22

The number that changed how I think about money — and why I built Live Your Financial Dreams.

I lost everything in 2009.

Not figuratively. Not “things got tight for a while.” I mean everything.

The market crashed. The real estate market followed. I’d spent years on the road doing advance and operations work — I knew many of the people I worked for, and they may or may not have known me. It wasn’t personal. It was just business. But when the economy collapsed, the companies that owed hundreds of thousands of dollars suddenly couldn’t pay — many of them entering bankruptcy protection. And when you’re on the mid to lower end of the totem pole, you’re the last one to get made whole.

Everyone was hurting. And then a political transition made it worse.

A new administration came in, and with it came an unspoken mandate — if you’d worked with the wrong candidates, you were out. Not fired. Just... erased. Doors that had been open for years closed overnight. It was like wearing a scarlet letter. Your experience, your talent, your track record — none of it mattered. You were on the wrong list.

So there I was. No income pipeline. No political cover. A crashed economy. And bills that didn’t care about any of it.

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I wish I could tell you I figured it out fast. That by 2010 I had some brilliant plan and was back on my feet.

I didn’t. And I wasn’t.

2010 was hard. 2011 was expensive — and not in a good way. 2012 was full of what I now generously call “educational opportunities.” The kind that cost you real money and teach you lessons you didn’t sign up for. I landed a few large contracts along the way — including one in 2010 where I spent eight months straight on the road living out of two suitcases. Hundreds of events. And then we got the call that Diane Sawyer — who was heading the evening news at the time — wanted to do a piece. They flew her in by helicopter. The interview became one of the most-viewed Diane Sawyer interviews of all time. That story deserves its own article. It’s coming.

But the wins were scattered, and the math still wasn’t mathing.

And here’s the thing that made it all harder — I’m dyslexic.

You know what’s not designed for a dyslexic brain? Spreadsheets. Budgeting apps. P&L statements with columns of tiny numbers that swim on the page. Richard Branson has talked openly about not being able to make sense of financial documents — to the point where he’d sit in board meetings and have to ask if the numbers being presented were good news or bad news. When I heard that, I didn’t feel sorry for him — I felt seen. Because I’d been faking my way through financial documents for years, nodding along in meetings while the numbers blurred together.

So I stopped trying to do it the “right” way. And I started doing it my way.

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I broke it down to one number.

Here’s the math — and I promise, if I can do this, you can do this.

Take every expense you have in a month. Rent, utilities, insurance, subscriptions, food, gas, entertainment, tithes/giving back, car repairs, etc — all of it. If something is paid quarterly or every six months — like car insurance — divide it down to a monthly amount and fold it in. You want one number that represents what it costs you to exist.

Now divide that number by 22.

Why 22? Because that’s the average number of working days in a month. You take weekends off. You take a sick day here, a life-happens day there. Twenty-two is what’s real.

That number — your monthly expenses divided by 22 — is your daily breakeven. That’s what you need to earn every single working day just to stay even. Not get ahead. Not save. Not invest. Just survive.

Once I had that number, everything changed.

I stopped thinking about money in these massive, overwhelming chunks that made my chest tight. I started thinking about today. Can I hit my number today? If I beat it, tomorrow gets a little lighter. If I crushed it, maybe I could take a breath on Friday.

I hustled my number. Every single day. And slowly — painfully slowly — the math started working in my favor.

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That’s the foundation of what became 22 Days to Financial Freedom.

It’s not a get-rich-quick framework. It’s not about manifestation or vision boards or “abundance mindset.” It’s reverse engineering — start with what you need, break it into daily chunks your brain can actually process, and build from there.

I designed it for the way I think. Which means it works for people who’ve been told their whole lives that they’re “not numbers people.” You don’t need to be a numbers person. You need one number and twenty-two days.

There’s a full spreadsheet behind this, and we’re building something to make it even easier to use. But the core of it? It’s what I just told you. It’s not complicated. The financial industry wants you to think money is complicated so you’ll pay someone else to manage it. But the foundation isn’t complicated at all.

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And that brings me to Live Your Financial Dreams.

I chose that name on purpose — and yes, I know it sounds big. Here’s why.

In this country, we’re wired to chase. Build more. Earn more. Achieve more. And I’m not against any of that — I built a business from zero to seven figures, so clearly I believe in the hustle.

But money isn’t the dream. Money is the tool.

One person’s financial dream is paying off their student loans and sleeping through the night without that knot in their stomach. Another person’s is funding a nonprofit. Another’s is buying a house where their kids have a yard. And someone else’s is retiring at 50 and never setting an alarm again.

All of those are valid. All of those are right.

My goal with Live Your Financial Dreams is to help people stop chasing someone else’s definition of financial success and start building toward their own. To think about how they want to live — where they want to give back, what kind of life they’re actually creating — and then reverse engineer the money to make it happen.

We’re working toward helping one million people become financially free. That’s the big, audacious, say-it-out-loud goal. And I think 22 Days to Financial Freedom is the starting line.

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Here’s your homework for the weekend — and yes, I’m giving you homework.

Pull up your bank statements. Add up what it actually costs you to live for one month. Don’t guess. Don’t round down because the real number scares you. Get the real number.

Then divide by 22.

That’s your number. Sit with it. It might be uncomfortable. But I promise you — knowing it is better than not knowing it. And once you know it, you can start building from there.

That’s how it starts. One number. Twenty-two days. And the decision to stop being afraid of the math.

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Now do me a favor. Think about one person in your life who needs to know their number. The friend who’s stressed about money but won’t look at it. The business owner who’s hustling but doesn’t know if they’re actually breaking even. The person who thinks financial freedom is for other people.

Send them this article.

And if this hit home for you — drop a comment, hit that like button, and share it. Every share helps me reach our goal of helping one million people become financially free. That’s not a tagline — that’s the mission.

Have a great Friday. I’m taking the weekend off from writing — but I’ll see you Monday.

If this resonated, subscribe to The Jenn Files. I write about business, money, resilience, and grit — cutting through the noise so you can build something that can’t be broken.