My 2018 Word of the Year

Happy New Year and Hello to 2018. I am super excited about a fresh start to the new year and super excited about the great things to come this year.

As I reflect on the past and look to the future, this year I have decided to choose a Word of the Year to be instrumental in guiding my decisions and path for the next 12 months. When carefully choosing this Word, I draw inspiration from the past 7 years of where I’ve been and aspire to where I want to go.

I launched my design firm, originally named Interior Design Solutions by Maria, in 2011. To better market myself and my services, I renamed the firm, Maria Adams Designs in 2015. Over the last 7 years, I have tremendously grown professionally and personally. I have attended dozens of seminars, workshops and trade shows to soak up the do’s and don’t’s of the biz. I have attended every High Point Furniture Market, both spring and fall, to see all the new products, check out the latest trends and search out the coolest products. I have learned a great deal about my clients, my projects, my trades and my contractors to know what works and what doesn’t. I have painstakingly learned the hard lessons of finance, how to make money and how not to lose money. I have learned about marketing, advertising, business development, relationship development, legalities, insurances, and many other things that go along with owning a buisness. And although I will never stop learning and growing, I have come to that point in my personal and professional life to go from learning and growing to making my mark.

So how does one make it’s mark? I believe making your mark means that you’ve accomplished something significant that not only makes you noticeable but also impacts others in a positive way. With that being said, I have BIG ideas and goals on how I plan to make my mark. I love setting goals and I love even more achieving my goals. I have BIG goals this year, for myself, my family, and my business. And in order to achieve these BIG goals, there are important actions I must take on a daily basis. Therefore, the word I choose this year is……

Discipline will be the back bone of every decision I make and every action I take. Foolishly thinking that I should never turn away a buck and many times ignoring my intuition, I have taken projects that were not profitable, not fun and full of stress. With discipline, I will only take the projects that are inspiring and profitable with enjoyable clients. I have allowed poor time management or someone’s else’s priorities to distract me from important weekly tasks. I’m a good planner, but with discipline I will excel at planning and achieve my duties without interruption.

My family has always been my priority however, there have been more times than not that I find myself working during family time, because I lost business hours with irrelevant tasks. I will no longer sacrifice my family time. With discipline, I will shut down each day with the satisfaction of knowing that I completed the most important work for the day.

With discipline, I will also achieve my personal goals. My personal goals are just as big as my business goals. I have spiritual goals, financial goals and health and wellness goals. I’m excited to apply discipline to those goals as well.