No pill just yet...

I was on the phone for a long time this morning with my cousin, Dr. Electrica Venue, a research scientist and an expert in the field of human behavior. I told her that a lot of us are struggling with what we believe to be an addiction to blogging. What she had to say both surprised and comforted me. If you think you may have an unhealthy relationship with your blog, please read what she has to say.

Dr. Electrica Venue has a PhD in Extrapolation from the prestigious University of the Principality of Sealand, where she also minored in both Nullification and Obfuscation. She now serves her Alma Mater as the dean of her field, and has made several televised appearances, on shows such as "Good Morning Sealand!" and "Great Sous Chefs of the North Sea."

Doctors and scientists around the world have been playing around with the concept of internet addiction for several years now. It falls short of being classified as an addiction in the clinical sense because most experts agree that excessive internet use is a symptom of other disorders -such as depression or OCD- and not a disorder in and of itself. Personally I believe that the time will soon come that it will no longer be possible to sweep this problem under the rug and insurance companies will be required to provide treatment.

A blogging obsession can be seen as an extension of an internet addiction, and this is where I believe the problem lies with many bloggers. Some bloggers are able to simply write a post, then turn off the computer and go do other things. The next day they will login again, read their comments, check their stats, and post another blog.

Other bloggers may spend their entire day at the computer, constantly checking and analyzing their stats and obsessing over comments. This is where it can become unhealthy. This is what an internet addict would do. The blog is not the addiction, but the manifestation. Some addicts play World of Warcraft, some lose themselves in social networking sites, some gamble, and some blog.

Blogging is the healthiest of these, but it can become unhealthy. Look at this list and count how many of these apply to you.

* You check your stats constantly throughout the day
* You become excessively excited when you receive a new comment
* A comment that seems in any way negative can ruin your day and has the power to keep you up at night
* You constantly think about what you will blog about next
* As you go about common daily activities you consider ways you might turn even the most mundane tasks into interesting blog fodder
* When speaking with a friend or relative you often begin a sentence with "On my blog the other day..."

When you let your blog take over in these ways, not only can it effect your personal life, it can destroy everything you love about blogging. If you can relate to anything I've listed, perhaps it's time to take action.

Here are some things you can do to save your blog, and yourself.

1. Set one time each day, and a time limit, that you may check your stats.

2. Set one or two times each day to check and respond to comments.

3. If you have your comments sent directly to your inbox, disable that feature to better adhere to number 2.

4. Try posting a new blog every other day instead of every day. This will help you keep your mind focused on other activities instead of always thinking about your blog, and will have the added benefit of keeping your content fresh and potent.

5. If you aren't sure what to blog about, don't go digging around for a topic; simply do not post. While this can sometimes lead to a very good post, more often than not it will simply cause further obsession and generate lackluster content.

6. Set a time limit to spend reading other blogs. If you read many blogs, spread them out to read certain ones on certain days rather than reading all of them every day.

7. If you have free time and are tempted to go straight to the computer, pick up a book instead. Not a magazine or newspaper; you will find too many things to blog about in those. Find a good, thick, engrossing book that will keep your mind too happily busy to think about blogging. TV and movies are also no good; too easy to multi-task with those. Reading will have the added benefit of improving your mind and grammar for better blogging.

I recommend choosing one item from this list to apply, whichever one you feel you have the most trouble with. More than one or two exercises may be overwhelming, take it slowly. I think most bloggers will find they do not have as big a problem as they imagined, and can quite easily find ways to go about blogging without obsessing.

I wish you all the best of luck in this endeavor. I commend you for acknowledging your problems and confronting them. I encourage you to communicate with and support one another in this area.

Now if you will excuse me, I need to get back to World of Warcraft, I'm in the middle of a very important raid.

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Okay, Marie here. What do you all think? Remember, if you have anything you'd like Dr. Venue to discuss, click on the button in the sidebar to send her a message.

Now looky here at what Brad did last night. He even cleaned the kitchen afterward! This is the second time in our relationship I have ever seen him cook, and boy did he ever cook.



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