You have to be ready to say no, and say no repeatedly, and say no inflexibly and incontrovertibly, if you want to survive the Achievement Season. The Achievement Season begins the morning after Labor Day. This is the time of year when, every time the phone rings, it's someone saying, "We need you to chair the auction."

People have come back from vacation with big plans that are designed to ruin your life. At the beach they've vowed to accomplish more, live larger, expand their circle of influence, network more, delegate more, take on new challenges, etc. -- which is to say, they're going to be gunning for you. You are going to be part of their plans. Here's a crucial bit of advice: Hide.

They're going to do something big, fabulous, impressive, important, and Earth-changing, and you are going to address all the envelopes.

They're going to end World Unpleasantness, and you can be part of their wonderful scheme as chairperson of the Do All the Actual Work Committee.

The best-run organizations and institutions have people who are charged with saying no to the bright ideas that pop up during Achievement Season. They know that most ideas, in general, are bad ideas. Only about 15 percent of ideas are even doable, and of those, two out of three are demonstrably stupid. Even good ideas have an opportunity cost, in that their execution might drain resources that could be better targeted toward better ideas. Thus naysayers play a crucial filtering role: They quash, hinder, undermine and redirect without completely suppressing the creative and noble instincts from which the bad (and not-good-enough) ideas emerged. Often these people have sunny personalities, the better to disguise the fact that, in the organization, they fill the role of Terminator.

In your private life you must have your own Terminator function, your own Naysayer module, operating at all times, particularly when people are feeling a lot of initiative. It can be tricky, because you also want to please people and fulfill some role in the broader social contract. Also if you're not careful you'll wind up on the clean-up crew. Sometimes it helps to invent a chronic ailment that can "flare up" at opportune moments, i.e., "I'd love to join you but my Ebola is acting up."

Worst of all is when the person emerging from vacation with the preposterous ambitions happens to be you. Let's say you've decided, over the summer, to write a novel. This is undoubtedly because you like the concept of having written a novel, and have not adequately pondered what it would require to write a novel. You haven't grasped how much effort goes into persuading someone to publish it, or the long hours of writing and rewriting, or those difficult moments when you doubt the wisdom of having a plot that pivots on the discovery that the Earth is hollow. And you haven't contemplated the likely outcome: The despair of watching your novel be ignored, except for the lone, eviscerating review that concludes:

"One wonders if it is a personal psychological impairment, or a broader societal pathology of which he is merely an exemplar, that has persuaded the author that he has something to say."

So you need to be vigilant in these perilous days and weeks. Say no. Dare to do less. Remember: Technically, it's still summer.