Jott, my new BFF

So I've been a big admirer of Getting Things Done – the organization system popular with the geeks and other productivity fiends. The premise of the system is that in order to relaxed and productive, one needs to have a mind like water. Basically, you keep nothing stored in your head because doing so is stressful and it is the stress about doing something that often hinders one from getting things done in the first place. So David Allen recommends that you keep an inbox – a central repository of stuff to do. From there, take stuff out of your inbox and sort them into contexts, projects, someday etc. I'm not going to get into a lot of it here. Follow the links above for a good overview. I do recommend the book/audiobook. 

I've loved the GTD idea but have never found a good way to keep a decent inbox, and Apple hasn't helped things. I love Apple mail but tasks are treated as red-headed stepchildren. They aren't synced with the iPhone in a way that you can act upon them. You can see them but that's definitely not enough. Even that task functionality is pretty weak. I've tried many things, including Evernote, a centralized note program, but the iPhone version is a little unwieldily and the entire program doesn't have powerful enough to-do functionality. 

I discovered the Jott app for the iPhone a few days ago; they make a Blackberry version as well. OMG! It's incredible. When you launch the program, you see an old reel to reel tape recorder – cute retro touch. You have 15 seconds to say something and it transcribes it and posts it. You can either manipulate your Jotts in the app or you can go online and use their web version. It's finally the seamless inbox I've been  seeking. There are various Jott links to other web software but they require a subscription. I'm going to see how I fare without it, for now. I now have the Jott app open nearly all the time to capture silly things like blog posts, what I've eaten, exercise etc. It all maps back into tracking myself. I'm hoping I'll improve. :)