THE AI MEMORY GUIDE

Your AI Keeps Forgetting Everything.
Here's How to Fix It.

A step-by-step system for building persistent memory across Obsidian, OpenClaw, and Claude Code — so your AI actually knows who you are, what you're working on, and how you like things done.

# What your AI currently does:
$ openclaw chat
Agent: "Hi! I'm Claude. How can I help you today?"
You: <explains entire project from scratch, again>

# What it does after this guide:
$ openclaw chat
Agent: "Good morning. You've got a standup in 20 mins, the
RPG project deploy is pending, and you prefer dark roast."

£9 one-time · PDF + 9 templates · instant email delivery

✓ Works with free Obsidian ✓ OpenClaw + Claude Code ✓ ~30 min to first results

SOUND FAMILIAR?

Your AI has no memory. Every session starts from zero.

You explain your project setup for the hundredth time and Claude still gets it wrong
Your AI uses Oxford commas when you've told it not to. Again.
You set up a perfect system prompt last week but you can't find it now
Claude Code forgets your entire project structure the moment you close the session
Your AI should know your preferences and working patterns by now — but every session starts from zero
You've seen the demos of AI agents with perfect memory — but nobody explains how to actually build it
Your AI gives you generic advice instead of context-aware help because it has no context

WHAT'S INSIDE

A 7-part guide to building the system properly.

Not theory. Not a blog post stretched to 10,000 words. A structured, opinionated guide to the exact setup that actually works.

PART 1

Why Your AI Keeps Forgetting

How LLM context windows actually work, why conversation history isn't memory, and what most setups get wrong. Understand the problem before you solve it.

PART 2

The 3-Layer Memory Architecture

Layer 1: Knowledge Graph (MEMORY.md, long-term curated knowledge). Layer 2: Daily Notes (timestamped logs). Layer 3: Tacit Knowledge (TACIT.md — preferences, habits, working patterns). Why you need all three and how they interact.

PART 3

Setting Up Obsidian as Your AI's Brain

Vault structure, folder layout, naming conventions. Installing obsidian-sync skill. Connecting your vault to OpenClaw workspace. Daily note templates and frontmatter for AI-readable notes.

PART 4

OpenClaw Memory Configuration

AGENTS.md, MEMORY.md, SOUL.md, and the secret weapon: TACIT.md. Daily notes automation. Nightly memory consolidation with a cron job that actually works.

PART 5

Claude Code Integration

CLAUDE.md as project memory, session logging and compression, bridging Claude Code projects with your Obsidian vault. When to use Claude Code vs OpenClaw for different task types.

PART 6

Advanced Patterns

Heartbeat-driven memory maintenance, cross-project knowledge sharing, memory search with vector embeddings, building an expertise graph over time, sub-agent memory isolation.

PART 7

Templates & Quick Start

Complete vault starter kit, copy-paste configurations, troubleshooting common issues, and a 30-day plan for building genuine AI memory from scratch.

INCLUDED TEMPLATES

9 templates. Drop them in. Start immediately.

Everything from the guide, pre-built. You're not starting from a blank file.

AGENTS.md

Your agent's operating manual — role, rules, how it should behave and what it should check on startup.

MEMORY.md

Structured long-term memory template with sections for facts, decisions, relationships, and ongoing context.

SOUL.md

Personality and values configuration. Defines tone, communication style, and what the agent should and shouldn't do.

TACIT.md

The secret weapon. Captures implicit preferences, working habits, and context your AI would otherwise never know.

daily-note-template.md

Daily note structure with proper sections — what happened, decisions made, things to remember, follow-ups.

HEARTBEAT.md

Heartbeat checklist template for proactive memory maintenance and periodic checks without clogging context.

project-template/

PARA-structured project folder with CLAUDE.md, README, and decision log. Clone per project.

consolidation-cron.json

Nightly memory consolidation cron config. Runs automatically, summarises daily notes, updates MEMORY.md.

.obsidian/ config

Recommended Obsidian plugins and settings for an AI-readable vault. Includes Dataview, Templater setup.

WHO'S THIS FOR

Built for people who use AI seriously.

⚡

OpenClaw users who want persistent memory

You've installed OpenClaw, you're using it daily, but your agent forgets everything between sessions. This is the missing piece. You'll have a proper 3-layer memory system running within an afternoon.

💎

Obsidian power users who want AI integration

You've got an existing vault and you want your AI agent to actually use it — not just as a file system but as a knowledge graph it can read, write, and reason about.

⌨️

Claude Code users who want cross-session memory

Claude Code's CLAUDE.md is a start, but it's not a memory system. This guide shows you how to bridge Claude Code projects with your knowledge vault for genuine continuity.

🎥

People who've seen AI memory demos and want the actual how-to

Those AI memory demos look great — until you try to build it yourself. This guide gives you the exact folder structure, config files, and obsidian-sync setup. Step by step.

WHY TRUST THIS

Built by someone who actually runs this system daily.

This isn't assembled from blog posts. I run this exact 3-layer memory architecture across my own Obsidian vault, OpenClaw setup, and Claude Code projects. The templates in this guide are the actual files I use.

I've iterated through broken configs, weird edge cases, and the inevitable moment where your AI confidently tells you something wrong because your MEMORY.md had a stale entry. The guide includes what I wish I'd known from the start.

The obsidian-sync skill that powers this whole system is two days old. Nobody's written a comprehensive guide yet. This is the first one.

FAQ

Common questions.

What tools do I actually need? ▾

OpenClaw (free), Obsidian (free), and Claude Code or a Claude API key. The guide is specifically built around this stack. You don't need any paid Obsidian plan — the free desktop app is everything you need. The obsidian-sync skill is free from ClawHub.

Do I need to pay for Obsidian Sync? ▾

No. The obsidian-sync skill handles the connection between your Obsidian vault and OpenClaw directly — it reads your local vault files. You don't need Obsidian Sync (the paid cloud feature) at all. Just the free Obsidian desktop app.

How long does the initial setup take? ▾

About 30 minutes to get something working. An afternoon if you want to set up the full system including nightly consolidation and all three memory layers. The templates do most of the heavy lifting — you're filling in blanks, not writing from scratch.

Does this work if I don't use Obsidian yet? ▾

Yes. Part 3 covers setting up Obsidian from scratch specifically for this use case. You don't need an existing vault or prior Obsidian experience. The guide includes a recommended vault structure you can clone directly.

What if it doesn't work for me? ▾

It's £9. But more practically: the guide covers troubleshooting common issues in Part 7. If you're stuck, the templates include comments explaining what each section does and why.

Your AI Keeps Forgetting Everything.Here's How to Fix It.