To break even means to make exactly the same amount of money as you have spent on a given venture, but no more. Imagine, for example, that you set up a lemonade stall. It costs you £20 per month to rent the space for your stall; you spend another £20 on the ingredients for lemonade, and you give your little brother £10 to help you make the lemonade and sell it. So, you have spent £50 in total. If you then sell 500 glasses of lemonade for £0.10 each, you will break even - you have not made a profit but you have also not lost anything. If you sell each glass for £0.11 then you will make a profit of £5. In order to function, all a business needs to do is to break even after paying rent, electricity, tax, wages etc. Dreaming your life away means thinking of good ideas, plans, schemes etc., but never actually doing anything to make them happen.