The High Throughput Zero-Writing Documentation System

I go for a walk multiple times a week and just talk.

Not on the phone. Just talking. Out loud. To myself. Into Voice Memos (Apple).

Whatever's in my head comes out: project ideas, work wins, half-formed thoughts, problems I'm stuck on, things I learned.

A raw, unfiltered stream of consciousness.

Then I transcribe it, send it to Claude, and get back something structured and useful.

This has become my most powerful tool for thinking and documenting.

Here's why it works and how to use it.

The Paradigm: Walking + Talking = Thinking

Walking does something to your brain, something about the movement unlocks thoughts.

If you've ever noticed this or even started taking walks to think, consider the way it was and the way it could be.

The old way:

• Think while walking
• Try to remember when you get back
• Open document
• Forget half of it
• Reconstruct poorly

The new way:

• Think while walking
• Speak thoughts as they come
• Let them flow without judgment
• Transcribe later
• Process with AI

When you follow this process, you've removed the friction of getting your thoughts out. Now you're no longer writing, you're thinking out loud with perfect memory and leveraging a tool to process that perfect memory.

Why This Works

Movement unlocks creativity: walking gets your body moving, which gets your mind moving.

Ideas come easier on walks than at desks. And speaking is faster than writing. You can speak 150 words per minute but type maybe 60, so speaking captures more detail, more nuance and more context.

When you write, you edit as you go. When you speak, you just dump. Raw thoughts come out uncensored. There's zero activation energy: open the app, hit record, talk. No blank page. No cursor blinking at you.

Then AI handles structure. You dump messy thoughts and Claude turns them into structured, useful output. Best of both worlds.

The Basic Process

That's it. The whole system.

What You Can Use This For

This isn't just one use case. It's a paradigm. Here are three ways I use it:

Use Case 1: Building a Brag Doc / Resume

How to prep: Before your walk, think: "What did I ship this week? What problems did I solve?"

Then talk through:

• What you built
• Why it mattered
• What the impact was (numbers help)
• Technologies you used
• Who you collaborated with

Example raw recording: "This week I shipped the authentication rate limiter. We were getting hammered with bot signups costing us like two grand a month. Built a Redis-based rate limiter, integrated it with our Express middleware. Dropped fake signups by 95%. Saves us 20k a year. Took three days total. Used Redis, Node, and Express."

Prompt to Claude: "Turn this voice memo into a structured brag doc entry with: project name, problem, solution, impact, technologies, and skills demonstrated."

Output:

PROJECT: Authentication Rate Limiting System

PROBLEM: Bot signups generating $2k/month in costs

SOLUTION: Redis-based rate limiter integrated with Express middleware

IMPACT:
- 95% reduction in fake signups
- $20k annual savings
- 3-day implementation

TECHNOLOGIES: Redis, Node.js, Express

SKILLS: Backend development, cost optimization, API security, middleware architecture

Resume-ready. Took 45 seconds to record.

Use Case 2: Brain Dumping to Clarify Thinking

How to prep: Pick a topic you're confused about or need to think through. Could be:

• A product decision
• A technical architecture choice
• A career move
• A problem you're stuck on

Then just talk. Out loud. Don't worry about making sense. Work through it verbally.

Example raw recording: "So I'm trying to figure out whether we should build this feature in-house or just integrate with Stripe. If we build it ourselves, we control everything, but it's gonna take probably three weeks of engineering time. That's expensive. But if we use Stripe, we're locked into their pricing model and we can't customize the checkout flow the way we want. But realistically, do we actually need that customization? Most companies just use Stripe and it works fine. And three weeks of eng time is probably worth more than whatever customization we think we need..."

Prompt to Claude: "I'm trying to decide between building a feature in-house vs integrating with a third-party tool. Here's my voice memo thinking through it. Extract the key tradeoffs, identify what's important, and recommend a decision framework."

Output: Claude gives you:

• Structured pros/cons
• Key decision criteria
• Questions you haven't considered
• A framework for making the call

Your confused rambling becomes clear analysis.

Use Case 3: Creating Educational Content Outlines

How to prep: Think about something you know deeply that others ask you about. Could be:

• A technical concept
• A workflow you use
• A lesson you learned
• A tool you love

Talk through how you'd explain it to someone who knows nothing about it.

Example raw recording: "Okay so people keep asking me how to set up Claude Code permissions. The thing is, most people don't understand that there are two config files. There's the project-level one in .claude/settings.local.json and there's the global one in your home directory. And they work together. The project one overrides the global one. And you can use wildcards to allow entire categories of commands instead of listing every single variation. Like instead of doing npm run dev, npm build, npm test separately, you just do npm:* and it covers everything. The security model is actually really smart because you can be permissive globally for safe stuff like git and npm, but then lock down project-specific things..."

Prompt to Claude: "Turn this into an outline for a tutorial article about Claude Code permissions. Include: intro hook, main sections, examples, and best practices."

Output: Claude gives you a full article outline with:

• Opening hook about the pain point
• Section breakdown
• Example commands
• Best practices
• Potential visuals

You just created a content outline by talking for 2 minutes.

Building It Into Your Routine

The magic happens when this becomes automatic. Here's how:

• Daily walks - Don't schedule "thinking time." Just go for walks with Voice Memos ready. Talk when thoughts come.
• Post-ship dump - Right after shipping something, 2-minute voice memo. Capture details while fresh.
• Weekly reviews - Friday afternoons, 5-10 minute memo reviewing the week. What worked, what didn't, what you learned.
• Decision moments - Stuck on a choice? Walk and talk through it. Voice memo as you work through the logic.
• Content ideas: - Someone asks a good question or you explain something well? Voice memo it again. Instant content outline.

Why AI Makes This Paradigm Possible

Before AI, voice memos were just... memos. You'd listen back, take notes, structure manually.

Now:

• Transcription is instant and accurate
• AI extracts key information
• Formats consistently across use cases
• Identifies patterns you miss
• Generates multiple outputs from one input

You dump messy thoughts. AI turns them into structured artifacts.

The compound effect is huge. Every walk becomes documentation. Every thought gets captured. Nothing gets lost.

Common Objections

• "I don't like hearing my voice" - Don't have to listen. Just record, transcribe, process.
• "I'll sound stupid talking to myself" - Yes you will. But you can record in private, in the car, on a walk, in an empty room. Nobody hears it.
• "I don't have time" - Already walking/thinking. Just hit record. Adds zero time.
• "I'll forget to do it" - Put Voice Memos in dock. One tap.
• "My thoughts aren't structured enough" - That's the point. Dump messy. AI structures.

Getting Started Today

Right now:

1. Go for a 5-minute walk
2. Open Voice Memos
3. Hit record
4. Talk about one thing on your mind
5. Stop recording
6. Transcribe (iOS does this automatically)
7. Copy transcript into Claude
8. Ask Claude to structure it

Done. You just turned a walk into documentation.

This week: Pick one use case. Try it three times.

This month: Build the habit. Daily walks with Voice Memos ready. Talk when thoughts come.

The Real Shift

This isn't about "being more productive" or "documenting better."

It's about thinking out loud with perfect memory.

Your best ideas come when you're moving, talking, working through things verbally.

Before, those thoughts disappeared.

Now, they become:

• Brag docs
• Content outlines
• Decision frameworks
• Learning notes
• Career artifacts

All from just talking on walks.

So next time you think "I'll write that down later", stop. Take a walk and start talking instead.