If I had to sum up 2024 in one word, it would be rollercoaster 🎢
Is that two words? You’ll have to forgive me if so.
This year brought incredible highs, challenging lows, and pivotal realizations that shaped not only my work but also how I think about the life I want to lead. Let’s break it down through the lens of Wins, Results, Alignment, and Pivot, before wrapping it all up with a look at 2025 through my WRAP framework.
Heads up: if you need a quick overview of the WRAP framework, click here 👋
Wins
When I think about the wins from this year, one stands out far above the rest: the birth of our baby girl, Hallelujah Jean. Everything else is a distant second, though launching HeyCreator and crossing 100,000 YouTube subscribers were also milestones I’m incredibly proud of.
Other wins included:
- Marking 3 years of consistent WRAP newsletters
- Publishing 20 YouTube videos, more than 2022-23 combined
- Reading 30ish books, including the longest book ever, Wind and Truth
- Earning my purple belt in jiu-jitsu (the most unexpected win)
- Gaining a better understanding of how to integrate AI into my work
On a personal note, we also tackled some home improvement projects, like laying turf in the backyard—this transformed our space and made it so much more fun and livable for our kids!
Results
Here’s where the roller coaster dipped. While I’m proud of the work I accomplished, the results didn’t always match the goals I set. This was my least focused year of goal planning, which left me scrambling more often than I care to admit. Without clear goals, my to-do list devolved into “what’s due today” mode.
Let’s look at some key results:
- HeyCreator: The launch went well with 500 initial members, but growth stalled, and we ended the year with fewer members than we started with.
- YouTube: While I published videos consistently, I didn’t hit my goal of weekly uploads, which slowed growth.
- Client Work: Clients saw great success, but I couldn’t scale the business.
- Family and Balance: I made some strides but still struggled to create the calm, focused schedule I wanted.
Ultimately, this year showed me how easy it is to fall out of alignment with your vision when you’re pulled in too many directions. After Halle was born and I took a month off, regaining momentum in HeyCreator was harder than expected. Add to that the demands of agency work, and I found myself increasingly torn between what I wanted to do and what I had to do.
Alignment
This tension forced me to take a hard look at why I was doing the work I was doing—and whether it aligned with the life I envision for myself and my family. The truth? It didn’t.
I didn’t leave stable jobs at Kit and Podia to become a customer success manager in my own business. Yet that’s what my role had turned into: troubleshooting automations and doing behind-the-scenes work that, while important, didn’t light me up. More importantly, it didn’t serve my ultimate goal of being a creator first.
I realized that if I want to help others build creative businesses, I need to be in the trenches, doing the work myself. I want to share from experience—“This is how I made this video” or “This is the email sequence that worked for me”—not theoretical knowledge or sharing vague client results.
Being a creator isn’t just what I do; it’s who I am. That realization set the stage for a big pivot heading into 2025.
Pivot
Starting January 1, 2025, my focus is crystal clear: create first, teach second. My two priorities are:
- Growing my YouTube channel
- Building the HeyCreator community
This shift means aligning my day-to-day work with what truly excites me: creating content that informs and inspires. If I’m not filling my own creative well, how can I help others draw from it? That’s why I’m committing to:
- Publishing 50 high-quality YouTube videos
- Growing my channel to 200,000 subscribers
- Growing HeyCreator to 1,000 engaged members
- Generating $200,000 in revenue, primarily through my creative work
While client work may still play a role in hitting revenue goals, my primary focus will be on leveraging my own content to drive value for the community and my business. If I’m not creating, I’m not in alignment—and that’s a non-negotiable for me moving forward.
2024 WRAP’D
To wrap it up, 2024 was a year of reckoning. My wife and I have chosen a challenging but rewarding path: raising four kids, homeschooling, and building a single-income household supported by my creative work. This is the life we want, but it’s not without pressure and sacrifice. In fact I would say it’s mostly been pressure and sacrifice the first four years 😅
In 2025, I need to hit at least $150,000 in revenue, with a goal of $200,000 and a stretch goal of $250,000. But it’s not just about the money. If I hit those numbers but don’t publish 50 videos or grow the HeyCreator community, I’ll consider the year a bit of a failure. Because the ultimate goal isn’t just to make money—it’s to create meaningful content, help others build their creative dreams, and have a lot of fun along the way.
I’m optimistic about what lies ahead. The challenges of 2024 clarified what I need to do to succeed in 2025. The path forward is simple but not easy: create great content, stay aligned with my vision, and keep moving toward the life I know we’re meant to live.
Here’s to a year of growth, alignment, and creativity. Let’s get to work.
