1. Are you constantly wasting time looking for information you were sure you had saved?
2. Is that pile of unfinished projects causing shame and anxiety?
3. Are you stuck in a perpetual state of overwhelm when you look at your buzzing social media feed, your email inbox at 999+ unread messages, and the 17 open browser tabs with interesting articles to read?
4. Are you trying to get into a flow state, but when you sit down to work, you feel overwhelmed and unsure where to start?
5. Are you easily distracted by the next meeting/to-do/emergency instead of being fully present with your loved ones?
6. Are you always busy and yet don’t feel like you’re moving your life forward in the areas that matter most to you?
If you answered “no” to all of these questions, great! You can close this page.
But if you nodded your head at least once and want to finally clear the mental clutter and start doing your best work with clarity, purpose, and ease…
Then read on!
AUTHOR & CREATOR OF BUILDING A SECOND BRAIN
I’ve spent more than 10 years researching and personally experimenting with a new way of organizing our digital lives and improving our productivity.
What started as a quest to deal with a chronic illness turned into a life-long mission to help you harness the full potential of your ideas and turn them into reality.
My work has been featured in
If you’re reading this, then something in your life has caused you to stop and think,
(just like my mysterious illness did for me).
Maybe your responsibilities have increased dramatically as you started a family, a new job, or a business, and now you need a way to do great work, despite having less time.
You might feel like you’re dropping balls left, right, and center, losing track of open threads, and it’s impacting those around you.
Maybe you’re dissatisfied with your current job and want to move to a more fulfilling career and get more out of life.
Or maybe you have a lot of ideas and expertise but don’t know how to link all that information together to make the impact you want to make.
Whatever your situation, I can tell you that you’re not alone.
When I ask people why they aren’t going after their goals (and instead often lower their hopes and ambitions instead), the #1 answer is always:
Information overload!
They share things like…
“I get overwhelmed at the tasks before me. I don’t know how to manage the volume and set priorities.”
“Things just fall through the cracks.”
“I just feel like I can’t make progress on anything.”
This state of permanent information overload and overwhelm has become our “new normal.”
Why? Because our biological brains are reaching their capacity. We have way too much to remember, too much to think about, and too much to do.
And the problem is: The volume of information flooding our brains today is just a trickle compared to what’s coming.
(Forecasts* show that the volume of information created, captured, and consumed worldwide will double from 2022 to 2025. Isn’t that crazy?)
That brings us to the key question…
The answer is to build a “Second Brain.”
Now, you’re probably wondering: “What the heck is that? Some weird new creation from the lab of Elon Musk?”
No, no, no... it's nothing like that. No wires will be plugged into your head, I promise.
A "Second Brain" is simply the name for a trusted place outside your head where you can collect and organize your most important ideas and insights (while filtering out the junk) and use them to do your best work.
We already have thousands of people all over the world using their Second Brains to:
A minute ago, I told you it's a place for storing your ideas and information. And while your Second Brain is indeed a place, it's more than that. It’s a system you follow.
Think of it as an operating system, like Windows or iOS. Except for your life and work.
The Second Brainers (as we call ourselves) use this system daily.
Every time they come across a new piece of useful information, it enters their system. And when they begin a new project at work or at home, the tasks flow from their system.
Of course, we have a name for that, too. It’s called CODE.
CODE is our proven process for consistently turning the information you consume into creative output and concrete results.
Remember how we talked about being bombarded with information? This is your first line of defense.
Whether you’re collecting information from meetings, books, articles, podcasts, or conversations…you’ll escape the “reactivity loop,” consume content at your own pace, and capture what resonates with you.
That way, you can let everything else (and the FOMO) go. This filtering process alone will free up 50% more head space.
You’re capturing information, but where do you put everything? How do you organize your digital life?
From now on: No more random notes spread across your different apps, docs, notepads, and sticky notes. Not only will you know where your insights are, but you’ll also organize your digital life differently than ever before — for action.
This will make it easy to prioritize your life and turn your digital notes into “thinking tools” that allow you to access brain power you didn’t even know you had.
This is where the magic happens. The Distill phase is how you're able to find what you need at a moment's notice.
In the midst of a busy workday, you don’t have time to review ten pages of notes on a book you read last year. By distilling your notes in a way that your future self can use them over and over again, you’ll build your own “knowledge treasury” full of your unique intellectual property.
Now it’s time for action. All the previous steps—capturing, organizing, and distilling—are geared toward one ultimate purpose: Getting your work done faster with less effort. And thanks to your Second Brain, you’ll never start from a blank page again.
With the building blocks all laid out, you can start expressing your ideas in your unique voice –through writing, speaking, designing, teaching, persuading, or building a product or a business – to help advance your career and make a meaningful contribution to the world.
CODE is the result of thousands of hours spent teaching, speaking, coaching, and writing about productivity and Personal Knowledge Management.
I’ve charged between $25,000 and $50,000 to teach this system to elite professionals at some of the world’s leading organizations, such as…
But I want to make that same quality of education available to everyone, regardless of where they live or which resources they have access to.
You don’t have to take our word for it. Here’s what graduates of our Building a Second Brain program say…
BASB has literally changed my life. Every time I take this course I get a new job that's more specialized and better aligned with my goals and beliefs.
Camila Holanda
Designer, Researcher & Futurist
After taking BASB, I feel 1000X more productive and have a system that gets a lot done for me.
Yaw Owusu-Ansah
WordPress Developer
After BASB, my thoughts are clearer and my writing has improved. It's already allowed me to create things I never would have considered before this course.
Tamisha O'Neal
Board-certified Cosmetologist
The BASB course has made me more confident in handling what life throws at me and being more effective in expressing myself.
Dennis Nehrenheim
Software Engineer & Blogger
BASB has reduced my stress levels. I now feel less scattered and more directed.
Sheila Glesmann
Owner of Emission Strategies, Inc.
I feel as though I have increased my IQ by 20 points. Of course this isn't true, but it feels this way because I am thinking so much more clearly and with so much more relaxation and concentration.
Rob Joseph
Fractional CFO
This isn’t about finding the “perfect” productivity app to solve all your problems. It doesn’t exist!
Too many people get lost in the sea of tools available out there.
(As one of our students exclaimed: “I have all the tools and none of the results!”)
Nor is it about mastering every feature of a sophisticated software program such as Roam, Notion, or Obsidian.
While tinkering may feel like learning, it’s likely only a distraction from what really matters: moving your goals forward. These apps ultimately have to serve you, not the other way around.
And watching more YouTube videos or reading another book on productivity won’t help either.
You’re still left alone, trying to apply what you’ve learned to your situation.
After teaching 5,000 students from around the world, I’ve found that…
The best way to get started is by putting CODE to use and applying it to your current projects and priorities.
It doesn’t matter if…
You make progress by taking action. That’s how you’ll see immediate results.
And we’ve created the perfect place for you to do just that.
Over the last 5 years, we’ve run 14 cohorts of the Building a Second Brain course, teaching the system to thousands of students.
Having battle-tested these methods, we’ve found the bottlenecks to students’ success.
Now we’re laser-focused on the elements that provide the biggest transformation, simplifying and reimagining what’s needed to build and successfully use a Second Brain.
What you don’t need is more theory and concepts. The Membership provides a practical, action-oriented approach to building and using a Second Brain.
It combines and amplifies what our alumni love most:
Work alongside Tiago on a personal or work project, taking it through the CODE system from start to finish. By the end of your first 3-week cohort, you’ll have a deliverable you are proud of. Going through the full process together will allow you to apply it to any other project again and again.
Join Tiago for step-by-step walkthroughs, live exercises, and in-depth Q&As to help you build and implement your Second Brain system. Of course, live captions, transcripts, and recordings are available to make these sessions as accessible as possible for you.
Connect with over 3,000 of the most dedicated Personal Knowledge Management practitioners in the world on our community platform Circle. Our alumni includes leaders, experts, and creative professionals from some of the world’s leading organizations such as Google, Nike, Yale, Berkeley, MIT, Harvard, Stanford, Philips, Unicef, AstraZeneca, Automattic, Upwork, VaynerMedia, OnDeck, and Greenpeace.
Of course, we’ll support you on your Second Brain journey also in between cohorts. Hop on a monthly live call with Tiago to get your burning questions answered, discover real-life examples of how others are using their Second Brain, and hear about the most exciting developments in the PKM ecosystem.
Join the waitlist and get our free Second Brain Quickstart Guide right away.
Join The WAitlistProfessor of Educational Psychology, University of Central Florida
Founder and Managing Director of Good and Prosper Ltd., Wicklow, Ireland
Building a Second Brain is life-changing. I feel more organized. I know where everything goes. It's cleared up my information hoarding and replaced it with buckets for distilled work.
Barjes R. Angulo
Financial Planner
After taking the BASB course, everything has changed for me. This system is GENIUS and I'm so excited to read the book!
Savera Tasawar
Project Manager
BASB has given me a roadmap of where I want my life to go. It's sparking some creativity in all my endeavors.
Diana Lyn Davidson
Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Artist, Writer & Photographer
BASB got me from 0 to a knowledge management system that makes me more effective by the day. This is almost an unfair advantage!
Adam Zielinski
Software Engineer
Visit our Wall of Love for more in-depth reviews of Building a Second Brain.
• Identify and overcome the most common limiting beliefs around productivity, thinking, and learning in the Information Age.
• Set up your digital capture system with clear criteria for what is worth saving in your Second Brain and what isn’t.
• Discover why you need to build a digital notetaking system even though you can “google” anything.
• Escape the “reactivity loop” and learn how to manage information overload. This will have a direct positive impact on your physical and mental health.
• Choose the best digital tools for you and stop jumping from one “shiny object” to the next.
• Identify your personal priorities using the “12 Favorite Problems,” a simple exercise inspired by Nobel prize-winning scientist Richard Feynman.
• Turn your apps into "thinking tools" that allow you to access brain power you didn't even know you had.
• Organize your digital life in minutes with our PARA method – a favorite among Second Brainers.
• Set up your Second Brain as a dynamic system that evolves along with your needs and priorities.
• Discover the incredible power of an up-to-date Project List, with in-depth feedback and guidance on how to create one for yourself.
• Find out why digital notetaking is nothing like what you did in high school and how it can explode your productivity.
• Design your notes in a way that makes them easily discoverable for your future self, saving you a lot of time.
• Learn a technique called Progressive Summarization to make sure your biggest insights are always front and center.
• Train your intuition to decide what's important and what's not in the moment.
• Switch your default approach from “heavy lifts” to "slow burns" to escape the rat race of trying to work harder and longer than everyone else.
• Turn raw material into knowledge assets – a valuable treasury of knowledge for a side project, career advancement, or new business.
• Use the concept of Intermediate Packets to completely transform your approach to productivity. Never start anything from scratch again.
• Become interruption-proof and get better and faster feedback than you ever thought possible.
• Escape any creative roadblock or dead-end with the principles of divergence and convergence.
Anyone who needs to consume a lot of information, understand it, and use it to produce a result in their jobs. Whether you’re in Tech, Finance, or Management— if your greatest asset is your knowledge, Building a Second Brain is for you.
As a YouTuber, blogger, podcaster, or someone who needs to give killer presentations at work, a Second Brain will help you capture and organize your ideas, so you always have rich material to pull from.
If you’re working on a thesis or want to make sure every ounce of your learning is captured and secure forever, Building a Second Brain will help you get the most out of your studies and stand out among your peers.
Having trouble managing all the information you need to run your business? Building a Second Brain will help you work on your business and in your business without dropping any balls.
Managing a household can be chaotic and draining. But when you leverage technology the right way and build a Second Brain to offload some of the burden, you can thrive, not just survive, at home.
You’re consuming a ton of useful information but struggle to put it into practice. Now you can save all the knowledge you’ve gained, find it when you need it, and take the necessary steps to improve your life.
Most importantly, Building a Second Brain is for…
Our digital lives are expanding exponentially. Your profession and pursuits require you to consume and understand more information than ever, and it’s only going to get more demanding. Building a Second Brain is the answer to information overload and overwhelm. You’ll clear the mental clutter so you can start doing your best work with more clarity, purpose, and ease.
Founder and Principal Consultant at Resource Catalysts in San Francisco, California
Co-Founder at Uncle Clay's House of Pure Aloha in Honolulu, Hawaii
Take this course to start to feel agency in the world of infinite information and filter failure!
Doug von Kohorn
Managing Partner, Fathom Ventures, New York, NY
BASB is the best online course I've taken so far. It's helping me sort through all my mental, emotional, spiritual blockages.
Danbee Kim
Creative Director, OORI Studio
BASB gave me a noticeable boost in self-confidence and energy towards working on my projects. It’s hard to understate the sense of growth of who I am – of what I’m capable of achieving. It has profoundly altered my outlook on life and what I dare to aspire to.
Filip Rankenberg
Body therapist and trainer, Entrepreneur
BASB has given me a sense of peace and comfort to know it's easy to find things without remembering where I put them.
Laurie Anderson
Alexander Art, CEO
Look, at this point, you might be suspicious that Building a Second Brain is just yet another self-help program, promising the moon with productivity tips, life hacks, and “one weird trick.”
I get it.
There are far too many feel-good, wishy-washy “secret systems” cooked up by people looking to make a quick buck.
So I want to address any doubts in your mind head on
This system was developed in the trenches of dealing with real-life problems, not in a laboratory or classroom, which means it is highly practical and immediately useful.
While we focus on practical skills, we don’t stop there: The course also cultivates the deeper mindset and paradigm shifts necessary to thrive in an age of information abundance.
It’s based on how the fundamental creative process works (and has worked for thousands of years):
• Capturing information from the outside world
• Organizing it in a way that lets you easily find and use it
• Distilling it down to the best ideas
• Expressing your ideas in your unique voice through writing, speaking, designing, or teaching
This is what we call the CODE method – our 4-step process for consistently turning the information you consume into creative output and concrete results.
Organizing information for the sake of it isn’t the goal of a Second Brain. We teach you how to do more with less, to use the sources of leverage available to you, and to offload as much effort as possible to technology. As a result, you get more time and freedom to pursue the things that are important to you.
This is actually the opposite of self-improvement. Building a Second Brain is about optimizing a system outside of yourself – a system not subject to your limitations and constraints. It’s designed to leave you happily unoptimized, free to roam, to wonder, to wander toward whatever makes you feel alive here and now in each moment.
Building a Second Brain is tool-agnostic, meaning it works with any app or platform you prefer to use. In our community, students use Evernote, Notion, Apple Notes, OneNote, Craft, Roam, Obsidian, Bear, Google Keep, among many other notetaking tools.
Building a Second Brain only requires you to have the most basic familiarity with how to use a computer or smartphone. And because we’ve noticed that so many people begin the course without knowing which notetaking app to use, we’ll guide you through choosing one before the first live session.
Applying even one or two of the methods I teach can revolutionize your productivity and learning. And if any part doesn’t make sense or doesn’t resonate with you, put it aside. You can mix and match the tools and techniques you learn to suit your needs.
Join the waitlist and get our free Second Brain Quickstart Guide right away.
Join The WAitlistThe book contains the full Building a Second Brain material. But think about how often you’ve read a book, were inspired by the possibilities it outlined, yet didn’t take action to put your learnings into practice.
That’s what the Cohort is for!
In the cohort, you’ll build your fully functional Second Brain with the momentum, accountability, and support of our team and like-minded Second Brainers. You could spend years tinkering with your system, probably making every mistake possible. Or use our proven blueprint and create a system for personal knowledge management you can trust and rely on in just 28 days.
BASB Foundation is our self-guided option for those seeking an introduction to building their Second Brain. Here’s what’s included:
• 7 modules with succinct instructional videos so you can absorb the fundamentals of the BASB methodology in the most distilled, easy-to-understand way
• Pick-your-notes-app quiz & checklist to help you choose & properly set up the right notetaking app for your needs
• Guided implementation steps so you can put what you learn into practice immediately
• A resource library of our best, most impactful content to dive deeper into digital notetaking and personal knowledge management
• Lifetime access to this version of the course
The BASB Cohort is our 4-week sprint to build your Second Brain with the momentum, accountability, and support of our team and like-minded Second Brainers. Here’s what’s included:
• 4-week live cohort running from April 3 - 30
• 8 expert facilitators from diverse backgrounds who have tested their Second Brains in the real world
• 4x interactive live sessions with options for all time zones
• 4x office hours with direct coaching from our teaching staff to work through any roadblocks
• Step-by-step instructions so you can use your Second Brain faster to reach your goals
• Personalized support on Circle to get instant feedback and answers to your questions
• BASB Foundation self-paced course if you want to dive into the fundamentals of the BASB methodology right away
You’ll have access to BASB Foundation for as long as we’re offering this course. You’ll have lifetime access to the replays of your BASB Cohort.
The upcoming Cohort 18 will run from July 3rd to 30th, 2023.
Here are the key dates*:
• Wed., July 5th at 10 am ET: Live Session 1 (Americas/Europe)
• Thu., July 6th at 4 pm ET: Live Session 1 (Americas/Asia/Pacific)
• Fri., July 7th at 1 pm ET: Office Hours
• Wed., July 12th at 10 am ET: Live Session 2 (Americas/Europe)
• Thu., July 13th at 4 pm ET: Live Session 2 (Americas/Asia/Pacific)
• Fri., July 14th at 1 pm ET: Office Hours
• Wed., July 19th at 10 am ET: Live Session 3 (Americas/Europe)
• Thu., July 20th at 4 pm ET: Live Session 3 (Americas/Asia/Pacific)
• Fri., July 21st at 1 pm ET: Office Hours
• Wed., July 26th at 10 am ET: Live Session 4 (Americas/Europe)
• Thu., July 27th at 4 pm ET: Live Session 4 (Americas/Asia/Pacific)
• Fri., July 28th at 1 pm ET: Office Hours
The live sessions run for 90 minutes and are led by our facilitators. The office hours run for 60 minutes and are led by our course team.
We'll publish the recording of one live session per week including captions so if you have to miss a session, you can always watch it later.
You’ll have lifetime access to the replays of your cohort live sessions.
*Please note that these dates and timings are tentative at the moment and might change.
We’re running one more cohort of Building a Second Brain in 2023. Here are the dates:
Cohort 19: October 2 - 29, 2023
We'll publish the cohort dates for 2024 around June.
We’ve designed BASB Foundation and the BASB Cohort to fit your schedule and pace.
BASB Foundation
While you can watch the Foundation videos in just a few hours, we highly recommend that you follow the implementation steps to put the BASB system into practice.
It will take some time and effort to implement, but ultimately, building and leveraging your Second Brain will save you countless hours.
BASB Cohort
When you’re joining the BASB Cohort, you’ll be part of a more intensive learning experiences delivered live in real time.
Although we make replays of all sessions available, and you can always rewatch them afterward, we strongly recommend that you attend the live sessions to fully benefit from the live learning experience.
Overall, you should plan on spending around 2.5 hours per week for the 4 weeks of the live cohort, including:
• 1.5 hours per week attending the live session (or watching the replay)
• 1-2 hours per week implementing what you learn
• (optional) engage with your peers on Circle, our community platform
Building a Second Brain is tool-agnostic, meaning our methodology will work in any software you prefer.
Students use Evernote, Notion, Apple Notes, OneNote, Craft, Roam Research, Obsidian, Bear, and Google Keep, among many other notetaking tools.
There are no official prerequisites to take Building a Second Brain. However, we do expect you to be reasonably comfortable with using a computer or smartphone.
Your satisfaction is our #1 goal, and we want the decision to join Building a Second Brain to be 100% risk-free so you can focus on learning.
BASB Foundation
If you decide the Foundation course didn’t deliver on its promise for any reason, email support@fortelabs.com and submit your refund request within 30 days of your purchase to get a refund. All we'll ask is that you show us that you completed Modules 0-3 of the course.
BASB Cohort
Join the first week of the Cohort and if you decide it didn't deliver on its promise for any reason, email support@fortelabs.com before the second live session (July 12th) to get a refund.
With that being said, we want you to feel fully confident in your decision to join Building a Second Brain. If you have any question whatsoever, email support@fortelabs.com for a private chat with our team.
We don’t offer discounts or scholarship. Instead, we support Purchasing Power Parity Pricing. Based on your location, you might qualify for a reduced price for BASB Foundation and the BASB Cohort. If you do, you’ll automatically see a banner with a discount code on this page.
Didn’t see the answer to your question? Check our Help Center for more FAQs.
Imagine what it would be like if you knew with total certainty that every great idea you encountered was reliably saved forever.
That you could wave goodbye to information overload because you have a way to filter out the junk while saving only the best stuff.
You could move forward decisively on your goals without wondering whether you had all the right information. You could execute your projects and create new things without wondering whether this was really the best you could do.
If you're paid to think for a living, you cannot afford not to invest in the most valuable asset you own – your ideas.
You can’t afford to burden your biological brain with trivial details that only gunk up your wheels as you go about your workday and go after your goals.
It’s time to build a Second Brain and fully unlock the potential you know you are capable of.
Don't spend 10 years figuring out how to make your knowledge work for you like I did. Don't resign yourself to watching your ideas pile up and never doing anything with them. Don't reach the end of your career wondering if you were actually capable of more.
Join me on this incredible journey, and find out what it's really like to have the full power of a Second Brain at your fingertips.
See you inside!
Tiago
Senior Lecturer and Mathematician, Melbourne, Australia
Writer, Musician, and Entrepreneur, in Santa Fe, New Mexico
BASB has already impacted my life in more ways than I could have imagined. Now, I feel like an authority and I am not worried about expressing myself.
Jenn Reid
Imagine being able to recall all the really interesting things you’ve ever read, seen and done. How good would that be? I wish I had done it years ago.
Jimmy Conway
Organizational Improvement Consultant
This course completely re-organized the way I consume content. It changed what I pay attention to and why.
Yuri Burchenya
Co-founder at GetFoundXL
As a long-term collector of information that often sat unread and unused, BASB has changed my approach to information and the possibilities are just beginning to unfold. This was life-changing.
Kiva Slade
Analytics and Operations Consultant
Join the waitlist and get our free Second Brain Quickstart Guide right away.
Join The WAitlist