Hi friends,

Happy Saturday. Just a couple of weeks left in 2025. Can you believe it?

I'm currently putting the finishing touches on my new book, Lessons from 2025. If you're interested in helping me out and being an early reviewer of the book, please let me know by clicking here. I'll be reaching out soon (probably in the next few days).

For December, we'll be reading Finish by Jon Acuff.

And for January, we'll be re-reading Atomic Habits by James Clear.

— Maneet

Weekly Discussion

When COVID-19 hit, my experience was different than most.

I was fortunate to get through it basically untouched. In fact, my experience was the opposite of most.

In January of 2020, a couple of months before the world went on lockdown, I made a commitment to myself to start publishing a YouTube video every single week. Connecting back to the book we read last month, The War of Art, this was my moment of “turning pro.” It was the moment I went from making videos in my bedroom without any sort of agenda to wanting to do something more intentional and purposeful.

When I first started my YouTube channel, I experimented with all kinds of videos.

I didn’t quite know what I was doing yet, but I still showed up each week. In fact, sometimes I would post two or even three videos in a single week. It felt easy. I was exploring topics I enjoyed learning about and turning them into little videos to share with the world. Eventually, this led me to the world of Book Tech and e-readers. I found my “thing” and decided to stick with it.

And so I did.

Until I didn’t.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve had a much more challenging time staying consistent with uploading YouTube videos. What felt like play in 2020 turned into climbing mountains of resistance. Getting myself to go through the production process of a single video started taking multiple weeks. It started taking a toll on my mental health because it felt like I was failing. Not because the videos weren’t doing well, but because I couldn’t get myself to show up the way I used to.

Over the past few months, I’ve been reflecting heavily on this topic. Countless journal entries and internal debates.

But ultimately, this month’s book is what provided me with the most clarity.

In Finish by Jon Acuff, we discuss the idea of perfectionism showing up in unconventional ways. One of those sneaky ways perfectionism rears its head is in the form of things needing to feel “hard.” I don’t know about you, but if something feels easy for me, I have a hard time believing I’m doing it correctly. With YouTube, that’s exactly what was happening. I had gotten to a point where I was making videos that I no longer enjoyed making.

I thought the amount of fun I have doesn’t matter. What matters is making videos that will perform well on the channel.

But what I didn’t realize is that if I’m not having fun, I’m going to have a much harder time getting videos done in the first place.

For a while, I realized that reviewing e-readers on my YouTube channel tends to do the best in terms of views. People love searching for the latest and greatest e-reader they might be interested in buying, so I decided to buy a bunch and review them all. However, the process of switching devices and constantly transferring all your books is annoying AF. Even though companies were offering to send me their devices, I started to feel so much resistance each time the opportunity arose.

My production eventually came to a grinding halt.

I stopped making videos altogether.

In recent weeks, I’ve managed to get back into the YouTube game. I’m uploading videos consistently again, and I’m doing it with a new approach. I made the decision not to review every new e-reader that comes out. Instead, I’ll be sticking primarily to Kindle, with a few other devices mixed in whenever I feel like it. I’ve gotten comments calling me a Kindle fanboy or a paid actor. But the honest truth is that I’m just sick of switching devices so much. In order for me to keep making videos, I need to love the act of reading. I need to love what I’m talking about. Reviewing every device out there is going to do the opposite.

Having fun is an essential ingredient in finishing whichever goals you set for yourself.

Yes, things might perform better if you force yourself to do less-fun things. But how sustainable is that? What’s the point if you’re not going to be able to maintain it for long?

Here’s my question for this week: what’s a goal you’ve been having a hard time working on lately? What can you do to make it more fun?

Reply and let me know. While I can’t reply to everyone, I do read every single response.

Weekly YouTube Video

​🎬 Amazon’s New $80 Kindle Sling Bag: Is It Worth It?​

This week’s video is a full review of Amazon’s new $80 Kindle Sling Bag. I bought it expecting to return it immediately, but it surprised me. The quality, the pockets, and the Kindle-first design actually make it more interesting than I expected. If you’ve ever wanted a sling bag that fits a Kindle comfortably, this one might be worth a look. Link above if you want to check it out.

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Three ways I can help you...

🎬 Check out my latest YouTube video. My channel is all about Book Tech and using technology to live an intentional life.

📖 Need something new to read? Check out all the books I've written and support my work along the way.

📚 Check out the Presently Reading book log. It is a complete list of every book we've read in the book club since I started it.