What a crazy year 2023 turned out to be. This time last year, I had an idea my year would be different, but I didn’t know how different.

Here’s a reflection on the 2023 year, the changes, and the future in 2024.

The Past

When 2023 started, I had been a tennis coach and English teacher for thirteen years. My passion for teaching had been waning for a while, ever since they treated me as nothing more than a pawn. I had spoken to my principal before Christmas break about getting out of coaching. I wanted to be home with my family more since we had another baby expected in June. My principal’s reply led me to decide never to teach again, not until something changed.

My website has been dedicated to my writing, mainly with Apple technology. The plan to leave teaching had been to continue to work on my blog and to get some writing jobs that would help me grow a career.

For most of the spring semester of school, I focused on my last season as a tennis coach and maintaining my quality in the classroom despite knowing I wasn’t coming back. I passively looked for writing jobs until the tennis season ended, and then I actively looked.

I felt like I was in a time crunch. Applying for jobs while expecting a new child felt difficult. I wanted some time at home with my growing family but also job security.

As my teaching career ended, I landed a job with Make Use Of and another with Swing Vision.

I started training at MakeUseOf while still teaching and coaching, and things got overwhelming. Luckily, they allowed me to delay my training until the tennis season ended. Unfortunately, that only gave me a couple of weeks before I went on paternity leave. Swing told me I could start after my leave as well. Things seemed great.

Present

I left teaching the week my second son came. We spent the next three months together as a family. I spent most of my time ensuring our oldest still received attention after the baby came.

Unfortunately, our previous childcare couldn’t continue for two months as my wife returned to work, so I became an accidental stay-at-home parent.

I contacted both of my writing gigs as the three months ended. Swing decided not to add writing to their portfolio, so that job didn’t pan out. It might have been for the best since I found myself with no time to write.

I spent the first few weeks of August trying to maintain my writing for Make Use Of, but I couldn’t make it work between dealing with kids, sicknesses, and sanity. I just couldn’t commit enough time to making the work good enough.

But once both those jobs went away, I pivoted again. I started to work on more fiction writing—being a creator has been my dream all my life. I’m about forty-five thousand words into my current novel project and not even halfway done.

Furthermore, I committed more to writing about my experience as a dad. I’m hoping the content has enough personality that I can continue to build on this and make something of it.

At home, we’re honestly in the thick of everything. A three-year-old and a newborn can be challenging to juggle. I’m so proud of my boys every day. Life is hard but so good. It’s nice that the oldest attends school a couple of days a week. It gives me a little break and time to work on my projects.

The Future

In the future, I hope to finish my novel’s first draft, edit it, and get it out to the world. I love my story and think it will fit many people’s lives. The book is a cross between Big Daddy and a Fredrik Backman book. Once I finish, I’ll post some excerpts.

I want to post more about being a dad. Once November hit, with sicknesses, birthdays, and holidays, I failed at posting weekly like I wanted. I’m not promising to post weekly, but my goal is to post weekly.

I want to grow my subscribers as well. I know that comes with good content, which I’m trying to improve, but it also comes with marketing. I need to learn more and try more things to get my content out into the world. So, look for a renewed focus on getting the word out. So sign up for my email list, below to stay up-to-date with the blog!

That said, I need to get better at social media. I have imposter syndrome when it comes to social media. I also don’t like social media that much. It becomes too addicting and time-wasting. Sitting there scrolling through Threads or TikTok doesn’t make sense when I have little time to work. Content creation on social also takes time, which I don’t have. So I’ll have to figure something out.

I would also love to be able to help out more with the family monetarily while continuing to write. If you are enjoying the content and feel like you want to help out, think about donating or even signing up for a monthly donation. Every little bit helps! Thank you to all who have contributed already.

At home, I hope to keep doing what I’m doing and improve some things. I want my oldest to be a little more independent, and I plan to help. I love him so much and want to be around him all the time. So that can be a problem too.

I also want to take some time for myself. Parenting is such a twenty-four-seven job. I need to make sure that I spend some time on myself. I want to start running again, but I’m unsure how to work that out.

Overall, though, this year has been challenging. A career change, a growing family, and too much time at home have been interesting. I love my life, and I feel fortunate to live it. I’m interested to see what the future will bring.

What are your plans for the coming year? Let me know on Threads, Facebook, or Instagram.