[chrisrkline]

There are nearly as many ways to use contexts as there are users. If you feel overwhelmed with contexts, you could use just a couple of them. I use just a few working contexts, computer, up, outside, school, and errands (with a bunch of sub contexts). But you could use fewer. I use them to give an extra layer of organization in my views. I use a today view which is my available flagged or due tasks, grouped by context (so I see a group of items I can do at my computer, a group I can do while "up", a group I can do outside, etc.)

The shorter answer is you don't have to use contexts. You should be able to see any item on your list assigned to a project or list. Maybe your view is hiding stuff with no start date (look for an arrow that you can click that expands your "start" groups.)