Hey, it's Marie, and welcome to another episode of The Marie Forleo Podcast, and today's

question comes from Belinda, a student in my Time Genius program who asked,

Hey Marie, I'd love your take on deadlines.

If there's no actual project deadline, no outside party waiting on me to deliver, except

for when I want my project done, how do I set realistic time goals when I want the freedom

to take as long as I want, and I don't want the burden of feeling pressured or behind?

Belinda, this is a fantastic question.

So first up, it's important to remember that deadlines exist for a reason, because they

really work.

So lots of psychological research has been done to back this up, right, to back up the

power of deadlines.

So for example, Dan Airelli did a study several years back where he had three different groups

of students.

One were given no deadlines.

Others created their own deadlines, and then a third group had to stick to the deadlines

set by their professor.

Guess what happened?

At the end of the semester, it turned out that the students with no deadlines performed

the worst, and the students with externally imposed deadlines performed the best.

So the bottom line is that yes, even though deadlines can sometimes be uncomfortable and annoying,

they are a fantastic tool to help us perform better and actually get things done.

But the real answer to your question, Belinda, is actually found in a powerful question.

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