18th May 2026

Today, I want to talk about why having deadlines makes you do things. Without deadlines and having a fixed date to comply with, or real consequences, means we can sometimes drift, and days, weeks and even months and years can pass by quickly, without anything to show for it.
Counterintuitively, limited time yields more output. It seems backwards, but it’s so real; I’ve experienced it. A blank calendar somehow breeds procrastination and doubt, whereas having a firm deadline breeds results. I’ve yet to meet a genuinely successful person who doesn’t organise their life around deadlines.
Go on, think about your best work. I mean, truly your best work. The odds are that it was probably created under time pressure. When you have a deadline, something clicks. You stop just talking about plans and start actually executing them.
This pattern is usually consistent, no matter what you do. There’s something about a ticking clock that just makes you cut through the noise. You stop overthinking; you stop revising endlessly; you stop trying to perfect details that nobody else will notice, and you just ship your work instead.
Here are some examples:
– Students usually deliver their sharpest essays when preparing them the night before submission deadlines. The urgency of that deadline strips away all hesitation and somehow forces their best thinking onto the page.
– Similarly, you find that journalists write stronger stories when editors demand them by the next morning. That constraint forces a narrative, whereas endless time means conducting more research and going down rabbit holes.
– You also find that athletes perform objectively better in timed races than during training. There is something about the starting gun and finishing line that creates an intensity that solitary effort cannot replicate.
However, this doesn’t mean that pressure is always healthy; some people freeze under time constraints, rather than thrive as I’ve described. Additionally, having infinite deadlines with no breathing room often burns people out and degrades their work. Deadlines and their application require wisdom about pacing and recovery.
So today, remember that deadlines, whether externally-imposed or self-imposed, aren’t always burdens. They can be used proactively by you as catalysts for doing the work you have to do, because deadlines make you do things!




