I have a very close friend who is the managing director and part owner of a large software company with about 80 employees. Although a very busy man he is also a very committed dad, all at the same time. I was invited to his surprise 40th birthday party. His T-shirt said it all, “The first 40 Years of childhood are always the hardest”. We both played extensively with his new ...

Some time ago I received a request to speak at a Fair Divorce Forum at a local Leagues Club in Wollongong. When I first received this invitation, my inclination was to ‘not accept’ because I don’t believe that divorce can be fair. Life is not fair and neither is love. My good friend Jeff Dakers prevailed upon me to reconsider, and so I include the following excerpt from my speech given ...

We live in an increasingly bizarre world which is at War with itself, The war has been against women and mothers in particular. The war has shifted over the last several decades to be against men and fathers. Increasingly this war is being waged against our children too as this disturbing War on Our Children video demonstrates. This war is now on our doorsteps and in our schools and we must ...

Brendan Hayward is a brave young man who is again baring his soul to all my blog readers to help them understand how important they are to their children. I shared his story many years ago but good stories are worth repeating. Good stories that inspire give us all hope as fathers to “keep on keeping on” for our children and our families. Many children take their dad for granted. In ...

Next Saturday, 28 May 2016, we celebrate Australia’s thirteenth National Day of Thanks.  It is a day we can use to say ‘thank you’ to those around us. I am thankful to say that I have been privileged to be part of this national celebration from its early beginnings. For over almost two decades I have conducted seminars where I asked people to stand up and begin to say thank you ...

Music is a wonderful gift.  It can transport you to places you would never normally go.  You might say that I am a little biased, having spent half my life as a musician, songwriter and producer.  Some time ago, at a marriage retreat my wife and I attended, I heard heavenly music playing in the course breaks.  It was the angelic voice of Eva Cassidy singing Sting’s love song, ‘Fields of ...

When we were bringing up our boys in the eighties it was the vogue to suggest that boys and girls are trained to be the sex they represent by people’s expectations and gender manipulations. Almost anyone my age believed it. I carefully watched my own children’s behaviours and realised that I and my generation had believed a lie. I was both ashamed and angry at the same time. How could I ...

You don’t appreciate your own parents until you have your own children. The famous native-American quote comes to mind, “Don’t judge any man until you have walked two moons in his moccasins”. Maybe we could change the quote for Mother’s Day to something like this, “Don’t complain about your mother until you have changed two months of nappies and been woken up every night for 60 nights in a row”. Most ...

As I looked down the road into the sun, I saw the silhouettes of a man and a woman walking side by side. The man held a young two year old boy in his arms. The young boy reached and called out for his Mummy. Maybe I got it wrong though, because the next moment, when I looked again, I saw the young boy in his mother’s arms reaching out and ...

Editors Note: This is guest post from Ben Pratt good friend and a devoted father of four and adoring husband of the most beautiful woman in the world.   I love my family. Every day since my wife and I got married, I have told her that I love her. Every day since my children were born, I have told them the same. It’s a track record I want to keep ...

We must initiate the love revolution in our society by telling the truth. As George Orwell said, “In a time of deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.

Henry Youngman, a comedian who was known as ‘King of the One Liners’ once said, “I was an atheist for a while but I gave it up, no holy-days.” Such a one liner about holy-days sums up the subject of this week’s Dads4Kids newsletter – Easter Family Holidays. Most of us celebrate Easter holidays but where did they come from and why do we celebrate them? Most countries in the world ...

The headline said, “Toddlers to be taught about cross-dressing in a controversial sex-ed program”. What really caught my attention was this nonsensical statement from Early Childhood Australia spokeswoman Claire McHugh. She said that the proposed sex-ed program would reduce domestic violence because ‘rigid views on gender’ were associated with violence and domestic violence. Let me paraphrase that piece of Orwellian double-speak just in case you don’t get it. People who believe ...

Brian Houston whom I would rate as a truly great leader, often says these words. “The best is yet to come.” He is relentlessly positive and is living proof that staying positive is the best way to ‘Love Live Lead’. The Warwick Marsh paraphrase of Brian’s words is there are “Better Times Ahead” but perhaps I stole them from the Black Sorrows. More on that later. If you are a father ...

Nelson Mandela said, “There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.” If that is the case, our society is sick beyond belief. Not only are some of our retail stores involved in promoting the overt sexualisation of our children, but government-funded programs in our schools are actively indoctrinating our children in subversive sexual ideologies. We can choose where our children ...

Oscar Wilde said, “To live is the rarest thing in the world”. William Wallace agreed when he said, “Every man dies, not every man really lives”. Really living is one of the greatest challenges a man will face. In many ways this was the sole motivation behind last weekend’s INTENSIVE that I attended at Stanwell Tops. The pamphlet introducing the INTENSIVE put it well: Most men set off to change the ...

Last week I talked about one of the greatest decisions of my life, travelling Australia with my young family for 12 months back in 1990. Many of you probably thought that it was an easy decision to make. Others probably thought, ‘How do you make good family-friendly decisions?’ Hindsight is a wonderful gift. My decision to travel Australia with my family was quite hard to make and fraught with challenges. Many ...

Let me share with you the story of one of the best decisions I ever made for my family. Travelling around Australia was the dream of a lifetime. When you live out of your heart, you will never regret it.

Guest Post: A big thank you to Ben Pratt for helping out this week and sharing his wisdom to inspire and encourage Dads. Ben is a father of four and a devoted husband who hails from Armidale in rural NSW. He is currently studying ministry and is a keen advocate for men’s issues at a local, national, and international level. ____________________________________________________________________ I have a confession to make: I find it really ...

Guest Post: A big thank you to Ben Pratt for helping out this week and sharing his wisdom to inspire and encourage Dads. Ben is a father of four and a devoted husband who hails from Armidale in rural NSW. He is currently studying ministry and is a keen advocate for men’s issues at a local, national, and international level. ___________________________________________________________________ The last time I wrote for this Newsletter, it was ...