In an episode of Sex And The City, the lead character Carrie Bradshaw, once poignantly concluded, “Maybe the past is like an anchor holding us back. Maybe, you have to let go of who you were to become who you will be.”
In extraordinarily different circumstances, in a far cry from the glamorous lives portrayed on SATC, a 21-year-old homeless woman named Dani Johnson, came to roughly the same conclusion, though perhaps, through a more excruciating journey.
She made a meager living as a cocktail waitress in Hawaii, and was living out of her car with just two dollars and three cents to her name and $35,000 in debt. Haunted by a childhood filled with brutal and systematic physical and sexual abuse, she attempted suicide following a cocaine binge – but in that moment, ironically, her life changed forever.
Today Dani Johnson is a multi-millionaire many times over, runs five companies and spends her time jetting around the world, giving back through her various charities.
How she went on to make her first million despite a tortured past and despite being homeless, is the stuff of entrepreneurial legend.
Her story suggests, as Dr. Phil would put it, “It doesn’t matter what your mama did; it doesn’t matter what your daddy didn’t do. Nobody but you is responsible for your life. You are responsible for the energy that you create for yourself.”