About 5 months ago, my close friend and photographer Josh (aka Aurelius) encouraged me to make my 100 Life Goals list. It’s a list of a bunch of things I’d like to accomplish by the time I’m 35. If you know you me, you know how obsessed I am about setting goals and achieving them.  I also believe that in order to get ahead you need to track where you’ve been and give yourself a pat on the back. While I am always trying to push myself to get to the next level, I believe it’s so important to acknowledge our victories.  This is a birthday post to myself recognizing all the things I did from 24 to 25.

Here are 25 thing I accomplished in my business by 25:

1. Attended A Conference

There were a few conferences I wanted to attend this year including Blogging While Brown and Alt Summit. I wanted to be more intentional in investing in experiences with like minded bloggers and creative business owners.  After going to Marshawn Evans’ Make Money Speaking Tour, I ended up signing up for her Speak For Pay conference that was Atlanta Georgia from April 8 – 11.

2. Hosted A Webinar

I hosted a webinar called Making Things Happen with my sister, Mattie. It was awesome being able to collaborate on something with her. We had a chance to motivate our social audience to jump start their dreams.  You can see some of the tweets from the virtual event by searching for #mthwebinar on Twitter.

3. Hosted A Workshop

This past weekend I held my very first paid in person workshop. It was such a cool and amazing experience. I’m honestly super proud of myself, and can’t wait to turn this into a virtual experience for my out of state followers who couldn’t attend.  I’m extremely grateful for the 3 people that drove from out of town to attend. This was exactly what I needed to boost my confidence to start my speaking career.

[Tweet “In order to get ahead, you need to track where you’ve been.”]

4. Invested In A Coach

After attending the Speak For Pay conference, I made the biggest investment in my business EVER. I enrolled in Marshawn Evans‘ coaching program. I 100% believe that coaches need coaches, and if I wanted to learn from someone, I wanted it to be a millionaire woman of faith. I’m so excited about all that I’ve learned from her and all that she has left to teach me. 25 is going to be a year of abundance and excellent speaking opportunities. 🙂

5. Joined A Mastermind Group

My mastermind group consists of the awesome people who are in the same coaching program as I am.  This is amazing because I am amongst people who INVEST in themselves. There’s “business owners” and then there’s business owners. I want to be around the people are as hungry for it as I am. I also have an accountability partner in the group which is amazing. She calls me to make sure I have my sh*t together, and I REALLY appreciate that.

[Tweet “Surround yourself with people who are just as hungry as you are.”]

6. Collaborated With Another Business Owner

So my new business bestie these past couple months as been Mariah Coz from Femtrepreneur.co. Like, I love her. I’m mad I haven’t known her since I came out the womb because I feel like we were destined to meet. She and I held a webinar together to offer a package for her Your First 1K course and my Blogademics course. Now we talk every single day and scheme and think of money making plans. 🙂

[Tweet “@MariahCoz is so damn cool.”]

7. Became A Coach

I love love love love working with creative business owners who are set on taking their business to new heights. Coaching has been such an amazing opportunity, and I really believe that teaching is a huge part of my calling.

8. Became A Mentor

This was definitely an interesting journey. It helped me understand exactly who I’d like to work with and what guidelines I’ll set moving forward when I ever decide to become a mentor again.

9. Incorporated My Business

I’m legit as of September 2014. I was hustling the first few years. 🙂

10. Opened Up A Business Account

Super, duper legit.

11. Created Multiple Streams Of Income

Finally offering coaching and launching my course allowed me to earn an additional income along with my design services.

12. Took My Blog Seriously

Starting my blog and treating it like a business has really impacted how I built my audience and network. The blogging community is SO SO SO uplifting and encouraging. It’s also given me a chance to prove my expertise and connect with new clients, bloggers and creative business owners.

13. Wrote An eBook

I wrote an ebook with over 40 pages on how to make your website more profitable. You can get it for free here. 🙂

14. Created An Online Course

In January I launched Blogademics which is an online course for creatives who want to build, brand and monetize their blog from scratch in 45 days. The members in there are SO awesome. I love being able to grow with them in our private Facebook community.

15. Built A Team

The hardest part about growing my business has been building a team that is reliable. I’m still working on it, but I have assistants that are helping me with “little” tasks that take a lot of my time away from coming up with valuable content.

[Tweet “I would totally work for Maya just to learn from her.”]

16. Received Testimonials

This is a big part of building your business because it’s not just about how good YOU say you are.  My clients rave about me, and I love it.

17. Learned To Become A Speaker

If you’ve seen my videos from earlier this year compared to seeing me speak now, you can definitely see my growth. I’m much more confident in my presentation, and have worked on my voice inflection which is HUGE. It’s so easy for me to be monotone.

18. Learned My Craft To The Best Of My Ability

I study experts like it’s my job. Before I hired a coach, I allowed myself to be coached from afar. I signed up for newsletters, read blogs, and eventually invested in some eBooks, programs, products and courses. I study how emails are written, when blog posts are released, the length of a blog post, and all the little [BUT IMPORTANT] stuff that people don’t pay attention to.

19. Tracked My Finances

Since I decided to be all legitimate, I decided I would start tracking my income and expenses. I’ve started income reports which has been the most transparent part of being a business owner. Entrepreneurship is SCARY!!! I’m fortunate that I work for myself full-time, but not knowing the exact number to expect (like you would with 9 – 5 paycheck) can make your armpits sweat a little. I’m still waiting to break $7,000 in a month. I’ve been doing a lot of transitioning while I grow as an entrepreneur, and it’s almost like starting from scratch. I believe 25 is going to be a good year, though. I’ve learned, invested and worked too much to not have a successful year.

20. Work On My Personal Development (Develop a good work ethic)

A lot of being a good business owner has to do with being a good person. You learn how to communicate with your team and with your clients. You learn your strengths and your weaknesses. This is huge.

[Tweet “Build on your strengths. Delegate your weaknesses.”]

21. Learned To Take Criticism

Constructive criticism is meant to help you grow. If someone close to you gives you feedback it’s because they’re helping, not hating. Take constructive criticism seriously, not personally.

[Tweet “If someone close to you is giving you feedback its because they’re helping, not hating.”]

22. Learned How To Use My Time Wisely

I acknowledge that my time is best spent thinking up great ideas and executing on them. Responding to emails and making edits to client work takes up a lot of time that I should delegate to other people. I’ve also disciplined myself to not tweet and watch Netflix all day. Spend your time wisely, kids.

[Tweet “Treat your time like money and you’ll have more of both.”]

23. Recognized Real Opportunities

People will reach out to you and offer you great “opportunities” and you have to be careful of how these opportunities are beneficial to you. BUT when you know you’ve been waiting on an opportunity to arise, but you hesitate because it seems scary, do not ignore that feeling. No more waiting around. Seize it. As soon as it comes to you. OR. Go find it yourself.

[Tweet “The opportunity of a lifetime must be seized in the lifetime of the opportunity.”]

24. Learned To Ignore Fear

If I allowed fear to stop me from going places I need to be and doing things I need to do, I would be poor and sad. Fear is bullshit. Dont ever allow it to own you.

25. Pissed Off Some Clients

I just had to save the best for last. You can do everything in your power to make people happy or run your business with integrity, but at the end of the day, we’re people first.  I’ve never let a relationship end negatively, BUT sometimes I have to hold the responsibility of making a client unhappy. When things like this happen I use it as a learning experience to tighten up my process. It always helps me gain clarity on who I want to work with (my audience) and the services I want to offer (my niche). Pissing off clients is just another part of growth.

I can’t believe I’ve made it to my mid 20’s.  I don’t really want to accept the fact that I’m a real adult. Wah! 24 has been good to me and 25 will be great.  What are some things you’ve accomplished since your last birthday? I’d love to hear from you!