2025 - No Days Off

// A Year of Movement

One way to review your year and to look back is to sit and try to remember everything you've done but when I do that for 2025, everything blurs into one - I try to think of the earliest memory of this year and all I get is the first, opening day of the year when I started the 'Brave the Wave' challenge for MyTime Young Carers which has involved me jumping in an ice bath every single day for the entire year.

Another way to review the year is to look back through your own camera roll.

I love a camera roll (as my newsletter will attest to) as it's a living breathing memory bank - screenshots, selfies and moments in time which document your year in a way that you could only imagine.

The overall theme that I can see from scrolling back in my camera roll for 2025 is one of movement.

I haven's stood still for even a second - 2025 has been ripped through at such a pace that it's difficult to see where each month started and where each month ends. In the whole of the year, I can honestly say, there have been no days off.

The holiday I've 'had' from the day job has all been used on my 'own' business which has meant that every time I've taken a break from Yammayap, I've still been working and honestly, that's been both exciting and exhausting.

I've been an advocate for working in this blog for a while, the notion that you can take as much time as you like to 'work' as long as you're happy and this year - it's been a blast.

// Letting Them Create

In mid-late 2024, I started an agency as a side project, I love creating videos for people - it's a creative passion of mine and I had the opportunity to secure some government funding to kickstart my company and I grasped it with both hands.

In February - I secured my first big client - no more small consultancy sessions, this was a proper shoot with a proper client which meant I had to roll my sleeves up and deliver the goods.

I flew out to the United States (which I loved, thats the only thing I missed from my previous job) - and we set about capturing some film from the almost a week of travelling. One thing stood out to me whilst I was there - people mean everything. I was once again travelling with my good friend Julio and I was capturing something special for a client and that, that was what made it special.

That lit a spark under me - that proved I could do what I wanted to do and this year has been slowly building up the clientele and the work I take on outside of Yammayap.

I've stayed true to Yammayap for the entire year - never the two parts of my life meet - I don't work on Yammayap when I'm doing 'Let them Create' work and I never work on 'Let them Create' when I'm in Yammayap mode. It's important to follow those guidelines - but it has meant that the video agency work has reached a natural 'peak' of what's achievable. I'm almost maxed out in terms of work as we reach the end of 2025 and I'm having more conversations about doing more..

// The Shift

Of course, the biggest catalyst for the video work was my video, Relevance which debuted at the You Are the Media Creator day in May - the video took a lot out of me creatively and I put everything into creating it - finishing the video at 5:30am on the morning of the event was foolish looking back but it was a breakthrough that I needed - it meant I delivered something that I was proud of and that meant something really special to me.

The Relevance wave took on a life of it's own once I released it - the positive feedback, the love and appreciation of the video was incredible and it meant the process I was undergoing in my own head of becoming more confident in creating video was cemented and I knew that this was a turning point.

I said it at the time and I'll say it again but having your own work, that you've put an incredibly large amount of work into, played on a large cinema screen for all to see is special and it was both overwhelming and exhilarating at the same time - it was a day I'll never forget.

But the thing is, that was only in Month 4 of what has been a crazy year.

Work could have slowed down then - I could have taken my foot off the pedal and focused more on resting, putting my feet up and enjoying the year but life has other plans and in May (around the time of Relevance) Tina and I found out we're expecting again and another switch went off in my head that meant that I was never going to slow down.

I became obsessed with notion of stepping up, delivering the work that I needed to and making sure we all had enough - enough to plan for another baby, enough time to work and enough energy to provide all of this.

The shift of the year happened in May - I delivered my favourite piece of work at Creator Day and then found out we're expecting our fourth child - it turned out to be an equally hectic summer.

// More Work

Yammayap moved offices at the start of 2025 - we were thick in the redecorating, renovation and then the re-location (I love alliteration) of the team into the new office in Parkstone and by May - we'd moved in.

It was a catalyst to become more 'grown up' at Yammayap and we all stepped up the day job a little bit more - it's been a challenging year at Yammayap - I'm coming up to 2 years in the role and it's been a struggle this year to find new clients. I think this is the case across the entire industry - everyone is struggling for new business and we've entered into a new world of running events in order to secure new business.

The event's have been a nice and welcome addition to our portfolio of 'things we do' at Yammayap but it's not been without stress and anxiety - we ran our very first in person event and we've run online events - personally, I love the in-person events more because you can sit in a room with people and connect - online always feels a little more performative.

But those events have been a success - we've captured more work on the back of the events so it's been a success.

But the struggle still remains - we need new business and it's something that weighs heavy on me - that's my biggest failure of 2025 and I want to address that in 2026 - we need to push through this barrier and create more work.

We grew in 2024 - the bounce we experienced as I joined was great but in 2025, we've taken a step back - there have been mitigating factors but we must push on in 2026 and really grab new opportunities.

We're in a strong place as a team this year and one of our biggest victories is the securing of a Knowledge Transfer Partnership with Innovate UK - to revolutionise the way the company operates in the future and be involved with 'start ups' in a new way - we'll be creating them, identifying gaps in the market and finding new revenue streams.. it's an exciting time.

// The Year

I'm now in my 45th year on the planet and I thought that things are supposed to slow down as you get older but for me, things just keep accelerating - it's been hectic, frantic and somewhat confusing at times over the last 12 months but I feel like I've exited the cloud which hung over me in 2024 - when I look back at my 'year in review' for 2024, I can see someone who was struggling to get his mojo back after exiting a toxic work environment and burning out.

I think that was still with me in the early part of 2025 and I had lost some of my confidence - it's slowly returning and I want to make sure I succeed in my role(s).

Whilst 2024 was fractured (metaphorically and physically, with the broken leg) - 2025 seems to have been a blur - there was no slowing down, no big break in the middle to allow a moment of reflection and redirection - it's been relentless with work, relentless with family and there hasn't been any time to slow down.

Life seems to be getting faster and faster and I both like that and worry about it all - I don't want to burn out again but at the moment, I'm enjoying the ride.

I'm not going to lie, the festive break and then the 'paternity' leave month off The Clique is going to come at a welcome time - I need to slow down a little and take it all in and I want to cherish the early moments with my daughter (feels mad saying that) in January 2025 - then we'll rev the engine a little, lift the clutch and engage fully when I'm back.

I want to see what pressing my foot to the pedal can do for us all - that's my goal for 2026 - lift the clutch, press the pedal down and see what happens.

I'm looking forward to it.