkasten folder.

2. Go to Settings again.

3. Find the section "Templates" and set "Template folder location" to your newly created Templates folder.

   

4. Now create a new Zettelkasten note template in the "Templates" folder.

   

Here's a template you can use:

{{date:YYYY-MM-DD}} {{time:HH:mm}}
Tags: 

# {{title}}

---
# 📒 References

This template provides a structured format with date, tags, title, and references sections. The tags section is especially important as it enables seamless navigation between related notes (think: Wikipedia).

How to Use?

1. Open the Command Palette (Cmd + P on Mac or Ctrl + P on Windows)

2. Search for "Templates: Insert template"

3. Select this template

Pro Tip: For faster access, configure a custom shortcut (such as Cmd + T) in settings. Remember to first remove any default shortcut assignments for that key combination (like "New Tab" for Cmd + T).

🏠 Home Note

I like to have a Home Note from which we'll grow our knowledge base. Let's rename the "Welcome" note to "Home" and we're good to go.

Your Obsidian vault should now have a basic structure with a Home note, a Templates folder with your template, and a Zettelkasten folder for all your future notes.

🔍 First Research

Since I don't know much about Product Launches, I'll turn to Large Language Models for help. For this first exploration, we'll use Perplexity.

I asked: "I'd like to learn about product launches. Could you write a high-level note describing what are the most critical aspects to make a successful product launch?"

Here are the results:

Now that we have some initial information, let's create a dedicated note for Product Launches in our system.

In Obsidian, square brackets create a reference to another note. If the referenced note doesn't exist yet, clicking on it will create a new note. Let's add a reference to our Home note by typing:

[[Product Launch]]

When you click on this reference, Obsidian will create a new note. Let's apply our template to this note by using the template command (Cmd + T if you set up the shortcut).

Now, we'll add a tag “Home” to our note and paste the results from our Perplexity search.

When examining the results from Perplexity, we find a solid foundation outlining the essential components of a successful product launch. While this provides a valuable starting point, we should expand our knowledge base by incorporating additional knowledge.

🏕️ Further Exploration

Perplexity also suggests follow-up questions for deeper exploration. Let's use one of them: "What are the most common mistakes to avoid during a product launch?"

Here are the results:

The results highlighted several issues to watch for:

• Lack of Market Research

• Undefined Target Audience

• Poor Pricing Strategy

• Weak Marketing and Launch Plan

• Ignoring Customer Feedback

• Overinvestment in the Launch

• Timing Errors

When examining the results, I noticed some overlap with our previous findings (like "Market Research" and "Target Audience"), as well as valuable new insights including "Pricing Strategy" and "Overinvestment in the Launch." Let’s add the latter into our note.

These complementary perspectives enhance our understanding but also create a challenge - our note is getting quite long and potentially difficult to navigate.

✍️ Refinement

While both "Key Success Factors" and "Key Mistakes" are important information, they might make our main Product Launch note too cluttered. Let's create a separate note for these insights to keep our main note focused and clean.

We'll create a new note called "Key Success Factors and Mistakes during Product Launches" using the square bracket method:

[[Key Success Factors and Mistakes during Product Launches]]

Click on this reference to create the note, apply the template, and transfer the relevant content from our main note.

Now, the Product Launch note looks as follows:

In general, for “main” notes, I prefer to create an index-style approach with references to specific components. This structured approach makes the knowledge more navigable as it grows. Here's what our revised Product Launch note might look like (note all the created notes on the left):

The structure is clear, with emojis making the distinction between categories more visible. An important note: this structure will definitely change as your knowledge grows, but because we're using links rather than directories, the change only happens at the linking level.

For example, during further research, you might discover that "Launch Execution" needs to be expanded into more categories, or that some aspects are less relevant than initially thought. That's normal — your knowledge base should evolve with your understanding.

🏃 Next Steps

That covers the high-level organization of your Product Launch note. What comes next?

From here, you can explore each category in depth using the same process:

1. Research specific topics (like Market Research or Goal Setting)

2. Take comprehensive notes

3. Refine and organize the information

4. Link it to your existing knowledge structure

If you discover entirely new categories during your exploration, simply create new notes linked from your Home note. Over time, you might need to create deeper structures within your Home note as your knowledge expands — for example, grouping "Product Launch," "Product Discovery," and similar topics under a broader "Product" category.

That's all there is to it! The beauty of this approach is its simplicity at the start, combined with unlimited potential for growth and refinement over time.

🕰️ Understanding Across-Time Thinking

As you've seen in this guide, Across-Time Thinking is about building knowledge incrementally through an iterative process:

1. Collect - Gather initial information and ideas (e.g., our Perplexity research on product launches)

2. Organize - Structure the information logically (e.g., adding the research to our Product Launch note in Obsidian)

3. Refine - Improve and enhance your understanding (e.g., creating separate notes and establishing a knowledge hierarchy)

4. Move Forward - Identify gaps and plan what to learn next (e.g., recognizing the almost-empty notes like "Market Research" that need further exploration)

This cycle allows your knowledge to evolve naturally over time, becoming more sophisticated and interconnected with each iteration. Unlike one-time thinking (solving problems in a single session), Across-Time Thinking distributes the cognitive load across multiple sessions, allowing for deeper understanding and more complex insights.

The beauty of this approach is its flexibility — you can leave Obsidian for a few days, then return, review your Product Launch note, and begin exploring whichever empty category interests you most. There's no pressure to complete everything at once.

The knowledge base you're building in Obsidian is both the product of this thinking process and a tool that enables it — creating a virtuous cycle of growing understanding.

Happy Knowledge Basing! 👋 🌍