A few years ago, New York Times reporter Phyllis Korkki was writing a column about deadlines. Using the column itself to illustrate the power of deadlines, she noticed that she never really got started until she announced to her coworkers that she planned to write it and set a date for when she would hand it in.
The idea of letting her coworkers down and endangering her own reputation helped Korkki meet her deadline. The experience got her thinking: How could more people, including her, approach long-term personal projects with the same sense of urgency? That’s when she discovered the topic of the book that she had wanted to write for the past forty years. The result is her inspiring and humorous new book, THE BIG THING: How to Complete Your Creative Project Even if You’re Lazy, Self-Doubting Procrastinator Like Me.