Deadline Quotes

I’ve had to write a column an hour after I’ve come back from a funeral. A deadline is a deadline, I mean, that was just what my job was.

The hardest part of writing is the first draft, and the closer you get to your deadline, the messier your workspace becomes – but that’s the same with any creative outlet.

I write on weekends, on vacation, and, really – on deadline and on my floor. Both terrible for the back.

I’m nicer on tax day than I am when I’m on deadline.

When I was in college or working, I had the luxury of writing on whatever subject. Now, I’m in the business, I have a deadline and pressures. Sometimes, I have to do things that I am not in the mood for.

I would never finish a painting if I didn’t have a deadline.

At some point, I would like to write a book and other things, but I work best when there is some sort of deadline in my own mind, but not when fifty people or fifty million people are breathing down the back of my neck.

I was in a weight-cutting sport, in judo, so I had to be a certain weight on a deadline. It kind of pushed me into having a really unhealthy relationship with food in my teens. I felt like if I wasn’t exactly on weight, I wasn’t good-looking.

The value of a story like ‘Deadline’ is kids get to look at death at the perfect distance. They can put the book down. They can experience the story, rub up against it, but it’s not real life.

I find that it takes a lot of years of living, and many more of reckoning, to come up with one worthwhile paragraph. And when a deadline looms, prayer doesn’t hurt, either.

I always want to have time to experiment, and have transitional things, and have these weird non-songs, but usually the stuff I’m working on comes down to this weird deadline, where it just never happens, and it’s kind of a bummer.

I could not do what I do, and teach a class, and never miss a deadline, never be late for anything if I was a lush, OK? I would really love to read a piece that said, ‘He is not a lush.’ That would be fabulous, it would be a first, I could show it to people and say, ‘Look!’

For us, there is no such thing as failure. You can’t miss a deadline; you can’t come up short on an assignment. You have to perform, period.

I have a deadline. I’m glad. I think that will help me get it done.

Good intentions aren’t enough. People have good intentions when they set a goal to do something, but then they miss a deadline or other milestone.

The premise of ‘Deadline’ forced me to go against my own grain with a character determined to find all that is valuable in that time. I believe this is a story about redemption; how, even with the best intentions, it’s sometimes found and sometimes not.

‘This will pass and it always does.’ I consistently have to keep telling myself that because being an entrepreneur means that you go to those dark places a lot, and sometimes they’re real. You’re wondering if you can you make payroll. There is a deadline, and you haven‘t slept in a while. It’s real.

The only deadline is the one I give myself.

The drug plans our seniors choose will define their health care options for years to come. If they do not make a decision and wait until the May 15 deadline passes, they will face penalties and higher prices for the drugs that they need.

I write because it feels good, and I don’t have a deadline, and I don’t have people telling me what they want me to write. Maybe if I did, I wouldn’t be very good at it.

Dream up big, hairy, audacious goals that you are passionate about and pursue them relentlessly. You have to begin with the end goal in mind, knowing that a goal is a dream with a deadline.

Jerry often says that Slam Bradley was really the forerunner of Superman, because we turned it out with no restrictions, complete freedom to do what we wanted; the only problem was that we had a deadline.

When you wait to the last minute, you rush to get things done, and the closer you get to the deadline, the less options you have.

I once set myself a deadline: half a chapter a week, 20 minutes a day. The thought froze me instantly, like literary Botox. I returned to my non-schedule: sleeping, writing 20 minutes, and then back to sleep. Breakfast in bed, with juice congealing on the sill: pages and pages began to pour out again.

I think every artist needs a rule that’s stupid but that helps him, like a deadline would.

I always think the most important thing for a writer is a deadline, and it’s the same with a house. They say you shouldn’t make an emotional decision with a house, but I think it is the only decision you can make.

The thing about having a deadline like a baby is that it sharpens the pencil. It makes sure stuff gets done.

Peace is not the product of a victory or a command. It has no finishing line, no final deadline, no fixed definition of achievement. Peace is a never-ending process, the work of many decisions.

We are always rushing to an appointment or trying to meet a deadline.

I am a world expert on how to organise tasks in a senseless order, totally unrelated to priority, and thus create a massive panic leading up to an important deadline.

Cooking involves a deadline and hungry people and ingredients that expire in a week. It’s stressful. Cooking happens on the stove and on the clock. Baking happens with ingredients that last for months and come to life inside a warm oven. Baking is slow and leisurely.

I do try to deliver a solid first draft, meaning it’s my tenth or twentieth draft and then I call it ‘first’ and hand it in, much to the chagrin of the studio sometimes when they look at the contract and go, ‘You’ve passed your deadline.’

Your best ideas, those eureka moments that turn the world upside down, seldom come when you’re juggling emails, rushing to meet the 5 P.M. deadline or straining to make your voice heard in a high-stress meeting. They come when you’re walking the dog, soaking in the bath or swinging in a hammock.

OK, so I never had a transfer in my career, but I used to love deadline day: Dimitar Berbatov turning up at Manchester airport with hours to go, Robinho coming to Manchester City instead of Chelsea.

As you schedule individual tasks, give yourself a cushion. Mark the due date a few days ahead of the actual deadline so you have time to deal with changes or last-minute emergencies.

I definitely learned that when I want something done, I’m very tunnel-visioned out. I don’t come out of the house. I beat myself up. I don’t eat. I don’t sleep until it’s done, especially if I have a deadline in mind.

Peace is not a matter of prizes or trophies. It is not the product of a victory or command. It has no finishing line, no final deadline, no fixed definition of achievement.

There’s a photograph of me in the transplant unit where I have a vomit bucket under one arm, I have my laptop on my knees, and I’m crying, not because, you know, I’m about to have a bone marrow transplant, but because I’ve missed a deadline!