What to Put in a Commonplace Book

The blank page is the hardest part. Once you know what belongs in a commonplace book, the pages fill themselves.

The honest answer is anything that strikes you. But that is not much help when you are staring at an empty notebook.

So here is a fuller list, with examples. (For the bigger picture, see what is a commonplace book.)

Quotes and passages

The classic entry. A line from a book, an essay, a poem, or a talk that stopped you.

Copy it out, and note where it came from so you can find your way back to the source.

Historically this was the heart of the practice. A personal anthology of the best things you have read.

Your own thoughts

The most underrated entries are the ones no one else could write. A passing observation. A half-formed idea. A connection between two things that suddenly clicked.

These tend to arrive at odd moments and vanish just as fast. Write them down anyway.

Years later, your own notes to yourself are often the entries you treasure most.

Questions you cannot answer yet

A good question is worth keeping. Something you are turning over, a problem without a solution, a tension you noticed and want to sit with.

Collected over time, your open questions become a map of what you actually care about.

Facts, definitions, and how things work

A statistic that reframed something. A word you finally understood. A clear explanation of a thing you always half knew.

These are the entries that make you useful in a conversation a year from now.

Lines from anywhere, not just books

A lyric. A line of dialogue from a film. Something a friend said that was sharper than they realized.

The old commonplace books mixed high and low freely, recipes beside philosophy. Yours can too.

Things that simply moved you

Not everything has to be useful. Some entries earn their place by being beautiful, or funny, or true in a way you cannot quite explain.

Keep those too. A commonplace book is allowed to be a record of what you loved.

A simple way to start filling the page

For one week, keep the book within reach and capture one thing a day. A quote, a thought, a question, anything.

Do not judge it. Just get it down. (Here is the full method.)

By the end of the week you will have seven entries. And, more importantly, the beginning of an eye for what is worth keeping.

That eye is the real skill. The pages are easy once you have it.

"Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge. It is thinking that makes what we read ours." John Locke.