Why you might want to cut down on your blog reading

I’m a huge fan of World of Warcraft blogs. I think you can tell from the excessive size of my link list to the right and from my bad habit of meta blogging. Like I'm doing right now.

Apparently I just can’t get enough of this little network of ours. It fascinates me, it entertains me, it educates me as a player and writer. And to be honest I think it’s one of the reasons why WoW has kept me hooked for over three years.

The voices. The personalities. The distinguished geeks. The clashes. The intelligence. The silliness. The ideas bouncing around. Not to speak of the super talented writers, who actually are enjoyable reads in their own power, not just because it’s about WoW. (I won’t mention those by name since I’ve pointed to them so many times by now that it’s kind of ridiculous. Oh bugger, I just linked them again. Sorry. Couldn’t help myself. )

Curse of Boredom
However, we have now come to This Time of The Expansion Cycle when a lot of the links in our feedreaders and blogrolls suddenly turn into a nasty purple color. Yep. It’s the seasonal Curse of Boredom, Burn-out, Bitterness, Lost faith and Godknowswhat that strikes again, just as it did towards the end of TBC. It is remorseless, the victims are countless and unfortunately it isn’t as easy to click off as the in game-version.

First a piece of advice to the affected bloggers:

There isn’t any quick cure from this, so you’d better treat it as a bad case of battle rez sickness. Rather than writing about what a miserable state the game is in, blaming your guild, Gearscore, Ghostcrawler, the Casuals, the Elitists, your ISP and your Wife, I would suggest you to take a break, not only from WoW, but from blogging and podcasting about it.

Log out from the WoW community, clear your brain from the fog, go do something else. You have NO obligation to anyone. Do not feel forced to rant about something you don't enjoy anymore.

And if you ever decide to come back, like for Cataclysm, I would dare say that you’ll be stocked up with rested energy, spitting out posts like never before.

Advice to blog readers
My second piece of advice is to the blog readers. Normally I would never ever dream about telling someone to read fewer blogs. Frankly I’m probably a bit annoying to people around me, I just can’t stop myself from constantly pushing for the blog community, spamming our guild forum with links to posts of interest.

However in This Time of the Expansion it might be a good idea to cut down a bit on your blog reading for a while. At least if you’re still enthusiastic, energized and pumped up about WoW – or if that is how you would LIKE to feel.

You need to protect yourself. That curse is contagious as hell and it’s ever so easy to get dragged down in the drain by an eloquent and convincing blogger in a bad mood. Suddenly you realize that the daily quests that you actually enjoyed pretty much are a tedious drag and a time sink or that pugging instances is a ticket to hell rather than a box of interesting chocolate pieces with unknown content. You hadn’t thought about it yourself, but reading that blogger you think he has a point.

If there’s a blogger who keeps dragging you down, consider deserting him for a while. Yes, that includes deserting Larísa of The Pink Pigtail Inn as well, if I’m the one causing you the lethargy. I’m aware of that there is an undertone of melancholy in my writings, and sometimes I write slightly cynical rants about stuff that bugs me a bit. It's theurapy for me and possibly for readers who recognize themselves, but it's not for everyone. If I make you unhappy, I would suggest that you’d have your pints in another pub for a while, where the beer is more sparkling.

Blessing of Happiness

Don't dispair at the sight of the darkness, look out for the lighthouses that still are shining thanks to their Blessing of Happiness buff! There are a few enthusiasts around, many of them players who were a bit late to the party and still are enjoying the game at its full potential. Tamarind is one of them, now that he finally has found some good dance partners. (Damn it, I just linked to him AGAIN. I've SO got a blogger’s crush on him.) But there are also old-timers, such as the crew behind The instance, who still have an unbroaken spirit and a heart that obviously beats for WoW.

Give those bloggers and podcasters - new as well as established ones - some comment love and encouragement. This will make them even more enthusiastic, and before you know it the infused power has bounced back and forward until it has created a field of positive energy. I suppose you could call it magic, but there’s nothing supernatural at all about it to be honest. Pick a positive environment to be in, contribute to it yourself and you your world will glow.

I suppose it might work in real lie as well, thinking about it. But that’s another story.

PS I can't help hoping that the return of BRK (even if just temporary) will give the blogosphere a well needed energy injection. I'm totally giggly about it myself and I suppose I'm not the only one who is tempted to roll a hunter alt now. Just because.