The day after a deadline

Very few things compete with the feeling of waking up the day after a submission deadline. There is a special kind of relief when you can do nothing more. The PDF is in the database. The submission system is closed. You are in the hands of the peer-reviewer. Time for contemplation. And rest.

It’s amazing how much energy and productive a deadline can produce. Focus, activity, collaboration, ideas and output. It flows out from the concept of a time set after which you can do nothing more about it. And you want to do it. Such a good couple of concepts to make things happen!

What if I could trick my brain and tell myself I have a very important deadline before I really have to do something about the thing I really want to have done? A point in time before I really have to do it or otherwise I can do nothing more about it. But to act upon the deadline I need to believe it’s real and if I have made it up for myself, I know it’s made up and nothing happens when the deadline passes. Just that nothing happens.

Maybe this is one of the most important strengths with the collective. If we want to live, work and act together in the world, we need to agree on deadline. Before which it has to happen. Or it’s too late. And something else happens. And that is what we don’t want to happen and therefor we stick to the deadline.

I love deadlines. Especially the day after.

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