For years I have gone back and forth on task managers. I have used a lot of them throughout the years. Todoist, 2Do, TickTick, Apple Reminders, Microsoft ToDo, Things, Omnifocus…..you get the point.

I would read a review and switch. I would talk to a friend and switch. The last couple of years I’ve narrowed it down. I decided the tool wasn’t quite as important as actually getting crap done. I spent so much time fidgeting with the different apps that it was preventing me from getting actual work done.

I mainly used Apple Reminders. For one, its on all my devices and it syncs perfectly. It makes sense. Plus it works with siri and I love that feature. Many times I’m driving in the car and I think of something I need to do later. So, out comes the phone with “Hey Siri, remind me to do such and such when I get home” and its there waiting for me. (By the way, Siri is a great way to do stuff on the phone. Messaging, phone calls, reminders, calendar events….all of it can be done by using Siri).

A good friend of mine, Ronnie, is a big advocate of TickTick. And he has good reason. Its a great app. As a matter of fact, I recently switched to TickTick. In early January I got laid off. Within a couple of days I was offered a position at a new company. I knew it was going to be a learning curve. I knew I was going to have to keep things more organized because I’m learning a new system, a new process, and new software. So I switched to TickTick since it works on both Apple and PC devices where Apple Reminders doesn’t. And don’t tell me about Apple Reminders on the web because its garbage and you know it.

So everything got switched over. I used it for about a month and started noticing that I was experiencing syncing issues. Things I marked completed on my computer were still showing open on my phone or iPad and vice versa. I assumed it was something that would fix itself but it did not.

So, last weekend I went back to the drawing board. Here’s what I realized. This is all overkill. In my current job, I realized I don’t have tasks that are usually day specific. Meaning I don’t have critical stuff that has to get done by a certain time or date. Realizing that changes things for me. I have gone back to Reminders. Mainly I use it for personal, at home stuff (take out the trash, pay this bill, pick up milk, etc). And for the work stuff, I’m using pen (or pencil) and paper. I am taking notes in the subtle notebook. For the project specific actions I’m using the Action Book Mini. Pen of choice right now is the Pilot G2 while the pencils I’m using are these.

For right now this is working. I can grab either notebook and throw them in my backpack and take them with me if I’m working at home or a different location. I can jot notes down, scribble messages or just doodle. I’m not saying this works for everyone. Sometimes you need a powerful task manager with all the bells and whistles. But sometimes, you just need a good pen and paper……or pencil and paper.