Beyond the Horizon

Blog of Spencer Magnusson

Guilt from not being Productive Enough

Social Media, Limits, and Goals

May 30, 2026 | 8 minutes

A few years ago, I made a goal to make a YouTube video every month. Now, I still have that goal. But I don’t know if I want it anymore.

I made that goal for a few reasons:

  1. Get better at making videos
  2. Share what I have learned — about Blender, optimization, and programming — all in one place
  3. Build a community, connecting with others
  4. Practice diligence, consistency, and productivity

Now, my video skills have drastically improved. I have a “Optimization in Blender” series, lessons about coding (which has been translated into a full course), and some artistic and funny videos too. I’ve connected with amazing people. Making a video every month has taught me a lot about myself, and pushed me to make what I otherwise never would have.

But now, my backlog of ideas is running dry. YouTube analytics and productivity “for the algorithm” feels more like a hindrance than how I want to grow. And I have more projects I am ramping up on, including a sequel to the add-on course I mentioned.

And that’s when I started feeling a creeping feeling. I feeling I remember all too well, and it lasts a lot longer than ten minutes. Finishing work that doesn’t leave me satisfied. Rest quickly replaced with stress, yet another to-do on my list. Less satisfaction taking breaks. Less guilt for not getting anything done.

The dreaded productivity guilt. Or its alias, productivity for productivity’s sake.

I hear this from other artists too. Struggling with stress and guilt, despite feeling and being productive. I’ve struggled with it in the past. I’ve talked about being a healthy artist before. But I want to talk about this some more.

Because productivity is good. But it can grow into an addiction, if we’re not careful. So, how do we treat it? Productivity is just a symptom. Not the root cause. That cause goes back to your goals, and the beliefs behind them.

I can change my productivity to be less guilt-inducing. And you can too.

“Welcome to the human race”

My relationship with social media is complicated. Not always negative, but often. I guess my writing a blog on my own website is a good indicator of a complicated relationship with social media.

Social media rewires brains in many ways. One way includes the sheer volume of content we see. So much is happening. People are creating, sharing, marketing, so much. “Maybe I should do the same.” Tempting you to believe you’re constantly behind. And that your value is tied to what you can produce, and engage with, quickly.

I remember pushing for followers on Instagram, and then realized: wait, why do I want followers? I’m not even on here that much. Now, I know I’m in a privileged place, where I don’t have to do any of this to make financial ends meet – I carry a lot of respect for those who do. Having Instagram in my environment reinforced the idea in investing in itself more. By focusing more on YouTube or other outlets, I felt more intentional with my time, and lessen guilt from doomscrolling when I clearly am not doing anything that qualifies as “building my following.”

Beliefs and values you are exposed to can become your own. But that doesn’t make them yours. Only if you believe and choose to follow them. Now, I’m not endorsing a mentality to shun any ideas passed onto you. Good people influence you too, in mindful, healthy ways. I’m just saying to check your sources.

“Welcome to the human race. Nobody controls his own life, Ender. The best you can do is choose to fill the roles given you by good people, by people who love you.” - Orson Scott Card, Ender’s Game

This is also empowering. Consider how your environment contributes to your ideas. Just by adjusting your environment — what you see, hear, and consume — you can drastically change voices and influences around you into good ones, pushing you to do good things with your productivity, instead of productivity for its own sake.

Spinning Plates

As I’ve gotten older, I have grown fascinated by grouping the things we do:

Yet when we talk about being “productive,” we tend to not attach that word to some of these, do we? Does sleeping count as “productive” to me? Maybe it should be.

Regardless, there’s a lot to be productive for. How do we balance them all?

I remember a church leader being asked, “How do I balance everything in my life? Family, faith, career?” And his answer was: there’s no such thing. He compared it to acrobats who spin plates on sticks. The plates can never spin forever. They keep coming back to slower plates and re-spin them. So instead of trying to find an impossible equilibrium, just be present with each “plate,” or task, that need you the most in that moment.

But just because you are productive doesn’t make all your to-dos get along with each other. You can quite easily pick tasks that eventually collide with each other.

It’d be difficult for me to have goals of both losing weight and eating Cheez-Its all day. So I started changing my diet, exercising and standing more often. But what about something else, like: being there more for my family, and finishing all my projects early? On the surface, it may not seem contradictory. Until one day, I could be faced with the choice of either going to a child’s school concert, or finishing a freelance gig early that night. Which will I choose? Which becomes an interruption for the other?

“[A customer] is not an interruption in our work. He is the purpose of it.” - Mahatma Gandhi

With most, there’s no right answer for every time. Just don’t try to do both at once. Pick one, and be present for it. Remember what you are productive for. That will help you see beyond goals and checkboxes. And if productivity still stresses you, or have a hard time knowing when to stop … you might want to sit down.

Productivity is Great, Until it Isn’t

So, you got productivity detention. You juggle lots of goals. Yet, these goals still stress you despite “going well.” You feel a need to push productivity further. Why? Well, productivity is rewarding in and of itself.

Productivity is measurable. It’s tangible. You define what gets done, and can measure if it has been done. Nothing like controlling a well-defined set of instructions. Programmers, am I right?

But let me compare taking care of a baby. Especially in their first few months of life, change is one of the hardest things to measure. They do the same three things every day, struggle to move on their own, and you wake up the next day wondering if anything has changed or will change.

But after weeks, months, and years go by, and you look back and see the small, consistent changes grow into bigger ones. They build strength. They can roll. They can stand up. They can run. And then you run, to the store, to babyproof the house.

“When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.” – Goodhart’s Law

Productivity is satisfying. Really, it is such a serotonin boost. Checked seven things off the to-do list? Awesome feeling. But I also define the to-do list. I can put “wake up” on my list and get a kick out of checking it off.

Compare that to long-term projects (I won’t use parenting again — a bit of a freebie, but it does work here too). I remember my animated short, which took about nine months (yep, tried to finish before the baby arrived). It was at least a couple months into it before I even felt like it was going to be good. Productivity can’t be all about the small quick wins.

Productivity feels “free” initially, or at least never sunken value. You got things done. You finished that project. Maybe you even earned some money. So you keep going. Keep producing. Keep checking things off. Then you check the clock and it’s 4am the next morning. And you have your real job to get to. That productivity no longer feels free. Except next time, on another night, you do it all over again.

My takeaway is this: many good and better things in life are not easily measured. They may not feel as satisfying in the moment as it will later. Every choice has a price.

In short, I’ve found productivity is not always this perfect “high” it’s cracked up to be. Certainly I enjoy being productive – I made a whole blog website myself, for crying out loud. But as I get older, “being productive” isn’t the most productive thing for me anymore. I have to let myself be a little less productive. Slow down. Do less. Let go of being productive, and focus on being intentional.

And that’s what I’m planning with my YouTube channel. I’ll still make videos and tutorials as they come to me. But for the months I don’t feel any inspiration or simply don’t have the time, I’m going to livestream. Most likely a “work and chill” or sort of office hours. It’ll be on YouTube, for now. I know Fediverse: boo YouTube. But it’s still where most of my following is, and I want to practice livestreaming with training wheels for a bit. Then, I can feel comfortable livestreaming anywhere people are willing to watch. Be it a PeerTube livestream, Twitch, or elsewhere.

And what’s next for me? A lot. There’s a lot to see from where I am. Not close, maybe not even soon. But somewhere beyond the horizon. Wait. Wait, did I just…?