Quotes & Sayings About Deadlines

I don't have these crazy deadlines. I don't have this, 'Oh it's got to be out tomorrow.' I don't like working like that. — Asif Kapadia

Today we often use deadlines - real and imaginary - to imprison ourselves. — Arianna Huffington

Having deadlines helps because people are constantly breathing down my neck, and tapping their toes waiting for pages. So I just have to work nine to five. If I didn't have deadlines then I might be more of a golden hour kind of guy, writing from eight to noon and calling it a day, but that's just not the way I work right now. — David Lindsay-Abaire

When you are overworked and exhausted, there is a sense of kind of delirium and that's why I think architects do all-nighters and they kind of do those deadlines. For four days I remember doing four nights in one row with no sleep. I mean nobody, unless you are crazy, would do that, but you are totally focused on the project. — Zaha Hadid

Everybody knows the power of deadlines - and we all hate them. But their effectiveness is undeniable. — David Eagleman

I had three days to screw over Nicodemus Archleone and his crew and get this thing out of my head, without getting myself or my friend killed while I did it. — Jim Butcher

I am an artist who works very well under pressure, in fact. I like to have deadlines. — Robert Barry

Gentlemen, I've done many deals in my lifetime and through that process, I've developed a methodology, a way of doing things, a philosophy if you will. Within that philosophy, I have certain beliefs. I believe in artificial deadlines. I believe in playing one against the other. I believe in doing everything and anything short of illegal or immoral to get the damned deal done. — Ben Horowitz

I tell myself I have time. But the itch forming along the back of my neck and across my shoulders says otherwise.
I hate this. It's like I'm racing a clock ticking down to doomsday without knowing how much time I have left. — Erica Cameron

Deadlines? Surely you know someone who is late all the time. Someone who can't deliver anything of value unless they've stalled so much they've created an urgency, an emergency that requires mind-blowing effort and adrenaline to deliver. This is not efficient or reliable behavior, and yet they persist. The reason is simple: they can't push through the common fear of completion unless they can create a greater fear of total failure. — Seth Godin

The received image of a writer is that of an unproductive sensitive who suffers from the vapors, is enslaved by his gonads, falls victim to romantic swoons and passes out at deadlines. — George V. Higgins

Jodie Foster did it, Natalie Portman did it. I think it's entirely possible to juggle university with filming ... I actually think going to university will make me a better actress. The experience of living like that, working to deadlines, living with other students. It's all the things I want. There are actresses who don't know about things like doing their own laundry and getting a bus. I'm not going to be like that. For me, this is just the beginning. I've only shown a little bit of what I can do. There is so much more to come. — Emma Watson

There is a curious relationship between a candidate and the reporters who cover him. It can be affected by small things like a competent press staff, enough seats, sandwiches and briefings and the ability to understand deadlines. — Ronald Steel

I love deadlines," he said once. "I love the whooshing sound they make as they go by.") He died in May 2001 - too young. His — Douglas Adams

I suppose these deadlines we set for ourselves are really a way of saying we appreciate time, and want to use all of it. — Margaret Atwood

Stress is a choice. Do you buy that? Some people have a hard time with the idea. Yes, bad things happen: The economy sours, our business struggles, the stock market tumbles, jobs are lost, people around us don't follow through, deadlines are missed, projects fail, good people leave. Life is full of these. But still, stress is a choice because whatever the 'trigger event,' we always choose our own response. We choose to react angrily. We choose to stuff our emotions and keep quiet. We choose to worry. Stress is a choice. — John G. Miller

So called 'late-bloomers' get a bad rap. Sometimes the people with the greatest potential often take the longest to find their path because their sensitivity is a double edged sword- it lives at the heart of their brilliance, but it also makes them more susceptible to life's pains. Good thing we aren't being penalized for handing in our purpose late. The soul doesn't know a thing about deadlines. — Jeff Brown

somewhere deep inside you realize that the dream has taken a hit. It hasn't died, of course. But it has been dialed back - calibrated to the reality of deadlines, budgets, and limited resources. A similar process can happen for individuals who set out to create something, whether a book, a record album, or even a comedy routine. It's easy to "settle." At this very moment, you face a decision. — Michael Hyatt

City life is stressful. Everybody is running around like crazy, stuck in traffic jams trying to make meetings, trying to make ends meet, trying to meet deadlines, trying to get kids to and from activities. There aren't enough hours in the day for all this business. — Rebecca Pidgeon

Classic authors should be older than I am, and wiser, and on-top of all their deadlines. — Neil Gaiman

Our actions today will protect children from the adverse effects of exposure to pesticides commonly used on foods. The agency also is on schedule to meet all deadlines for ensuring safer pesticides use under the new Food Quality Protection Act. — Carol Browner

In Sikaman, deadlines are on wheels. — Nana Awere Damoah

I don't believe in deadlines, I don't believe in telling the enemy when we're going to withdraw. — Ken Buck

It really does seem that the Democrat's problem isn't that they're calling for timetables - it's that they're calling them 'timetables'. You're up against Bush and the Republicans - you've got to bring some zing. Don't call them timetables - call them 'Patriot Dates', 'Freedom Deadlines' ... 'Glory Goals'. — Jon Stewart

The hard part on the subway is that you have, let's say, eight hours, but you have to hit these deadlines. From here to here, you can use this part. From this time to this time, you can use that part, and you have to hit them and it gets very stressful. — Jaume Collet-Serra

He realized that he needed a clear mind and clear emotion to draw and execute well from the beginning to the end of his work. We draw our most potent creativity from deep wells. That is not to say we cannot exercise energy as we execute. But we often mistake time pressures, stress and deadlines, alongside the cacophony of an always-on world, as the necessary stimuli to create great work. I believe great work comes from a place of stillness where one's focus is total on the action in hand, directed fully by the heart. — Alan Moore

Historically, the 'deadline' was the line around a prison beyond which prisoners were eligible for shooting. In keeping with shifts in the exercise of control, what one was delineated spatially over life is now enforced temporarily over labor. — CrimethInc.

The lifestyle that an artist can have, the freedom to wander in the landscape with no real pressure or deadlines, was a very attractive one. — John Dyer

Being overwhelmed can lead to procrastination, which often leads to being chronically late for deadlines and appointments. Being chronically late can take a toll on your self-esteem and damage your relationships. You've probably heard your whole life that you are uncaring, selfish, immature, or worse. Executive function impairment is tied directly to a distorted sense of time and a struggle to manage it. — Terry Matlen

The best solution is to use both together: Identify the few critical tasks that contribute most to income and schedule them with very short and clear deadlines. — Timothy Ferriss

not think about time or plans or deadlines or that rust spot in my old shower that bothered me so much or that wild animal with all the teeth charging toward me called the future, — Catherine Lacey

If I had to pull an all-nighter studying for a test or too many looming deadlines had me pulling out my hair, I wouldn't end up with just some trendy coffee addiction. I'd end up in a mini-coma, face down in the middle of the studio or on the floor of the community showers. — Laekan Zea Kemp

Death, I now see, may not come when I am 85 and weary, or after I have solved all my problems or met all my deadlines. It will come whenever it damn well pleases; all I can control is the time between. So when I see something I want, I grab it. If the tulips are particularly yellow, I buy them. — Joyce Wadler

They argue that, if the governments of developed countries want a fifty-fifty chance of hitting the agreed-upon international target of keeping warming below 2 degrees Celsius, and if reductions are to respect any kind of equity principle between rich and poor nations, then wealthy countries need to start cutting their greenhouse gas emissions by something like 8 to 10 percent a year - and they need to start right now. The idea that such deep cuts are required used to be controversial in the mainstream climate community, where the deadlines for steep reductions always seemed to be far off in the future (an 80 percent cut by 2050, for instance). But as emissions have soared and as tipping points loom, that is changing rapidly. Even Yvo de Boer, who held the U.N.'s top climate position until 2009, remarked recently that "the only way" negotiators "can achieve a 2-degree goal is to shut down the whole global economy."48 — Naomi Klein

As she made coffee in the kitchen and tried to spoon the frozen ice-cream from its carton without snapping the shaft off the spoon, Elizabeth was struck, not for the first time, by the thought that her life was entirely frivolous.
It was a rush and slither of trivial crises; of uncertain cash-flow, small triumphs, occasional sex and too many cigarettes; of missed deadlines that turned out not to matter; of arguments, new clothes, bursts of altruism and sincere resolutions to address the important things. Of all these and the other experiences that made up her life, the most significant aspect was the one suggested by the words 'turned out not to matter'. Although she was happy enough with what she had become, it was this continued sense of the easy, the inessential nature of what she did, that most irritated her. She thought of Tom Brennan, who had known only life or death, then death in life. In her generation there was no intensity. — Sebastian Faulks

'House of Balloons' was special because I had no deadlines, and nobody knew me, so there were no expectations. Spent a year making it perfect. Every song had at least, like, 7 different versions to them before picking the right one. — The Weeknd

There was something about the possession of a book that was important to me. Owning it gave me proprietary rights on the story. It meant that I could read as quickly or as slowly as I liked. No expectations, no deadlines, no proscriptions on bent spines or crumpled pages. I was not gentle on my books. I read while I ate, I read in the bathtub. At night, I rolled over on top of my books that had fallen between the covers as I dozed. For me, the worn pages and tattered covers were a sign of devotion. Like the Velveteen Rabbit, the books I read were only real when they were loved. And I understood that love was not always gentle. — Georgia Bell

If the novels are still being read in 50 years, no one is ever going to say: 'What's great about that sixth book is that he met his deadline!' It will be about how the whole thing stands up. — George R R Martin

Deadlines are things that we pass through on the way to finishing. — Peter Gabriel

We found that the students with the three firm deadlines got the best grades; the class in which I set no deadlines at all (except for the final deadline) had the worst grades; and the class in which Gaurav and his classmates were allowed to choose their own three deadlines (but with penalties for failing to meet them) finished in the middle, in terms of their grades for the three papers and their final grade. — Dan Ariely

The more you create, the more ambitious you become with your projects. Short films were a direct result of over 200 web series sketches and vlogs. After you create enough 2-minute videos, you start to wonder what else there is. Deadlines and discipline and quantity with a focus on quality have always been what keeps me going. — Anna Akana

Publishers give you deadlines for those last phases of production that are perfectly comfortable for them. So, to whatever extent I can, I like to push those to give me a little more time, and make it so that they're as uncomfortable as I am. — Charles Frazier

We still should have enough time to reach Rome."
Hazel scowled. "When you say should have enough ... "
Leo shrugged. "How do you feel about barely enough?"
Hazel put her face in her hands for a count of three. "Sounds about typical for us. — Rick Riordan

Goals are dreams with deadlines. — Diana Hunt

We'd met at university, where he was studying medicine and I was studying social awkwardness and a catastrophic inability to cope with deadlines. — Tammy Cohen

The best writing deadlines are poverty and death. — Victor LaValle

[Electronic newspapers will bring] plenty of ulcers for journalists because they'll have new deadlines every 60 seconds. It'll be a race to file. On the other hand, because space is infinite there will hopefully be more room for thoughtful pieces, longer pieces, the kind that a journalist wishes he or she could do but doesn't have the space. — Russ Wilcox

When I'm working on comics, I have to give myself a million deadlines, or I'd never get anything done. Comics are just so hard to make - I find it very difficult to motivate myself. — Jessica Abel

I've never been good with deadlines. My early novels, I wrote by myself. No one knew I was writing a novel; I didn't have a contract. — George R R Martin

One, I push my deadlines closer than anybody else, or let's say it this way: I'm really late. — Aaron McGruder

When I've got massive projects to be getting on with, I find myself open to distractions, particularly when deadlines are involved. — Max Tundra

You put deadlines on people you really don't want, because that's how you feel about them. — Al Leiter

Typically creative people are usually not clock-slaves or list-makers, so the idea of enforcing goals and deadlines can be somewhat daunting. — Kristin Armstrong

I spent the year behind on deadlines and everything else. It's only now in December that I feel even slightly caught up. 2016 has to be better. — Justine Larbalestier

The deadlines are much, much longer with books. When I was a reporter, a lot of times I'd come in at 8:30 a.m., get an assignment right away, interview somebody, turn the story in by 9:30, and have the finished story in the paper that landed on my desk by noon. — Margaret Haddix

I like doing research that has an impact. If I went to a company to make what they call 'real money,' I'd be just trying to make a system work as fast as possible to meet the product and serice deadlines. — Bjarne Stroustrup

Normally I miss deadlines like a storm trooper misses Jedi. — Patrick Rothfuss

A deadline is a finish line. Don't stop 'til the door shuts in your face! — Raven Moore

I've always worked on all different types of music, some with specific project goals and deadlines and some not. Sometimes I would write a piece of music that is almost like a film score or weird electro pieces, wherever the muse took me, and I still do that. — Serj Tankian

I envy people who can think, 'No, I'm not going to work today' when they have a huge pile of deadlines stacking up. — Julian Fellowes

Capable psychonauts who think about thinking, about states of mind, about set and setting, can get things done not because they have more willpower or drive, but because they know productivity is a game played against a childish primal human predilection for pleasure and novelty that can never be excised from the soul. Your effort is better spent outsmarting yourself than making empty promises through plugging dates into a calendar or setting deadlines for push-ups. — David McRaney

When I looked up at my father as a boy, I thought being a man was having control. Being the master and commander of your own destiny. How could any boy know that freedom is lost the moment you become a man. Things start to count. To press in. Constricting slowly, inevitably, creating a cage of inconveniences and duties and deadlines and failed plans and lost friends. I — Pierce Brown

Singles have goals, responsibilities, deadlines, events, and friends that occupy their time, as well they should. Nonetheless, before any goals are achieved, responsibilities are fulfilled, deadlines are met, events are attended or friends are visited, God's purpose should be accomplished. — Monica Johnson

The masculine heart needs a place where nothing is prefabricated, modular, nonfat, zip lock, franchised, on-line, microwavable. Where there are no deadlines, cell phones, or committee meetings. Where there is room for the soul. — John Eldredge

You don't need special traits, special genes, or special motivation to write a lot. You don't need to want to write--people rarely feel like doing unpleasant tasks that lack deadlines--so don't wait until you feel like it. Productive writing comes from harnessing the power of habit, and habits come from repetition

p.129 — Paul J. Silvia

Deadlines aren't bad. They help you organize your time. They help you set priorities. They make you get going when you might not feel like it. — Harvey MacKay

As for a fashion designer, you have those very precise deadlines to keep so you have to renew yourself constantly every three or six months. When you think about it, it's so intense. — Gaspard Ulliel

There are no unrealistic goals, only unrealistic deadlines. — Brian Tracy

Meeting external deadlines is much harder than meeting internal ones. On the other hand, internal deadlines sometimes don't feel real, and are therefore easy to evade. — James Surowiecki

Polly was a writer of many deadlines. There were the ignorable deadlines, the not-to-be-taken-too-seriously deadlines: the deadlines-before-the-deadlines deadlines, and finally, the no-kidding-around deadlines. She set these various dates, she'd told him, to fool herself. — Martha Grimes

Rather than worrying about work, schedules, and deadlines, I felt at peace with God. He was in control. The world at large would not crumble because I turned off my iPhone. This is how it's supposed to be. For the first time in who knows how long, I felt like myself. Fully alive. Fully present. And fully aware of God's goodness. — Craig Groeschel

Habitual procrastinators will readily testify to all the lost opportunities, missed deadlines, failed relationships and even monetary losses incurred just because of one nasty habit of putting things off until it is often too late. — Stephen Richards

I think setting goals is critical; having deadlines for ourselves- how much by when? Too many people have these big dreams where they want to have a big house on the ocean. But until we say what ocean, how big, what day, our conscience doesn't know what to do with that information. A positive expectancy, a positive attitude, a belief that your dream is possible is also helpful. — Jack Canfield

We city dwellers, we residents of Los Angeles and the surrounding areas, are for the most part urbanized to some extent. We know deadlines, start times and traffic. — Henry Rollins

A hammer made of deadlines is the surest tool for crushing writer's block. — Ryan Lilly

It may sound as though she wants a simple PowerPoint presentation about the business, but if she's hoping to persuade a client of something, you'll want your slides to help do that. Be clear, too, about deadlines and who needs to be looped in on the project. — Kate White

Dreams without deadlines are dead in the water. Deadlines are really lifelines to achieving our goals. — Mark Batterson

I often wonder, if there were no deadlines, would anything ever get ended? — Judith Weir

When you are a free and independent writer, without employer, without hours or deadlines, you have to play little games to force yourself into the actual writing. For me, one game is to announce...that I have finally decided on my next book, that I am ready to write it...to put my pride on the line. — Irving Wallace

We can draw no deadlines for God. He hastens or He delays as he sees fit. And his timing is all-loving toward his children. On, that we might learn to be patient in the hour of darkness. I don't mean that we make peace with darkness. We fight for joy. But we fight as those who are saved by grace and held by Christ. We say ... that our night will soon- in God's good timing- turn to day. — John Piper

Now I know that there's no such thing as the truth. That people are constantly misquoted. That news organizations are full of conspiracy (and that, in any case, ineptness is a kind of conspiracy). That emotional detachment and cynicism get you only so far. But for many years I was in love with journalism. I loved the city room. I loved the pack. I loved smoking and drinking scotch and playing dollar poker. I didn't know much about anything, and I was in a profession where you didn't have to. I loved the speed. I loved the deadlines. I loved that you wrapped the fish. You can't make this stuff up, I used to say. — Nora Ephron

Successful people always have their next goal in mind. Goals are dreams with deadlines. — Sarah Robbins

How could any boy know that freedom is lost the moment you become a man. Things start to count. To press in. Constricting slowly, inevitably, creating a cage of inconveniences and duties and deadlines and failed plans and lost friends. I'm tired of people doubting. Of people choosing to believe they know what is possible because of what has happened before. — Pierce Brown

Why are you so petrified of silence, here can you handle this? Did you think about your bills, your ex, your deadlines or when you think you're gonna die? Or did you long for the next distraction ... — Alanis Morissette

A deadline should not prevent you from writing, but writing will help prevent you from missing your deadline. Then write a word. Then remind yourself of that again. And then write another and hey, look at you! You're spitting in that deadline's eye. — Courtney Summers

But even writing the column for the 'Telegraph,' that idea of working to deadlines, which as an actor that's not something you have to do in the same way. It's excited me into wanting to do a bit more. — Dan Stevens

Wasted strokes, like missed deadlines, are preventable and costly. — Lorii Myers

Deadlines are like a drug for me. I hate and need them. — Todd Strasser

Dreams don't have deadlines ... — LL Cool J

Perhaps the most damaging aspect of the Obamacare tech nightmare is how wholly predictable it all was. Anyone who has been involved in building the most rudimentary of web operations knows nothing ever works as it's supposed to. Even awesome Apple, mighty Microsoft, and gargantuan Google miss deadlines. — Tina Brown

I surrender my anxiety and my sense of urgency. I allow God to guide me in the pacing of my life. I open my heart to God's timing. I release my deadlines, agendas, and stridency to the gentle yet often swift pacing of God. As I open my heart to God's unfoldings, my heart attains peace. As I relax into God's timing, my heart contains comfort. As I allow God to set the tone and schedule of my days, I find myself in the right time and place, open and available to God's opportunities. — Julia Cameron

I didn't really want deadlines and editorial work. I wanted something mechanical and eight hours a day. So I went to work, thinking it was easy - ha, ha - on the complaint desk at the circulation department. — Katharine Graham

Self-imposed insanely impossible deadlines often help. — David Hieatt

Dreams don't have deadlines. Believe in yourself. — LL Cool J

Deadlines are meant to be broken. And I just keep breaking them. — Sarah McLachlan

Red lights, green lights, stop and go jive. Headlines, deadlines, jamming your mind. — Billy Squier

I fell in love with Twitter. Fathers, lock up your deadlines. — David Edelstein

The rewards system of the traditional workplace keeps us on track, in line with deadlines from the higher-ups. If we adhere to it, the deeply embedded rewards system of our adult lives is likely to keep s employed and secure within the status quo ... However, these tendencies become destructive as soon as we begin to pursue long-term goals or attempt something extraordinary — Scott Belsky

I want to keep going as I have, to travel, read, perform, write, and enjoy my family. I've promised myself only this: no more Laundromats, no more two-shows-a-night, and no more deadlines. I'll work at my own pace. — Jimmy Buffett

Deadlines refine the mind. They remove variables like exotic materials and processes that take too long. The closer the deadline, the more likely you'll start thinking waaay outside the box. — Adam Savage