The 6 Templates That Keep a Second Brain Simple
Every template is a decision you made in advance. The daily note does not ask you what to write — it asks three questions. The project note does not ask you to invent a structure — it asks for a goal and a success criterion. That is the whole job of a template: to move the thinking from “how do I structure this?” to the actual content. But templates can also become the problem, when you collect forty of them and spend your evenings choosing. The fix is a small, boring set that covers the three moments your system actually has.
The Second Brain Starter vault ships exactly six templates — three in English, three in German — because the method needs three note types, not twelve. Here is what each one is for, and why the set is complete with just these.
The Daily Note — one per day. Three goals, a focus line, a short journal, and an inbox section for the thoughts that arrive during the day. The daily note is where the 17-minute routine happens: seven minutes in the morning to set the three goals, ten minutes in the evening to close the day. The date lives in the filename, because a date in the filename keeps the daily stream chronological without any extra setup. You never decide “what belongs in a day” — you just open today's note.
The Project Note — for everything with an end. A project is anything that has a goal and a finish line: a website relaunch, a course, a move. The template asks for the outcome in one sentence, an objective success criterion, and the smallest meaningful next step. That is the difference between a project and a permanent note: the project note is about the work and its deadline, the permanent note is about the idea that stays. Projects end, so their notes carry status and completion — the rest of your system does not need those fields.
The Permanent Note — one idea, your own words. This is the Zettelkasten engine. One note holds exactly one idea, written so you still understand it in six months, with at least one link to something you already know. The template enforces the checklist: one idea, own words, a link, a title that says what it is about. It is deliberately the strictest template, because links are what turn a collection into a brain. If a note cannot pass the checklist, it is either two notes or a quote without a thought.
Why six and not twenty? The three types map to the three moments of the method: capture (daily note), work (project note), understanding (permanent note). Everything else — meetings, books, goals, habits — is either a project, a thought, or an item on today's note. Adding a template for every special case is how a system gains weight, and added weight is the most common way a second brain dies. A template you do not use is not a feature; it is a decision you made that you now have to ignore.
Two languages, same structure. The vault ships the same three templates in German (Tagesnote, Projektnote, Permanentnote) with the same fields, so switching languages never changes the method. That is a small detail that matters more than it looks: the structure of your notes should not depend on the language you happen to think in on a given day.
How to use them without plugins. Open a template, copy the content, create a new note, paste, replace the placeholders. With Obsidian's built-in Templates core plugin it is one step less: set the folder once, then insert the template and the date replaces itself. No community plugins, no setup ritual — the whole vault runs on core Obsidian, which is the point. The inbox rule and the templates work together: capture into the inbox during the day, then let the evening routine decide which template each captured thought turns into.
If you want to see the six templates in a working vault, the free Mini-Vault is set up exactly like this — three folders, six templates, a daily note with the date in its filename, and an inbox small enough to empty in one sitting. It is running in about ten minutes.
Download the free Mini-Vault (ZIP)Question, feedback or an idea? Write to geld.hamster@gmx.net — every mail is read.