I Finished My Book in 14 Days

What I learned about finishing anything by changing how I approached it

Hi, my name is Matt McManus. I’m one of the founders here at Gents Journey.

It’s obvious that what we’re about is a brand focused on helping men elevate and execute on their dreams, as well as making friends, both personally and professionally.

I’d like to share something with you guys.

Towards the tail end of last year, I realized this idea I’d been writing bits and pieces for was actually a good idea for a book.

My favorite book is On the Road by Jack Kerouac. If you do any research on it, he lived his life on the road for seven years, then came back to New York, locked himself in a room, stapled about 100 pieces of paper together, fed them through his typewriter, and wrote ferociously for about three weeks. That’s most of the book.

The idea for my book? We don’t have to go into it. I’ll get into that at a later date. But it has to do with my life, spirituality, my relationship with my father, my higher power, and living as a contemporary man in a major metropolitan city dealing with parenthood and all kinds of nuanced contemporary manhood. It’s a way for men to develop a new language around love—personally, professionally, even romantically.

But again, we’re not going into detail about that.

What I’d like to say is: I finished it in 14 days.

I worked ferociously. And what allowed me to do that is exactly what I’m doing right now. I spoke the book, recorded it, and then transcribed what I had said into the chapters. It allowed me to expedite the process.

The whole reason I’m bringing any of this up is because if there’s one thing that separates most people from success, it’s finishing things.

Being known as someone who completes the tasks at hand. Whether it be something they have to do for work or something they have to do around the house.

And it’s hard to finish things. We all know that.

It’s hard to finish mowing the lawn and doing the yard work. It’s hard to finish all of your laundry, fold it, and put it away. It’s hard to finish college. It’s hard to finish the bar exam.

The list goes on and on.

If it were easy, everyone would do it. Right?

Now, I finished this book. I’m pitching it to publishers. I guarantee by the end of this first quarter, I will have sold this book. The name of the book is The Beach Where Jesus Lives, and I’ll be giving you guys updates as we make progress.

But what I would like to explain to you is that sometimes the thing preventing you from finishing is the way you’re looking at it or approaching it.

---

The Alternative Approach

For example, I can write. I went to college. I know how to put a sentence together and use grammar, et cetera, et cetera.

But sometimes it’s hard just opening the laptop.

It was easy for me to speak my ideas—fully formulated and outlined—into a microphone and then transcribe that. And with technology, we can do that.

So what I would like to do with you this week is provide an alternative.

Say you have a goal. Say you want to travel more this year. Or you want to have a better relationship with your spouse, partner, or child. Say you want to get into the best shape of your life.

How you approach that task is probably what’s stalling you. Because it’s the way you traditionally do things.

So I’d like you to think outside the box in terms of how you finish things in order to finish something this week.

---

Your Move This Week

Now, I’m not asking you to write your book this week. Although you’re more than welcome to start.

I’m not asking you to lose five pounds this week. But you’re more than welcome to start. And I recommend that you do.

Starting anything is amazing. Lacing up is the hardest part about running. It’s true.

So what I’d like you to do this week—because I will be releasing a mini course about how to do this exactly—is to just wrap your head around the fact that how you have been finishing things your whole life, whether successfully or unsuccessfully or somewhere in the spectrum in between those two polar opposites, might need to change.

I would like you to think about:

• Something small you’d like to accomplish this week

• Something large you’d like to accomplish this year

And then towards the end of the week, I will give you the framework and the tools to execute on that with a different approach.

That’s all I’m asking you guys to do right now.

Stay tuned towards the end of the week.

---

The book is called The Beach Where Jesus Lives. Updates coming soon.