After you have a fully funded emergency fund, your next pile of savings should be aptly named your "go to hell" fund. What is this fund for? Simply, it gives you the ability to tell your employer/professors/significant other/etc to "to go hell" should the need arise.
While your emergency fund should only come into play during an actual emergency (job loss, emergency car repairs, the fridge dies, etc), your "go to hell" fund can be used in the following situations:
- You hate your job and literally can't survive another day at work. An immediate sabbatical is called for.
- You need a (possibly permanent) break from your significant other and are willing to take the next plane to anywhere to accomplish this.
- You come upon a once in a lifetime opportunity and after careful consideration, determine that it is something that you want to throw your money at (it may be a business opportunity, a classic car, a can't-miss investment, etc).
- You realize you just spent the better part of your undergraduate life (and a huge chunk of your parent's money) to work towards a degree in a field that you recently decided you would never want to work in. You hear the siren call of trade school...
Anyway, you get the idea. To develop this fund, you will first want to determine the amount of money that you want to have in this fund (a range of $5,000 to $50,000 seems like a good amount). Next you want to build this fund as quickly as possible--sell stuff, get an extra job, put all "found" money (birthday checks, rebates, etc) into it. A huge amount of drive and momentum will do wonders to get this account filled up fast so that when the mood strikes, you can simply say "go to hell" and be able to back up such words with cold, hard cash.
