Daily Dose 45: Liberty Bell Deadlines

Daily Dose 45: Back Planning

If only one tool could be in your priority stewardship toolkit, back planning would be the tool I would select. Maybe I favor it, because back planning is the Swiss Army knife or Leatherman of time tools—many tools ingeniously packed into one! In conjunction with the Liberty Bell Deadline—oh, wait, you probably have never heard of a Liberty Bell Deadline. We need to start over.

Daily dose 45: Liberty Bell Deadline

The Liberty Bell Deadline resulted from my most horrific experience in elementary school, an event so cataclysmic, it changed my life forever.

Fourth grade. Late Fall. Annual Parent Open House. In preparation for the grand event, we had various assignments and papers to arrange neatly on our desks before leaving for home, all intended to suitably impress our parents with our fine work when they toured the room later that evening. Part of the preparation involved recopying short paragraph reports we had written. To assure the papers made a good impression, Mr. Davis announced we would receive an “F” if they were not neatly recopied. Mine was on the Liberty Bell. I don’t remember if everyone wrote about the Liberty Bell, but I will never forget that I wrote about the Liberty Bell.

What I did forget during the school day was to recopy the paper. Late in the day, too late to recopy, I remembered. Panic-stricken, I asked if I could take it home and have my parents bring it with them to put on the desk. No.

The Three Day Ahead Rule

I have no idea whether I received that failing grade. I do not remember if my not recopied paper was on display. All I remember is that I would NEVER again be late with an assignment. Somewhere in the fog of childhood, I began to ALWAYS set a personal deadline for an assignment before the “real” deadline, usually three days. The policy has held me in good stead, and is almost a subconscious habit after applying it so many ways over the years.

The most fascinating aspect to the Liberty Bell deadline is not the actual date setting, but the mental state that comes with it. Think about this:

When someone else sets a deadline, (a boss needs a quarterly report, a sociology paper is due, moving day is set, book club is coming) and then we meet it, we did what they expected.

Unexpected Benefits of Liberty Bell Deadlines

When we set a slightly earlier deadline from the assigned one, several things happen.

Focus on Working with Lord to Achieve the Goal

First, the focus becomes working for the Lord and with the Lord to complete the task for Him, the human deadline setter retreats to second place. This is very freeing, liberating even.

Jump starts Starting with Thinking and Planning

Secondly, checking the calendar and designing the earlier deadline date is like our own personal “starting bell” for the project. We are already thinking and planning, and beginning to own the project’s outcome. His Liberty Bell deadline engages us immediately, provides padding for unexpected problems, allows time for extra-special finishing touches, and keeps us working directly for Him on almost everything we do.

The Liberty Bell has taken on a double meaning. The Bell in Philadelphia was the subject of an elementary school report, but the Bell also became a lifelong liberating habit of working from God’s starting bell to meet His deadline for assignments and tasks.

Try it. His deadline before their deadline and your life will slow down.