How I Turned My Notes Into a Thinking Partner

Picture a table. On one side, you, with half an idea. On the other, three friends. One has a shoebox full of every quote and image you’ve ever saved. One just listens and, when you pause, asks a really good question. One remembers everything you’ve ever written and says, “Hey, this sounds like what you said last spring.”

That’s what writing a reflection in Ember feels like. In this video I’ll walk you through it: the simple writing space, thinking out loud with voice dictation, and how Sparks, Questions, and Reflections help you keep going when the ideas start to stall.

No setup. No tinkering. Just you and your thoughts, with a little help.

Chapters
0:00 – Minimalist Writing & Markdown Formatting
1:46 – Thinking Out Loud: Voice Dictation & Mobile Use
2:33 – Sparks: Thinking with Your Commonplace Book
4:29 – Searching & Filtering Relevant Sparks
5:51 – Sparking Reflection with Guided Questions
6:48 – Linking Related Reflections
8:28 – Wrapping Up & Trying Ember

Full Transcript

Minimalist Writing & Markdown Formatting

When you start a new reflection, it opens with a simple, minimal writing space. You can start with a title if you want. It’s built on Markdown, so if you’re familiar with that, you can make headings, bullet points, bold text, highlights, all that kind of stuff.

I chose just a handful of formatting options on purpose. This isn’t an app where you can customize anything you want. It’s meant to get out of your way.

I’m done with note-taking apps that make me put in a lot of effort to set something up before I do an ounce of thinking. I don’t want that anymore. I want an app where, when I open it, I’m inspired. I’m challenged in my thinking. I can express myself with ease.

That’s why the action bar at the top is designed the way it is. It gives you just enough tools to write, think with your commonplace book, and get a little creative with how you format things.

Thinking Out Loud: Voice Dictation & Mobile Use

This next one was here before, and it’s one of my favorite things to do: talk out loud about what I’m thinking.

Press the microphone and it starts recording what you say. You can think out loud at your desk when you have an idea you want to ponder. You can think out loud on a walk, because Ember works on your phone.

Ember isn’t in the App Store. I’m still thinking about whether to do that. But you can easily put Ember on your phone by adding it to your home screen. That’s what I use every day on my walks.

When I stop recording, it transcribes my words. It uses OpenAI’s Whisper for dictation.

Sparks: Thinking with Your Commonplace Book

What makes Ember Ember is the ability to think with your commonplace book.

The writing tools are things you’ll find in other note-taking apps. What’s different is that you can think with your commonplace book through Sparks, Questions, and Reflections.

When I click Spark on desktop, a sidebar pops up on the right with your sparks. That’s what I call the things you save in your commonplace book. The sidebar shows the ones most related to what’s in your note. You can scroll through and see what catches your eye as you think about whatever’s on your mind.

You can click and drag a spark right into your note. If it’s an image, you can resize it.

Once I’ve added something, I can respond again. Here I want to respond to this idea of “being cool as a prison” and doing something a little embarrassing and vulnerable, and how that connects to everything else I’ve been thinking about in this note.

As I keep adding to the note, Ember automatically updates what’s most relevant, whatever might stoke your thinking. Maybe it’s a quote.

Searching & Filtering Relevant Sparks

If you have something specific in mind, you can search. You can even search with a question, like “the best way to set a goal.” Hit enter, and everything I’ve saved related to that shows up.

Here’s one: Three criteria for a worthy goal: it should be thrilling, important, and daunting. I click it, it gets added to my note, and I respond again to this idea of a worthy goal.

You can see this is starting to look a lot like the previous version of Ember. You start with something you want to think about. Maybe you start with a spark, then you respond. Another spark, another response.

Besides search, you can also filter by text or images. Either way, it always shows you what’s most related.

Sparking Reflection with Guided Questions

There are two other tabs here. So there are three ways to stoke your thinking inside a reflection. The first is Spark, which is your commonplace book.

The second is Question. The question is like a coach, or a wise sage, sitting across the table from you. They’re listening. Every once in a while, when you stop talking, they pause and ask you a question. They don’t try to give advice. They ask a question that gets your mind stirring.

So that’s the Question tab. It asks you a question. You can shuffle to a different one, or add it to your reflection and start responding.

Linking Related Reflections

The third is Reflection.

This is kind of like bidirectional links in Obsidian, where one note relates to another note and you can link them together. A reflection in Ember is a lot like a note in Obsidian. It’s a page in your journal, whatever you want to call it.

Sparks are your commonplace book. They’re smaller pieces, the kind of thing you’d put on an index card or a sticky note. Ideas, photos, images. Bite-sized.

The Reflection tab looks for other reflections that relate to the one you’re writing. You can search here too. The most related one right now is called “Listen and Reveal on Friendship.” If I click it, it gets linked in my note. I can open that reflection, look through it, and think about it. When I hit back, I’m returned to my note and can keep reflecting.

Wrapping Up & Trying Ember

If this resonates with you, if you want to try this style of thinking and the simplicity of a journal and commonplace book together, give Ember a try.

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