Why You Feel Productivity Pressure in 2026: A New Year Permission Slip
2026 is here, and with it more new year’s resolutions, gym memberships, plans, and goals. January is filled with ideas of a fresh start, to do more, try harder, and be better. While potentially coming from a positive place, these unspoken messages can be daunting. There is a societal pressure to be the best and work the hardest all the time and an expectation that any new year’s goals should reflect that mentality.
You’ve just spent the last 365 days working hard and doing your best, how is any sort of goal to do more going to be any different than what you’ve been doing? You’re already maxed out. You are not alone in feeling like it all might just be a bit much, while also overcoming productivity guilt.
What is Productivity Pressure and Why Does it Feel Overwhelming?
We love to feel productive, and us humans know exactly what it means to be productive:
working out, making lists, doing laundry, running errands, learning a new hobby, replying to emails, making doctor’s appointments, finishing that house project, getting your oil changed, meal prepping for the week.
Life is insanely busy and there are also so many cultural messages surrounding us about self-improvement, being active, and goals, resolutions, and fresh starts. There is just so much to get done in a short 24 hour day. It is productivity pressure.
The Impact of Productivity Pressure on Mental Health
This pressure is intense and it’s everywhere. You might feel always on the go to get everything done and try to feel accomplished for the day. Your worried you won’t get everything done in time or that you’ve forgotten something. This puts your nervous system in overdrive trying to keep up, which are common signs of burnout in adults.
You’ve lost passion for the things that excite you. You’re tired and drained. But you can’t rest for too long because you don’t want anyone to think you’re lazy or don’t care. This productivity pressure can come out as a variety of things including anxiety, burnout, shame, guilt, or self-criticism.
Social Media and the Comparison Trap
Then add in Instagram, Tiktok, Facebook. Social media - a visual display of everyone else’s accomplishments, milestones, and strangers selling us products and trends. It’s overwhelming, and that makes sense. It’s natural to compare ourselves to what we see reflecting back to us on our screens. It seems so obvious to think “they are doing so great and I struggled to pay my bills this month” or “I just broke up with my partner but this girl just celebrated an anniversary”.
Remember, we are only getting half the story. We have no idea what is going on behind those posts and all the struggles they might have encountered along the way. Let’s not compare our unabridged version to their cliffnotes.
These messages can be so subtle. Social media, conversations, comparing ourselves to others. It happens slowly and gradually, until it becomes feeling guilty for “doing nothing” today. But that’s not your fault. We’ve learned that activity equals productivity.
Redefining Productivity: Output vs. Internal Growth
So let’s back up and see how we got here with productivity. Economics defines productivity mathematically as a ratio of output per input. That carries over to that laundry list of tasks. How many completed tasks (output) can our efforts accomplish in a certain amount of time (input). The dictionary also defines productivity as “the state or quality of producing something”. And we tend to always think of producing a tangible something. We must have something to show and prove for our work. So it’s not really anyone’s fault that we’ve been wired to see output and finished results as being productive when it comes to ourselves.
We are not placing blame. But let’s try and expand that definition and look at that something with a broader mind. What if that something wasn’t a tangible product or a check in the box. What if producing something was internal and restorative - would that still be productive?
Why Rest is Productive (and Essential for Growth)
Rest does not mean failing. Rest does not mean giving up. And rest does not mean being unproductive. In fact it is the opposite, especially when you consider the benefits of rest for mental health. Think of a newborn baby. They sleep a lot. But we know that babies need their sleep. We value that rest for their growth and development. We know rest is important, valuable, and worthwhile for them and there is no shame or judgment. We see nap time as a productive use of a baby’s or child’s time to facilitate growth.
So why do we apply different standards for adults? Kids and adults need important, valuable, and worthwhile rest. We equate rest to napping or laying on the couch watching tv. Those certainly can be forms of rest but there are many different ways we rest.
Let’s go back to the dictionary again. Rest is to “cease work or movement in order to relax, refresh oneself, or recover strength”. What are ways that you like to relax, feel refreshed, and feel recovered? I’m sure it is more than just sleep. Think of the things that excite you, that bring you joy, and make you feel fulfilled.
For a newborn baby that is going to look a lot like sleeping, but for kids and adults rest takes a lot of forms and is still insanely productive. Rest isn’t the absence of growth—it’s the foundation for it. Developmentally appropriate rest for children and adults supports emotional regulation, resilience, and long-term well-being far more than pushing through ever could.
How to Recharge Your Social and Emotional Battery
Another analogy for you… Picture your phone battery - its drains throughout the day as you use it. You’re using your phone for productive things or “work”. We plug our phones in at night or whenever the battery gets too low. We are recharging our phone so that it can recover strength to do more “work” for us. We prioritize and value plugging in our phones to recharge because we don’t want a dead phone. People are no different.
We all have an invisible social, emotional, and physical battery that dictates what we can accomplish in a day. Our productivity is not limitless, but directly defined by how we recharge our mental battery. It is a great feeling to accomplish tasks, but it also drains that battery so we have less social, emotional, and physical energy left to give the next task.
Restoring your own mental battery is a wildly productive use of time. It restores you to full strength so you are better able to accomplish more tasks and daily duties. You are producing a full battery my resting and prioritizing yourself and your needs.
Rest Strategies for Kids, Teens, and Parents
Like I said before, productive rest is not just sleep or inactivity. In fact some of the best forms of restoration are active. Here are some examples of active rest.
For Adults: Maybe you absolutely love to paint but you just can’t find the time anymore, but it is something that is fulfilling and you feel whole when you paint. That is rest. Maybe its reading a book and getting lost in a far away fantasy world. That is rest. Maybe it’s grabbing dinner with your friends and catching up on sunlit patio. That is rest.
For Kids: Play, imagination, and creativity are important. It is a child’s natural language. Rest is most often found in play and safety, not stillness. This can be free play, repetition, sensory activities, or through connection and predictable routines. For children, play is rest. It’s how their nervous systems regulate and how they make sense of their world.
For Teens: Rest often means less performance and more permission. This can be unstructured time without a goal to achieve, engaging in creative outlets like drawing, gaming or music, time alone to decompress after social or academic demands, and lower pressure around productivity during breaks or weekends. For teens, rest supports identity development and emotional processing.
For Young Adults: Rest may involve letting go of constant “shoulds.” Try taking breaks from comparison on social media, saying no to obligations that don’t align with your values or mental battery level, slowing decision making when feeling overwhelmed, and prioritizing fulfilling hobbies and sleep over constant output. We carry invisible pressure to be “on track.” Rest allows space to reconnect with internal cues instead of external timelines.
For Parents: Rest often means releasing the need to optimize everything. This might mean allowing downtime without turning it into a teachable moment, letting go of guilt around screen time or quiet days, creating predictable routines that reduce decision fatigue, and modeling self-compassion instead of constant self-improvement. When parents allow themselves rest, they also give their children permission to do the same.
Choosing Self-Compassion Over New Year Resolutions
So in 2026, instead of creating a new resolution, give yourself a permission slip. Permission to rest, restore, and recharge. Rest is not quitting. It is responding wisely and using your time in ways that are emotionally and physically fulfilling. It is okay if that is not where you are at right now. No one is judging here, and it makes perfect sense how we all became so focused on the output and the go-go-go.
Rest is not a reward for productivity. It’s a response to being human.
What would it look like to support yourself instead of pushing yourself this year?
Thought Exercise: Reflecting on Your Need for Rest
If you’re wanting a little bit more direction, try thinking over these few questions.
What has felt most draining lately?
(Not what you should be handling—what actually takes the most energy.)
How does your body let you know when it needs rest?
(Examples: tension, irritability, fatigue, zoning out, headaches.)
What kind of rest sounds supportive right now—not ideal, just realistic?
(More quiet, fewer expectations, unstructured time, movement, connection.)
What is one small way you could offer yourself (or your child) more ease this week?
(Something that feels doable, not another task to complete.)
If rest were an act of care instead of quitting, what might change?
Professional Support for a Balanced Year
If you’d like additional support and guidance with restructuring rest, Iris Mental Health & Counseling offers individual mental health therapy for children, teens, and young adults. Together we can create goals to help you prioritize yourself and your needs for a restful and productive year ahead.
