No year is ever all good or all bad. Each year brings joy and challenge. This year has delivered both in heavy doses.

For the past several years I’ve published a brief recount of the highs and lows of both Happy Families (as a business) and my personal life. The reviews take a simple format that examines three things:

What went well
What didn’t, and
Lessons learned

You can see previous years in review at these links (2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022). As time has gone by, I’ve felt a little less inclined to offer these reviews. They’re an authentic “pulling back the curtain” into areas of my life that I would generally share only with those closest to me. However, my team points out that these are some of the most regularly read articles I publish… which means you are deriving value from them.

So, as we dive into this year’s review, please remember that:

I don’t hold myself up as an example of what to do or what not to do. It’s just an exploration of what I’m doing and how I’m trying to live with intention – and learn to be better.

It’s not helpful or healthy to compare your year to mine. We’re all living our own lives – and it’s not a competition, and

The real value in this article is found in you taking the idea and examining your life for blessings, challenges, and opportunities for growth. Please do it – even if you only share it with your closest loved ones. It will teach your children valuable lessons.

Let’s dive in.

What went well

Lolly and Pops

Kylie and I are grandparents! And how stoked can we be? Indiana Skye was born in September to my oldest daughter and her husband. We love that kid like crazy. We're smitten. And watching my own child living with her husband and having a child… it’s genuinely #parentinggoals. (And it’s a great reality check around what really matters most.)

Thanks to Karen Young at 'Hey Sigmund' for the inspiration behind our names: we’re called Lolly (Kylie) and Pops (me).

And while we’re on the family thing, we’re delighted to say our second daughter is navigating challenges and showing resilience, and “doing good” as she does volunteer mission work in England – now 10 months in and 8 months left. And our third daughter is in the process of organising to do something similar (destination currently unknown) in the next few months.

An Incredible Team

Surrounding yourself with great people is vital to success, and our team is amazing - and growing. In addition to

Evelynne’s ongoing incredible work in marketing, digital, and design and

Caroline’s amazing client relations, and

Elizabeth’s essential work in admin, and

Anna’s ongoing contribution to behind-the-scenes direction and implementation, we have

Mim managing our socials as a real pro, and

Kylie co-hosting the podcast with me, while Craig and JR are amazing in rounding out our podcast team in conjunction with the iheartradio platform.

This year we’ve added Rachael to assist in marketing, plus Olivia and Jet taking on a range of digital and graphics tasks. Some of the team are full-time. Some are part-time. A couple are casual. But without them I couldn’t do what I do. They’re extraordinary. I’m so grateful for excellent people who believe in the vision of Happy Families and give their energy and effort to help make families happier. I can’t ever take them for granted.

(To thank them for being fantastic we had a big team retreat for key staff and their families at O’Reilly’s Rainforest Resort in the Gold Coast Hinterland mid-year. Loved it.)

New Book: The Parenting Revolution

I published my most important book this year: The Parenting Revolution. This is the best book I’ve written. And Professor Richard Ryan, the most cited psychology researcher on the planet, loves it. He told me his wife gives it to everyone they know who’s raising kids or has parenting questions. How does that even happen?

The book has helped so many families. It’s a life-changer. (And until Christmas, Amazon has the eBook for just $8.99! Grab it here.)

And we’ve built a powerful parenting presentation off the back of it that is also adaptable for workplaces. I’ve presented it to:

Corporate Leaders
Teachers and School Leaders
Counsellors and Psychologists
Residential Care Workers
Swim Coaches and Teachers
Thousand and thousands of parents… and more

Parental Guidance (Season Two)

The second season of the show was a hit! Great families. Great insights. Great feedback. Great ratings. Fingers crossed for a Season Three. (Watch it on 9Now here.)

New Book: Being a Great Dad for Dummies

We published my 9th book this year as well… my second dummies book for dads. Honestly, if you’d told me ten years ago that I’d be working on my 10th book in a decade I don’t think I’d have believed you.

(Close to) 5 Million Podcast downloads

The Happy Families podcast has exploded to become one of the most downloaded parenting podcasts in the country, growing from 3 million downloads last year to (almost) 5 million this year! Whoa!!!

Kylie is the star of the show. I do what I can. We are amazed and grateful that we get to provide that little snapshot of daily inspiration in the lives of so many parents and families.

Our most popular episodes for the year are here if you’d like to listen once you’ve read this:

#5 Gentle Parenting: Is it a Fad or Fabulous?

#4 Family Goal Setting

#3 The Power of Habit

#2 Managing Fatigue as a Parent

#1 Defusing Explosive Children (with Dr Ross Greene)

Two New Courses

As neurodiversity becomes increasingly recognised and prevalent, we’ve developed two courses (one on Autism with Dr Joey, an autistic psychologist, and one on ADHD), and have helped thousands of people with some of life’s most challenging parenting issues.

Public Speaking

For me, this is one of the greatest things. It’s why I do what I do. Being face to face with people who love their families and want them to be better is the greatest privilege. I love it. If you’ve seen me present this year I hope you’ve felt how much I love it. And if you’ve had me present this year – THANK YOU!

I’ve presented everywhere from Roxby Downs (SA) and Narromine (NSW) to Hong Kong!

What didn’t go well

Body Breakdown

A surfing accident in October saw me hit a sandbank headfirst, fracturing my neck and my spine. Incredibly I was released from hospital the same day and had no ill-effects (no brace, no surgery) and was back at work within 2 weeks and back at exercise within 6 weeks. I was swimming, surfing, and cycling again by 8 weeks post-accident.

This could just as easily go in the “what went well” section because of how fortunate I am. I count it as a miracle that I can write this. Nevertheless, it’s here because it’s serious.

Technology Troubles

Over the past three years we’ve sunk enormous amounts of money into developing the ultimate parenting platform – and failed spectacularly. The cost is unfathomable to me, particularly since we ended up with no result. It’s heartbreaking to prioritise spending in that way and have nothing to show for it. Pulling the plug on a never-ending mess was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.

Worse, our members have persisted with us on a platform that’s been high on promise but has never quite reached the level it was supposed to. Their membership fees have been put towards something that was supposed to be of huge benefit to them, and it just hasn’t quite delivered.

So… we’ve pulled the pin on the agencies that have failed to provide the services promised. I’m struggling to not be bitter about how they’ve failed us (no accountability and still taking all that money). And we’re doing it ourselves (I have an amazing team!). It’s forced a full rethink of what the membership is, and the new platform is almost here… and it’s undeniably better than anything the agencies were doing for us anyway.

Lesson learned: If you want something done right, sometimes it really is better to do it yourself. (And to our many, many patient members… be ready because we are confident you’ll love what’s just around the corner.)

Social Media - Vanity Metrics

Posting this out of habit - I’ve included it each year so let’s look at progress…

Facebook has grown from 220 000 followers to 242 000.

Instagram has grown from 40 000 to 48 000.

These numbers represent real people with real families. It’s humbling to have the responsibility to try to help so many. I continue to feel immensely grateful for the trust people have in what I share, and the amazing feedback I receive from people who have been helped by my parenting advice.

Holidays

We’re having them, but they’re not going to plan.

Holiday 1 - A cruise

Kylie scored us a super cheap cruise to Hawaii. Relocating the ship means discounted sailing… but three things got us:

I got so seasick it was terrible… and ended up in the medical centre getting jabbed in the butt cheeks with needles to end the sickness.
17 days at sea with only 3 land days was not much fun.
International flights home from Hawaii cost MORE than the 17 days on board the boat. Turns out, not so cheap after all.

Holiday 2 - Cairns

I live a pretty healthy life. It’s rare that I get sick… Except… I got sick, and Kylie took the kids on holidays without me. I flew to Cairns for the last 3 days of the “family” holiday, and was still under the weather while I was there.

Holiday 3 - Injuries

A fractured neck (C7) and broken back (T6) ended our family trip to Coffs during the Spring break. Kylie couldn’t make it anyway because she was with our newborn granddaughter.

Holiday 4 - Cancelled

We have a tradition that at age 16 we take each daughter on a special holiday. Just that child, Kylie and I. That trip was cancelled due to a family tragedy, which you can read about below.

Death

Two deaths have touched our family in the final months of the year. We were sad but relieved to farewell my 95-year-old grandmother after a long and slow deterioration.

Tragically, in November, suicide took my wonderful nephew at age 20. I wrote about it here. And it has changed me forever.

What I learnt

These lessons and ideas are kind of random. Some relate to what’s above. Some have nothing to do with my ups and downs and are simply reflections and musings that matter. Let’s go.

A Happiness Lesson

Where there is gratitude, there is joy. Without gratitude, there cannot be any joy.

When You Want Something Done…

I don’t know too many people with great stories to tell about technology development. We have suffered for several years and spent so much. The lesson seems to be that if you want something done, do it yourself. I am so lucky to have a trustworthy in-house team that is solution-focused, and are willing to go above and beyond job descriptions in order to develop what others couldn’t.

Our Brains Lie to Us

I’ve been thinking a lot about how our brains are designed to make us feel good more than they’re designed to help us be better.

For example, our brains make us think we want the chocolate (or the greasy chips, or whatever the unhealthy stuff is). We want it so badly! But it’s our brain that wants it. Not our body!!! And it’s the same with our emotions.

Our brain loves to release those big emotions like anger and anxiety. It feels so good in the moment, but while our brain lies to us about feeling better by expressing our anger and anxiety, eating the food, staying in bed, pursuing selfish outcomes, etc., it’s not working for us. Our body, our relationships, our psychology… they all need us to listen to them more than we listen to our brain. It’s deceitful, and it’s not working in our best long-term interests.

Being Nice to Yourself Feels Better

I’ve made some big mistakes. The tech one is the biggest. But at a speaking event I made fun of someone’s strong accent. They laughed. It seemed funny. But I accidentally offended them.

I was cranky with the kids once or twice.

I missed that family holiday due to illness.

I wrecked a family holiday because of an accident.

I’ve stepped in a number of holes (that I’ve dug for myself)… because I’m human.

This year I’ve gotten better at shrugging at my mistakes and being ok with them because that’s what it is to be human.

But to be clear, I’ve also practised my apologies when people have been hurt. And I’ve been sure to look not where I fell but where I slipped (African proverb). I’m not letting myself off the hook when I make a mistake. I’m just being nice about it, learning from it, apologising for it, and trying not to make the same mistake again.

Build Strong Systems

James Clear said,

"Goals are for people who care about winning once. Systems are for people who care about winning repeatedly."

Whether it’s in business or in family, creating successful systems means creating a successful life. This year, we’ve worked hard on systems for mornings, evenings, meals, shopping, holidays, couple time, dates, family fun, and more. We still have a lot of refining to do, but it’s clear that we rise or fall, not to the level of our goals, but to the level of our systems.

Love is All

Farewelling my nephew may have been one of the hardest experiences of my life.

One of our favourite memories of Logan is that whenever someone said “I love you” to him, he would always stop and say, “Love you, who?” He would wait until they said “I love you, Logan”.

Our family has adopted this in the way we speak. It has changed how we feel about one another.

Here’s what else we are doing:

A monthly weekend away (camping, staying with family, Big 4 Caravan Park) to reconnect deeply
Reminding one another that we love each other “no matter what”
Focusing on actually getting our holidays happening properly for once

My inspiration for next year:

Author and futurist Robert Anton Wilson said,

"You are precisely as big as what you love and precisely as small as what you allow to annoy you."

People matter. Things don’t.

I’m focused on 2024 being the year that nothing annoys me. It’s about gratitude, love, and service.

Thanks for reading. Have a great 2024!

Reflections on Faith

From the desk of the Religious Education Coordinator - Miss McMeniman