What's your Number?

I continue to see that financial firm's (ING I think) commercial with the guy walking around with "his number". The next door neighbor say's his number is a Gazillion - clearly a SWAG and without a thought of "how much is enough".

Back in 2001 my financial advisor (T.A.) helped pull together a financial forecast and we discussed "my number". Next I had the challenge of figuring out - was it enough (and endless question)?

We spend a lifetime thinking implicitly about "the number" - trying to earn it, save it, invest it, and give it away. K.C. and I talked about this yesterday. What if suddenly (like winning the lottery) the number changed significantly (we only talked about the number going up not down).

Do you calibrate "up" your number - basically saying "enough earlier was not enough"? Or do you say the surprise excess can be given away? Giving away "a big number" can be stressful. I know, I know - you are saying please let me have that problem.

Everyone has that problem today regardless of the relative certainty of your number (in actual terms or forecasted). In his book "Wealthy and Wise", Claude Rosenberg plays around with "the number" with the premise that we can give more than we think.

Remember - it's only a number.