Structuring My First Book

I know I want to write a book. I know a bunch of subjects I want to write about. I know that if I try I will figure it out... The problem: you have to actually get on and do it!

So I did.

This week I've been following a structured book writing process, which is something I've learnt from an online course I bought previously, and never managed to complete. I am going to show you the results of the first 5 days...

Day 1

The first task was to set some accountability markers. What does this mean? Essentially I needed a self-enforceable consequence for not completing what I set out to do.

The goal: publish a book by 2 July 2024. The consequence for failure: $500 aud of Bitcoin as a donation, plus streaking along the street outside my house (worst nightmare).

Then I had to answer 4 questions:

• 1) What messes have I overcome in my life?
• 2) What were the lessons I learned from those messes?
• 3) What were the feelings you remember that surrounded that mess or messes?
• 4)What specific results did you get from overcoming those messes?

The course teaches that for non-fiction books "your mess is your message". It was a great way of figuring out what the most significant problems were that I had overcome in my lifetime. The result was very interesting...

Day 2 & 3

First I had to review the work from Day 1. Did I like what I came up with? Sure. The theme was very clear. I wanted to write about the sudden loss of my father, inheriting money, and the journey I've been on solving the problem of wealth management.

Next I had to work through the "Big Book Idea". We used a framework:

“I help ____ (target audience), be/do/have ____ (the value I provide them), so that ____ (the result they REALLY want).“

This required tons of iteration. I was never quite happy with the wording I used. Interestingly I was attracted to certain statements, whilst others made cringe. Over the course of 2 days I settled on:

"I help young men grieving the death of their wealthy father, have a world-class inheritance strategy, so that they don’t “f*ck up” their newfound financial responsibility"

I wonder if this is where I end up at the end of this project? I am sure it will naturally iterate again. The most valuable feedback I got: "isn't that just far too niche?" Maybe. Time will tell. What's certainly true, is that I really love the idea of helping young men grieving, whereas simply talking about generic inheritance is not that exciting.

"Go where feels good" resonating strongly right now...

Day 4 & 5

This is where it really started to come together, and I got a real sense of achievement, plus an outline of what the book would actually look like. I worked through the "Book Outline Formula". It's as follows:

"In order to teach ____ (target audience) how to ____ (the value you provide & the result they want), they will need to understand ____."

So I asked myself:

"In order to teach young men grieving the death of their wealthy father, how to have a world-class inheritance strategy and not “f*ck up” their newfound financial responsibility, they will need to understand..."

And boom! I just started writing. It flowed out of me. I knew exactly what I wanted to talk to them about. It was almost too much. How will I get all this into a book?!? The lesson suggested I settle on 10 high level points. I chose:

• Grief management
• Inheritance stats
• Savings vs investing
• What is money?
• Asset comparison
• Make the call
• Legal structures
• Inheritance plans
• Time allocation
• Conclusions

And guess what? These are then your 10 chapters. Admittedly they again iterated slightly from day 4 to 5, which I am sure they will do so again in the future, but the rough outline is there.

Next was the job of fleshing out those chapters, with 3 bullet points to each chapter, and then 3 further sub-points to each bullet. The so called "bones of the book" took a day or so to percolate and settle on. They're as follows:

Chapter 1 - The Day That Everything Changed

• Bullet 1 - Opening story about the day my father died
  • Sub point 1 - vividly re-tell the day
  • Sub point 2 - explain all the emotions I felt
  • Sub point 3 - hammer home how shit it was
• Bullet 2 - Time is the greatest healer
  • Sub point 1 - drink, drugs
  • Sub point 2 - therapy
  • Sub point 3 - its going to be ok
• Bullet 3 - You’re on your own now, sink or swim, wake up and smell the coffee
  • Sub point 1 - self-belief, confidence, believe in yourself
  • Sub point 2 - mindset is everything
  • Sub point 3 - No-one is going to actually help you - you’re on your own - Rudderless and at sea. You can do it

Chapter 2 - Putting inheritance in perspective

• Bullet 1 - statistics on how many people inherit money
  • Sub point 1 - very fortunate
  • Sub point 2 - good to be grateful
  • Sub point 3 - unnecessary to be guilty
• Bullet 2 - burn rate - runway calculator
  • Sub point 1 - buys you time & mistakes
  • Sub point 2 - expenses will change over lifetime
  • Sub point 3 - can take risk
• Bullet 3 - its your money, do what you want with it
  • Sub point 1 - dont’t fuck it up boy
  • Sub point 2 - your journey, own it
  • Sub point 3 - how to decide with confidence? Read this book…

Chapter 3 - So you’ve got money, what are you going to do with it?

• Bullet 1 - admit that it is daunting
  • Sub point 1 - plethora of ways to do this 
  • Sub point 2 - solvable problem
  • Sub point 3 - up skill here with this book
• Bullet 2 - you want what money can buy you
  • Sub point 1 - value is individual
  • Sub point 2 - requirements change
  • Sub point 3 - need a safe way to look after it over time
• Bullet 3 - purchasing power
  • Sub point 1 - the key metric a financial adviser will never tell you
  • Sub point 2 - measure value in different ways
  • Sub point 3 - critical to follow it

Chapter 4 - Saving & investing are not the same thing

• Bullet 1 - Capital comes in many forms
  • Sub point 1 - Skill, relationship, financial
  • Sub point 2 - capitalism unfairly a dirty word
  • Sub point 3 - accumulation key
• Bullet 2 - Wealth portfolio
  • Sub point 1 - ok to save and invest
  • Sub point 2 - all an allocation
  • Sub point 3 - leverage any edge you have
• Bullet 3 - Modern monetary system has destroyed ability to save
  • Sub point 1 - forced to invest
  • Sub point 2 - taking risk
  • Sub point 3 - risk-reward / probability analysis

Chapter 5 - What is money? - Freedom and Time

• Bullet 1 - history of money - just a technology
  • Sub point 1 - barter economy
  • Sub point 2 - most saleable good
  • Sub point 3 - beads, coins, fiat, debt
• Bullet 2 - characteristics of money
  • Sub point 1 - portable etc
  • Sub point 2 - stored energy
  • Sub point 3 - most saleable good
• Bullet 3 - features of money
  • Sub point 1 - store of value - not present in usd / gbp etc
  • Sub point 2 - medium of exchange
  • Sub point 3 - unit of account

Chapter 6 - Asset allocation options

• Bullet 1 - comparison of different assets - all represent differing risk profile’s
  • Sub point 1 - bonds, equities, derivatives, collectibles, real estate, bitcoin, crypto
  • Sub point 2 - liquidity, volatility, risk
  • Sub point 3 - what represents the best way to preserve purchasing power?
• Bullet 2 - what do you want your asset to do
  • Sub point 1 - everyone is different
  • Sub point 2 - utility value to consider in physical real estate eg
  • Sub point 3 - do you have an investment edge?
• Bullet 3 - capital growth, preservation, erosion
  • Sub point 1 - CPI is BS
  • Sub point 2 - adviser incentive miss-alignment
  • Sub point 3 - long-term thinking

Chapter 7 - Making the decision

• Bullet 1 - Rational mind 
  • Sub point 1 - do your own research
  • Sub point 2 - writing is a forcing function for knowledge
  • Sub point 3 - document your decision making (didn’t do for years)
• Bullet 2 - Intuition
  • Sub point 1 - how does it feel
  • Sub point 2 - energetics
  • Sub point 3 - following your gut
• Bullet 3 - private investor, live and die by result, own it
  • Sub point 1 - back yourself
  • Sub point 2 - don’t invest more than you can afford to lose
  • Sub point 3 - the more you know, the more you buy

Chapter 8 - Legal structures

• Bullet 1 - tax efficiency
  • Sub point 1 - get good advice
  • Sub point 2 - work within the law
  • Sub point 3 - don’t cut corners 
• Bullet 2 - trusts
  • Sub point 1 - depends on jurisdiction 
  • Sub point 2 - great vehicle for inheritance 
  • Sub point 3 - asset protection
• Bullet 3 - companies
  • Sub point 1 - offshore
  • Sub point 2 - works in some cases 
  • Sub point 3 - again depends on the person 

Chapter 9 - Inheritance planning

• Bullet 1 - make sure the next generation get’s what’s theirs
  • Sub point 1 - critical step
  • Sub point 2 - don’t want assets lost on iPhone (guy in rubbish dump digging for laptop)
  • Sub point 3 - what happens if you get hit by a bus tomorrow?
• Bullet 2 - will
  • Sub point 1 - be clear in your succession plan
  • Sub point 2 - be fair
  • Sub point 3 - incentivise correctly
• Bullet 3 - if this fails you’ve failed 
  • Sub point 1 - steward wealth one generation to the next. Stored wealth / energy 
  • Sub point 2 - be prepared for the worst
  • Sub point 3 - sense of calm when done properly

Chapter 10 - Being yourself

• Bullet 1 - this is your crack at life
  • Sub point 1 - make your own decisions
  • Sub point 2 - come from place of confidence
  • Sub point 3 - no regrets
• Bullet 2 - play the best hand with cards given
  • Sub point 1 - self-interest is ok
  • Sub point 2 - protect on downside
  • Sub point 3 - don’t hang around
• Bullet 3 - if you need help
  • Sub point 1 - message me
  • Sub point 2 - when it comes to Bitcoin reach out for my consultancy services
  • Sub point 3 -the student becomes the teacher

And there you have it. The outline of my upcoming book! The aim is to have it published by 2 July 2024. Let's see if I manage that. Plenty of reasons to make sure I do...

Best

Jake "write that bloody book" Woodhouse

Ps - again, I messed up the email I was sending from, which I've now hopefully sorted. Hit reply for any questions you may have! Would be great to hear from you.