there is a growing epidemic in the cyberworld. a scourge which causes more suffering with each passing day. as blogging has exploded and, under the stewardship of the veterans, the form has matured more and more bloggers are finding themselves disillusioned, dissatisfied, taking long breaks, and in many cases simply closing up shop. this debilitating scourge ebbs and flows but there is hardly a blogger among us who has not felt it’s dark touch. we’re speaking, of course, about blog depression.

can’t we just take a blogbutran, celleblog or bloxal?

pills are wack, man. just step into the blogasmatron.

amen brother.

don’t follow the link to my blog from this comment…for i too have descended into the world of non-posting, and lack of energy…

although….i think i am starting to feel better..yes here it comes….it’s like that first cup of coffee…

salutations to you sir for the good work you are doing.  i think you have cured me with your pamphlet of tonic!

Ouch! Careful with that ax, Eugene…;-)

@ mr.b: haha! was just listening to a bit of the ol’ rosy floyd this morning. one two free four…

it’s an unfortunate coincidence we were just discussing this subject so recently… don’t want your travails to leave you feeling singled out… though i did very nearly quote you in one spot didn’t i? ah well.

as much as my treatment was characteristically snide i really do see it happening a lot, to a lot of bloggers, myself included. just my way of working through it i guess.

@the admiral: if i can help even one drag-ass blogger get back in the saddle, then i have done the world a disservice… uh, i mean, service. a service.

@tom: i thought crack was wack and pills were ill?

@rich: go ahead laugh it up fuzz ball.

little do you know the nonist is a grassroots front for the pharma-monster. i’m a marketing foot soldier covertly checking the surrounds for new nooks and crannies to pump with chemical bliss.

PERFECT!

No offense taken, jaime. I thought this was perfect. But for some reason, your comment engine turned my winky face into a little angry face…special feature?

@ mr.b: yeah, when i first set up the site i redesigned all the emoticons to be mostly subtle variations on blank, an eyebrow lift here, a slightly down turned mouth there. meant to remove them but always forget…

I am a psychologyst , I will atend severe crises online :)

I guess this means blogs are a cry for help. Makes sense.

Superb. Just superb.

That is all x

Must read for every blogger. Taken with thanks.

Well…  I don’t know about the rest of your, but…

I’m on a mission from God.

Must post!  Must post!

blogging depression not only affects you, it affects the whole family. for instance, the vague guilt of the close freind who always promises he is going to write and upload content and then never does, or does so sporadically that he may as well not even bother and you just fukkin know that fat bastard was up until 2 in the morning yesterday playing world of warcraft.

Brilliant.  Absolutely brilliant.

What are live journals then? Careful, blogging can also lead to death.

holy fucking shit that is funny.

i thought i was alone.

Priceless.

Too many of us get too self-absorbed and way too self-important. Anyone can gin up one of these things, and a lot of people do who have absolutely nothing to say. The truly tragic cases are those who thought they had something to say, and then discover that they were mistaken.

I’m one of the older veterans of these wars—my first site, the Palace Of Reason, opened its doors in 1998—and from time to time I’ve asked myself why I bother. The only honest reason is the pleasure I get from writing to elucidate those ideas that strike me as important. But that’s the only sound reason for any sort of non-fiction writing, isn’t it? Whether his words appear in print or in pixels, if the author doesn’t satisfy his own desire to express himself, he’s taken the short end of the bet.

so then i really should get a real life for a change, not only will i not make a decent living from my blogging, but i’m probably writing for myself anyways.  i think blogging is similiar to the other alternate universes that exist in cyberspace.  if anything, blogging is a natural progression to that order.  natural selection. 

i have met interesting people on the other side of the screen, inadvertently, intentionally, whatever.  i don’t know what i would be doing if it weren’t for blogging, other than writing.  chatting was old, and i don’t message anyone.  oh well.

hey i never tried the chemical thing, at least not for blogging anyway :)  i don’t look at beauties either, at least not anymore!  i guess that’s a good sign.  (sad, really sad and pathetic, not feeling too good about one’s self, :(  I think i’ll log off now ...

Very impressed.

Is it available in Japanese?

that made me smile.

absolutely brilliant.  nice job.

congrats, jaime. looks like this post got the zeitgeist right in the jugular.

Any bloggers who are about to shoot themselves should check this one out. It’s hilarious! Great job! By the way, I can’t download the PDF. Anybody else got problems?

looks like this post got the zeitgeist right in the jugular.

It hit the jugular, ripped it open, and sprayed blood everywhere.

Thankfully, it also provided a bandage.

I just picked up this pamphlet at the doctor’s office on my way out. I was surprised to see it online as well. Bravo.

- Wilson
RACINGMIX

Hilarious and brilliant.

Thanks. I needed that.

You’ve made my day.  Thank you.

thanks everyone for the compliments. glad you liked the pamphlet. it’s been hugely popular which is gratifying considering i created it when i was myself feeling kind of crappy.
i find it pretty telling that it has been received this way. evidently many of us have had a similar experience with blogging. as i’ve commented somewhere else-

blogging is fascinating in that (professional / goods and services sites aside) it has no practical purpose. it’s an art if looked at in those terms i suppose. it is such a new form, and such a public form though, that the growing pains are uncommonly visible.

i want especially to point you all toward tattered coat’s post on the pamphlet. not only did matt take the time to think through the implications of this thing’s popularity a little, but he was kind enough to email me and correct a few mistakes. i’m not going to bother to fix them. but i’ll post the corrections here so any other english teachers reading this don’t have to gnash their teeth over it.

* 2nd image:  dementia is spelled incorrectly

* 4th image:  under “self-loathing” —“you’re” should be the possessive “your”

* 5th image:  under “take a break,” “wont” should be “won’t”

* 6th image:  “know when to fold em’” should be “know when to fold ‘em”

thanks matt.

again, thanks for all the comments. i’m glad everyone enjoyed it so much. i’ll surely be rewarded with a huge bandwidth bill this month.

But can’t blog depression be cured with vitamins and exercise?

haha…good one..thanks for the diagnosis…and the cure!

Why did I feel an almost uncontrollable necessity to weep through that entire piece?

I must explore that…

Thank you.  Thank you…

thank you! hilarious post :)

I laughed my ass off! I love how it was modeled after those pamphlets that you get when you go to the doctor or a support group. Very creative!

this is a freaking crack up.  i linked you and your pamphlet if you don’t mind.  btw, “dementia” is spelled incorrectly (coming from someone who used to work in a psych ward)  :)

BRAVO!

Really great.  It’s amusing to me, how keeping a blog and writing a fanzine are exactly similar in these aspects.

Congratulations, a pleasure to read, especially when summer calls to you some other activities…

All the little blogger children say, “AMEN”!

Hilarious!  Although, I know of a few bloggers that would benefit….

I can’t thank you enough for this public service announcement. It came at just the right time for me. After reading your pamphlet, I contacted my doctor and was prescribed some BlogZac (because I don’t believe in Scientology) and have been feeling so much better. Now that I know about this, I can be on the lookout for it in the future.

Thank you NONIST!

ROFL!

Yup…thanks for penning this…we co-bloggers need a lifeline from time to time…

(rockin’ site btw!)

Incredible book! love it! from the french bloggers: Thank you! *^-^*

I invented this contraption to get myself over blog depression. http://www.tamesapien.com/downloads/blogdie/blogdie.pdf

I’d be more amused if it didn’t hit so close to home. Sigh.

That’s fuckin’ hilarious.

this is a great entry! i sometimes wonder why i even bother since no one reads my blog.

Read about this on the Diva Marketing blog. Too funny since she and I were just talking about how, as a new blogger, I am suffering from Blog Guilt—I missed posting one week… feel like I am not posting enough… blah, blah, blah. Thanks for reminding me to take my Type A personality down a notch.

This is fucking brilliant, and something I needed to read. Just in time!

This is frickin’ hilarious and right on time. I found it through a link on http://www.scott-o-rama.com. Thanks.

And here I thought I was all alone.  The light of hope runneth from my cup up against the wall.

Brilliant!

Terrific.  It’s a parody, and yet it’s a therapy.  A parapy, if you will.  Or therody… yeah, that’s it, a therody.  A thing that cures by poking fun at the disease…

You are a star! I came here via a link at http://susoz.typepad.com/ so I thank her as well as you, for the laugh. Bless Ya.

Like to say: thank your for the entry.
I wrote about it in my blog. ;-) Excellent!

How terrific and salutary and smart. And very, very funny… And true, so true.

Thanks.

That was AWESOME. I’m totally coming back here again.

Is there a support group available? or maybe a 1-800 crisis line????

Great Point! We have a trip bLoger in our office I have printed out your PSA for him, he will love it I am sure.

i can’t find a way to trackback, so i make one by myself here.
http://archum20.egloos.com/1637499/

So true that it is depressingly funny.

Incredible.  Uncanny how you were in my head there.  *Shaking you out of my head now*.  What a relief!

Oh my gorsh! I love it! It’s so perfect…

FABULOUS.  I linked to your site with this most important bit of info.  Thank the stars I’m not alone and I can stop drowning my sorrows in cheese!

I suffer from that on a daily basis.  Thank God there’s always vodka.

Remember the Ten Commandments:

Thou shall not have any other blogs before me

Thou shall not post any graven image (it takes up too much bandwidth)

Thou shall not take the name of my blog in vain

Remember the blogging hour, to keep it holy

Honour thy father and thy mother (don’t knock them in a blog)

Thou shall not kill (or recommend terrorist actions in a blog)

Thou shalt not commit adultery (so much time blogging, chance would be a fine thing)

Thou shall not steal text from another blog

Thou shall not bear false witness against thy neighbour (or Bill Gates, George Bush, Tony Blair etc, etc)

Thou shall not covet thy neighbour’s blog

Fantastic post! I thought I was alone, but with your help, I’m going to get through these difficult times :long:

It is very well…that is important for my class.Because we are learning about blog.These makes me know any thing about blog.So true that it is depressingly funny….thank you!

Too funny!

Excellent. My colleagues produce health education materials on all sorts of topics, including Depression. I think they’ll like this one.

Nice piece.

I blog mostly for myself so when self tells me I got everything I’m gonna get from it, she’ll quit.

bloggin’ on…

I LOVE that the pamphlet looks like the real ones you get from the feds. That is some seriously funny shit, man.

Have a great day!

Great entry.
Feeling depressed about your blog, like you’re supplying the entire world with news, is ridiculous.
I myself write for my own enjoyment.
Now, I’m glad if people read it, but sometimes, I really don’t care if they do or not.
People who get depressed about their blogs are often depressed over more serious things.
They probably need to just get outside more and do something.

I wasn’t depressed…until I read this post.

Thanks for the boost.

“Have some donuts. Chill.”

I LOVE it!

If I weren’t so isolated by my blog addiction, I would share this life-changing information with all my friends!

lots of comments
so many comments
I forgot what I was going to say

Just brilliant!

:down: There is something perfect about that.  Thing is, my blogging depression seems to conincide with my actual depression . . . I blog because I like it!

I LOVE IT.. freakin hilarious.. so guess what??? am gonna BLOG about it…lol.. just kiddin..

you should sell this pamphlet man… (not before I download it though)

hey! jim morrison wrote this, from outta space?!
great. I’m impressed und depressed at the same time, here in germany where I lead a blog with 500 long legs dressed in literarilly black.
Great! (I mean your report).
bye.

omg. hilarious…though frigtening familiar to a “chick” tract.

I’m saved!

oh, and that’s ‘frightening’...

next post: anal bloggers who send two posts with spelling corrections.

So, um, is there a support group for this? Bloggers Anonymous?

Wow! No comments! Me thinks they protest too much.

A brillient imagination that i have ever read .

Brilliant!

Can’t we all just… blog along??? ;)

At least chemistry’s better, and in math I can laugh at that cooky accent (I like feet, I don’t know why) anyways…I don’t feel much like writing anything else now….maybe later.

I haven’t been up to anything recently. I haven’t gotten anything done today. I just don’t have much to say lately. Such is life. I don’t care.

I hope everyone has enjoyed the blog as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

     
Oscar DeMaria

http://www.depressionsymptoms2look4.com

Great. I want a copy.

I was gutted this morning when I woke up.  For two main reasons.  The terraced house attatched to mine at the right and it’s fabulous caring residents….sarcasm.  And the terraced house attatched to mine at the left agin with it’s fabulous friendly residents…..sarcasm yet again.
But true to form…reading the bloggers anxiety panphlet I feel once again a fulfilled individual ready to sit in my garden and be leered over to sit in my living room and type away whilst watching Big Brother and overhear the ‘Mazing’ comments of slander and degredation coming out of the mouths of the aforementioned ‘useful’(sarcasm yet again….)individuals who surround my little terraced house!!Especially seeings as they’re directed at me, my boyfriend and my dog.
Thanks to the panplet I can happily leave my house and walk past these ‘great and gracious overbearing harrasing gossiping individuals’ to go buy more printer ink or cdr’s.  Because reading it made me smile….

Glad I stumbled onto this one - I have too many friends that this has happened to.  We must end Blog depression.

Wow… You’re at the opposite end of Europe (as seen from my location :D ) and you seem to be able to read my thoughts. Great post - big thumbs-up! :)

N. B. What a pity you’re considering a perfectly valid yahoo-email addy as an indication for spam. If my business e-mail suddenly gets spammed, I’ll hold you responsible…

(just joking) (a little…)

oops! Did I just say EUROPE?! No idea where that came from…

(But where the hell ARE you, anyway?) LOL!

This is so right on and painfully funny - love the illustrations.

I’ve been telling myself I’m this blogging thing is a huge waste of time…but for some reason, I kept doing it.  Now I know, I’m just depressed.

I am right in the middle of my blog depression!  This has been so helpful ... BTW those illustrations are so framiliar.  Great post!

Smooch,
The Tart
;  )

it was such a truth about blogger.
i am one of then who have same instinct about blog defression.

In my travels through cyberspace, I have noticed blog after blog discuss “Internet addiction” and “blog addiction.”  Until your post, however, I had never heard about “blog depression.”  Quite honestly, I thought that the feeling of “pressure” and “anxiety” I had been experiencing about keeping up with my three blogs was unique to me. 

After reading your post and thinking about things for a while, however, it has become apparent to me that many bloggers “out there” must be experiencing some of the same negative feelings about their blogs that eventually stopped me from keeping up with my posts. 

What can a person do who experiences “blog depression”?  Among other things, take a break and “go outside.”  If you think that this is a rather simplistic suggestion, please continue reading. 

I remember reading about a person who complained to his therapist about being depressed and “stuck in a rut” for many years.  After listening to her patient ramble on for weeks about his drab and unexciting existence, it came time for the therapist to take a stand and advise her patient what to do.  On the day of reckoning, the therapist calmly smiled at her patient and said:  “you need to get some sleep and get out in the sun once in a while.”  Upon hearing this, the patient understandably felt “cheated” with such a “simple solution.” 

The point:  sometimes we make things so complex that we become caught in a cycle of “paralysis by analysis.”  In a different scenario, maybe the patient described above, after years of psychoanalysis, finally “understood” why he had been depressed and “stuck in a rut.  And maybe based on this “insight” he started to live his life more honestly, more fully, and with more joy.  On the other hand, this same patient might have viewed his world in an entirely different manner with a good night’s sleep and by spending some quality time outside in the sun.

Thank you for such an insightful and relevant post :-)

DenMan7
http://www.alcohol-treatment-info.com

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