[Brian]

Sorry for the confusion! I assume you have the inbox and other items selected in the sidebar of Project view? If so, all you need to do is select

View -> Focus on <selected items>
and then
View -> Context View

The first command hides the projects you don't have selected. (To reverse this, use "Show All Projects" under the View menu.) The second command puts you into a mode where the items in the window can be sorted against each other in the manner you're looking for. Any of the "Sort By" options in the View menu will give you the results it sounds like you're after.

Why do it this way? Well, project mode supports both parallel (steps can happen in any order) and sequential (steps must be done top-to-bottom) projects. In order to avoid messing up the latter kind of project, Project mode sorts them against each other, but we won't mess with the contents of any of the projects...