the limitations of 'pkm' language
We are still lacking a good term to describe the curation, management, and preservation of one’s personal data: physical and digital artifacts; notable moments in time; connections to others; files, notes, journals, trackers, projects; the general global overarching infostructures(?) we build for our lives. We don’t have a good name for what that thing is or how we maintain it.
It is, but also isn’t, Personal Knowledge Management, building a “second brain”, a system for writing; it is and isn’t structure, like the Johnny Decimal System or PARA; same GTD, LYT, PPV. Terms like data or life management are, well, too managerial. Ephemera is the level of romance I think is appropriate, as in “collecting life’s ephemera”, but then we’re overlapping with things like commonplace books and resonance calendars, which I’m also not trying to evoke. Terms like digital ecosystems or digital permaculture (a la Marie Poulin) come closest, but relegating this practice to only what’s digitized is an impractical compromise for me.
There has to be a way to say this more concisely, to contain that system / process / art of maintaining a record of one’s self over time.
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The inability to articulate myself is more agitating when the available language seems intent on prioritizing the productivity of it all.
There are think pieces and seminars and conferences about establishing as much shape for, and removing as much friction as possible from, this nebulous thing for the sake of doing / reading / collecting faster / better / more.
So much energy, for what? To remember what Sam said in a meeting last week? Sam doesn’t remember what Sam said in that meeting last week.
We have access to a cornucopia of physical and digital data with which we can engage at our leisure to expand our understanding, immerse ourselves in context, and reorient ourselves toward truth / reality / some perspective that tethers us to our existence in a way that is at least tolerable, if not pleasurable.
There is data about the world, yes, more and more each day!
But what about you? What exists in your wellspring of self-knowledge?
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It goes without saying, I believe, that if we understood ourselves better, we would damage ourselves less. But the barrier between oneself and one’s knowledge of oneself is high indeed. There are so many things one would rather not know!