I’m venturing into uncharted territory. I’m about to become an Entrepreneur! This adds nicely to my many other supposed titles, writer, producer, reporter, blogger, wife, mother, daughter, sister, aunt and friend.

We all have so many different titles, but who are we really? Ever think of that? Ever ponder why you are here? What are you meant to do? What is your function in all of this dysfunction? Well, I don’t know, I’m doing the same thing that you are doing, searching. I’m always looking for the meaning of life. I grew up with parents who always told me that life was all about helping others. Family has always been my priority and helping others has also always been the core of my parent’s existence. So yes, I am jumping in to this new title but it does not define who I am. I am a human being who is having many experiences and evolving.

Back to my new title, simply defined, an entrepreneur is a person who identifies a need and starts a business to fill that void. But this definition doesn’t really give you insight into what really makes a successful Entrepreneur. Here’s what 20 company founders and business leaders told Business News Daily about what they think makes a truly successful entrepreneur.

1. To be courageous and sometimes reckless to actually do it, check!
2. To be constantly hungry,  the idea that you are never satisfied with how things are, check!
3. To have a mindset, a way of thinking and acting. It is about recognizing an opportunity and capturing its value, check!
4. To balance vision with a willingness to embrace change, that’s my weak point, but I’m working on it.
5. To go into uncharted territory and to be able to deal with the roller coaster of emotions that comes with failing, this one is really hard but I’m ready to conquer it.

I can go on and on but here is the shortcut of it, in order to be a successful entrepreneur you have to:

• make a passion of learning,
• to have courage and perseverance,
• to stay optimistic when things fall apart.
• be people oriented,
• to see opportunity everywhere,
• to take calculated risks,
• to look at the bigger picture,
• to have the creativity to question, the strength to believe and the courage to move,
• be wired to be driven by an innate need to create, build and grow,
• to push the naysayers aside, and turn possibility into a reality,
• to be able to take the bumps in the road and remain focused

That said, being an entrepreneur means being in full control of your destiny. If that’s something that is meaningful to you then all of the challenges associated with striking out on one’s own are worth it. And, this one is something that’s important to me. You need to be supportive of other women who are venturing out to do what you are doing. As women, we need to be supportive of one another. That’s what I teach my daughter, to be happy when her friends succeed and be supportive.

I’m focusing on my dream, I have many things on the burner, but this one is ready to happen. I have an online children’s store opening on Monday.  It’s something I’ve been meaning to do for about 10 years, since my little girl was two. Now she is 12, about to turn 13 in three months…better late than never.

My store,  Aria & Sophia is named after my daughter Sophia and my niece Aria, the two girls who own my heart. The desire to open a store that reflects my style has been something that my daughter Sophia has inspired.

Aria & Sophia will launch tomorrow. I would love to know what you think. Feel free to shop for the little one’s in your life,.

Stay tuned….www.ariaandsophia.com debuting on Monday, January 21st.