Many times, productivity guilt is simply a cover for the desire to stay or be busy. Workaholics have a hard time sitting still and doing nothing. Their minds will often find something -anything -to prod them to do to relieve that feeling. Productivity guilt is often the result. If they do find something to do, it is often busy work.

Being busy and being productive are often conflated but they are not the same thing. Busyness is about being occupied, about constantly doing something, often without regard to what it is or if it is helpful and moves you closer to your goals.

Busy people often prioritize non-critical tasks, try to multitask, and have many “good” projects going on at once. They let their attention get taken by just about anything, have trouble setting boundaries, and make little progress on important work. Then they feel productivity guilt because they DID work hard but did not get the important things done.

This guilt is not justified but such people need to find better ways to manage their time and prioritize tasks if they want to move on from productivity guilt. Opening the mail and answering most emails will keep a person busy, but will it get the job done? No. Critical tasks may still be undone at the end of the day because of it.

Productive people are not always busy even if they are occupied with tasks. Being productive means using an effective system to prioritize tasks and focusing on the ones most important to reaching goals or finishing work. They have good boundaries and know how to say no to things that will detract from their primary objective.

A productive person reserves those tasks that must be done but are not critical -such as opening the mail -for specific times and schedules a block to handle many of them at once. They do not multitask and often hyperfocus for extended periods on a single task. 

None of this is to say that productive people cannot be busy or that busy people cannot be productive. Most people have periods of both, but planning and effective time management can push a person from one state to another. 

If you recognize yourself as a “busy” person, then you need to focus on improving your time management skills and learning how to prioritize your to-do list and set boundaries before you do anything else. That will go a long way towards eliminating your productivity guilt.