2025
I’ve come to accept that, beyond a certain age, time really does accelerate.
It accelerates further with the busyness of a particular season of life. And while I feel like I’ve had a better handle on that busyness over the last couple of years (hello four-day work week), a year can still slip by remarkably quickly.
This year, more than anything, has felt like one of settlement and growth, growth I didn’t entirely expect. I’m more emotionally aware of myself than I’ve ever been, which may well be an age thing too.
Starting in Colorado
I started the year with a trip to Colorado Springs at the end of January, spending time in person with the Wild at Heart tech team. It was a chance to noodle on plans for the year and simply be together. I’ve said this before, but the last couple of years working on Loveology and Wild at Heart have been the most fulfilling of my career, building products that have a real impact on people’s lives, rather than just another commerce platform or revenue generator.
We reflected recently on what we’d shipped in a single week as a team of three, reinforcing my belief that a small, nimble, multi-skilled group can produce an extraordinary amount of meaningful work.
Whenever I spend time with the Wild at Heart team in person, I tend to return home with a few books. This time it was Love & War. It’s been a genuine game-changer for our marriage. Much of it feels like common sense in hindsight, but it simply hadn’t been on my radar before, not before marriage, and not even last year.
On the flight home, prompted by the book, I started writing my life story. I managed to hit the maximum capacity of an Apple Note in the process (who knew?). In retrospect, the forced stop was probably a gift. It made me sit with what I’d written rather than rush on. I don’t know if it’ll ever see the light of day, though I’ve promised Sarah she can read it when it’s finished.
I was listening recently to a podcast where a friend talked about using conversations with AI to clarify his thinking while creating content. Verbalising has never been my strength, but writing has always been more natural for me. I’ve written letters to Sarah over the years, actual pen-and-paper letters, and I used to write to my mum when she first moved to New Zealand because she hated email. Writing feels slower, more deliberate, and somehow more honest.
Perhaps I need to write more simply as a form of catharsis, without worrying whether it’s “worth sharing” or not. Even so, it’s easy for that to feel like just another item on the ever-growing list of things I think I should do.
I haven’t reread what I wrote on that flight yet. I might take some time over the holidays to finish it. I’d only made it to around age eighteen. Life has a funny way of hiding memories until someone casually brings them up in conversation. All that to say, beginning to write my story was cathartic and highlighted areas of my life that needed attention, or at least mindfulness.
Home purchase
I like the idea of buying a home. I like it far less in practice.
The stress is something else entirely. Open homes here are great in theory, less so when they’re all on a Sunday. The building reports run to hundreds of pages, and nobody realistically has time to read them properly. So I did what I do best and built a small tool to extract the signal from the noise, a simple traffic-light system to decide whether a house was worth pursuing.
After seven open homes in one day, reading report after report, the automation felt less like a side project and more like survival.
Buying in New Zealand also came with the usual business-owner hurdles. When we first arrived, a mortgage was a non-starter. Later, six months of trading history and twelve-month projections were suddenly sufficient, though not without jumping through a few extra hoops.
We agreed to purchase our new place in March, contingent on mortgage approval, an early release from our rental, and Overseas Investment Office consent. We didn’t actually move in until the end of June, making it one of the longer purchase timelines I’ve experienced here.
The house itself is refreshingly practical. Five bedrooms, built in 2014, and needing very little work, although we are currently converting the garage into a proper bedroom for Rebecca.
It was also great that with Sarah's mum in town for a few weeks, we were able to show her what our life looks like here.
Embracing (and delaying) the inevitable
Earlier this year I noticed my hair thinning noticeably at the back. I’ve always said I’d accept losing my hair with good grace, and given the things I’ve done with it over the years, I’ve never been particularly attached to it.
I decided to start shaving my head weekly. After the first attempt, Sarah admitted she wasn’t quite prepared for me never having hair again. I did a bit of research and settled on a New Zealand-made thickening shampoo. The results have been better than I expected.
I’m under no illusion that this is anything other than delaying the inevitable, but I’m happy enough with that for now.
Wild at Heart Retreat
Later in the year, I returned to Colorado for a Wild at Heart men’s retreat in Fraser. Despite working closely with the team for nearly two years, this was my first in-person event.
I love what Wild at Heart stands for, even if not everything resonates with me personally. What did resonate deeply were the worship sessions. I remember singing with thousands at a Gospel Coalition conference years ago and wondering how good heaven must be. This was smaller, around 400 men, but no less powerful.
One unexpected highlight was the no-device policy. I don’t think I’ve been that disconnected from a phone since the first week the iPhone was released.
It’s something I want to build more intentionally into my life. A friend recently shared his experience of a short, disconnected personal retreat, time away to think deeply about life and work. It’s something I’m seriously considering for 2026.
New workspaces
This year also brought two new workspaces. I now have a dedicated home office, and I took out a six-month lease on a permanent desk at a co-working space near the beach.
A good home office has always been a priority. The co-working space, though, has been a gift, a way to meet new people and break up the week. I’m still finding my rhythm with it, but when I’m there, I try to make time for a walk along the beach or around the Mount at lunchtime.
Denver
Three trips to Colorado in six months wasn’t on my bingo card at the start of the year. The retreat and Denver were both relatively last-minute decisions.
I hadn’t attended a US Laracon since before COVID, and Denver tipped the scales. Along the way, I even ran into PGA Tour pro Min Woo Lee while transiting through LAX, who kindly posed for a photo.
A personal highlight was a road trip with my friend Eric to play Ballyneal, a private links course in the middle of nowhere and one of the best in the world. It was hot, we had caddies, and I didn’t play any worse than usual. I was particularly pleased with a hybrid into the green on a 237-yard par three, close enough to flirt with 🐦, though par would have to do.
There was also an official Laracon golf day, which was far more about community than scorecards. I shared an Airbnb with Nic from the Wild at Heart team, and it was good to spend time together outside of work and introduce him to friends from the Laravel world.
To top it off, I managed to catch Tedeschi Trucks Band at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, a long-standing bucket-list venue. It somehow lives up to the hype, both for live music and simply wandering the park.
Other trips
We had planned a family trip to Sydney in September, only to realise, far too late, that the kids needed travel visas. Naturally, this discovery coincided with the Australian government visa site being down for maintenance. So the trip didn't happen.
With the money intended to be spent in Sydney, we opted to buy a hot pool for the house. This has been a real positive for us as a family. Much more convenient than visiting the local pool.
I did manage to plan a surprise birthday and wedding anniversary trip to Brisbane for Sarah and I.
Sports
Anyone who spends time with me will quickly discover my love of golf and football.
I’d largely retired from playing football after getting tired of feeling like I’d been in a car crash the next day. Watching Levi play for school reignited the itch, though, and I now play a social Tuesday game at the local park, three small-sided matches with around forty players of all ages and nationalities. It’s exactly right for this stage of life. Also, whatever happened to stores selling plain black boots that didn't require your first born as payment???
Since moving to New Zealand, my body feels better than it has in years. My dad noticed the same thing when they first moved here.
Golf continues to be a constant. I’ve joined my dad’s club and we play most weeks. I even got to see him break 100 for the first time. Rebecca has also taken an interest, which I love. Playing year-round without frosty mornings is a luxury I don’t take for granted.
Music
This has probably been the thing I didn't appreciate enough about Glasgow. The Glasgow Hydro is one of the busiest music venues in the world, then you factor in places like King Tut's or O2/Carling Academy, we were able to see high quality live music all the time.
New Zealand is such a small place that not all the mainstream artists - or the smaller unknown artists - make it down here.
That said, this year I have managed to see Teddy Swims (Brisbane), Tedeschi Trucks Band (Denver), Lewis Capaldi (Auckland) and a few lesser known acts here in Tauranga like Whiskey Soho, Dan Sharp & Ash Grunwald.
Family
As a family, we’re in a really good place.
We spend more time together than we did in Scotland, evening walks around the Mount, Sunday afternoons at the beach, evenings in the hot pool, and soon games of pool in the garage when the table arrives. We are unapologetically a fair-weather family, and moving away from Scotland has suited us well.
The kids are all doing well at school and thriving outside of it too.
Sarah and I have more time together than we ever have before. Part of that is having older kids who need us a little less. As I said at the outset, Love & War has been a genuine catalyst for our marriage, and I’m deeply grateful for where we find ourselves as this year comes to a close.
As this year draws to a close, I find myself less focused on measuring progress and more on paying attention.
Paying attention to the people I’ve been entrusted with, the work that feels worth stewarding, and the quiet ways God seems to shape my life over time.
I don’t feel a strong urge to rush into whatever comes next. If this year has taught me anything, it’s that settling isn’t stagnation, and growth doesn’t always arrive with clarity or fanfare. More often, it looks like faithfulness in the ordinary, learning to live, work, and love well, one day at a time.
I wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year. I hope the coming weeks bring rest, perspective, and time with the people who matter most.