There’s a hole in the bucket - Blunt Money

You're going to the well with you water bucket. It's a pretty good walk from where you started to get to the well. You fill your bucket with water and trek on back to where you began. Now, your bucket is empty. All that work for what? Nothing? An empty bucket? Is that what you wanted?

How did the bucket get empty? Was it because you weren't watching it? Was the water spilling over the sides as you went along?

Is there a hole in the bucket? Is the water somehow leaking out from a hole that you're not aware of? Or, is there a hole that you do know about, but you're just trying to get the bucket home before it's empty?

Alright, what does this tale of the empty bucket have to do with personal finance?

What if the bucket was your wallet or bank account. What if the water was your paycheck. What if the trek from the well to where you started was the time between paychecks?

How would you fix your bucket? Some people try to patch the hole with a short term loan. In some cases, these short term loans can be a life saver, as described in this post called Removing the Burden of Debt. But, other times, borrowing to replace the money that you lost because you were careless with your bucket, or to patch a whole is a very bad idea.

Be sure to read this post at Blunt Money There’s a hole in the bucket where there is more discussion about borrowing when you have a bucket problem!