About 7 years ago I decided to write a goal list. I had read what other people had written about the value of writing down goals and I decided to try it for myself. A few of them were typical dreams. I want to be a millionaire, I want a mansion and I want a Lamborghini. Yes, they were dreams and things that were not likely to happen, at least not anytime soon.

However, one of the major goals that I had written was helping families. At this point in my life my twin girls were nearing their first birthday at the same time the Kahui twin tragedy occurred. Two baby boys killed from abuse. This was terrible news and this affected me and my darling, Marama.

We sat up wondering what happened to those two babies.  They were the same age as our girls and we both knew that   having multiple births was tough. We imagined that for the parents of those kids it might have been too much. Maybe they didn’t have enough support with Whānau or maybe not enough experience with children. We weren’t experts but we had made up our minds that we would make progress on the goal of helping families.

We thought that if we shared what we learned with our kids then maybe we could prevent what happened to those two little baby boys. We also wrote some scripts for a series of Tips for Dads to put on the You tube channel demonstrating simple parenting ideas. These scripts ended up in the hands of the most unlikely person, an entrepreneur of an accounting business named Steve Taylor whose wife was experienced in working with families around parenting strategies.

To cut a long story short it eventually led to me being part of Whanau Marama Parenting and everything that we have accomplished together. I could not have imagined that writing down a goal could lead to so much change. Not just in myself but for everyone around me. I honour those two little baby boys that helped me to create a goal that has led me to where I am today and the firm belief that writing down a goal is a way to create a difference.