Over the last year I’ve seen a stack of YouTubers promoting things like “building a second brain”. And whilst I’m sure systems like this are beneficial for reviewing previously consumed ideas and great for content creators, I have some thoughts.

The moment I felt like this had gone too far was on one video where a popular productivity YouTuber (I don’t intended to name and shame, cause I actually think she’s pretty great otherwise!) essentially asserted that if you’re not doing something with the content you’re consuming, you’re wasting your time.

There’s a bunch of problems I have with this:

1. We shouldn’t have to “work-ify” everything.

Sometimes consuming content should just be for the sake of consuming it. We should be allowed to enjoy it, without feeling obligated to review our personal brand as a result. Content can be enjoyed for the leisure of what it is.  

• We don’t have to implement everything.

Sometimes messages are going to resonate, sometimes they won’t and there’s nothing wrong with that.

• We’ve got other things to do.

Sometimes I love listening to YouTube videos or podcasts on productivity on the go and I’m not necessarily going to have the time to then catalogue the key points post-hoc. And I’m okay with that.

Instead, I’m putting forward an idea I recently came across from a TED talk by Eduardo Briceno, a learning expert:

              What if, instead of spending our lives doing, doing, doing, performing, performing, performing, we spent more time exploring, asking, listening, experimenting, reflecting, striving, and becoming?

I don’t think consuming content without further directed action should be seen as frivolous or produce guilt. It should be a thing of great joy! By exploring new perspectives, we can broaden our worldview. By hearing about systems used by others, we can reflect on what works for us. A personal value, I think, is to worry less about the output of consuming content, to let go of this idea of building a second brain. Instead, I want to enjoy taking in new information, without fixating on the outcome.

What are your thoughts? Do you have a “second brain” system? Do you limit your content consumption in some way?