State of the Blog: August, 2013

Hear Ye Hear Ye!
Hear Ye Hear Ye!

I’ve been meaning to do one of these posts for a short spell now, but neither had the time, energy or inspiration. Then, “It’s Your Thing” by the Isley Brothers came on Pandora and reminded me, “Hey, this blog is my thing.” :) I also barely even noticed that, on 8/15/13, this blog turned two years old. Happy belated birthday blog! :) That’s indicative of just how out of it I’ve been lately, and of how much I’ve been neglecting my blog. I’m not going to bore you with apologies or excuses, however. I’m instead going to share my thoughts on what I can do to make this blog better.

For the past few months, I’ve been in a funk, as I’ve explained earlier. Somewhere in my brain, the notion of working on this blog became too big to deal with, too massive to tackle, so I shied away from it. In time, this brought about guilt from the feelings of neglect I had toward my blog, and eventually, this turned into a cycle of the guilt feeding the neglect feeding the guilt, a vicious one that pretty much stopped me in my tracks for a while. It got bad enough that even the notion of playing a game brought on this guilt. Once I realized this was happening (which always takes longer than one would like), that this crushing weight was self-imposed, I began to think of ways to deal with it. It was then I realized I’d felt this way before: When I began therapy for my abuse-created, PTSD-related anxiety and depression.

At the time, dealing with the anxiety and depression — and the inherent causes — also felt too big, too insurmountable, like a mountain I’ll never climb. I then thought back on how I dealt with and eventually conquered these issues which, if you’re unaware, I did thanks to the help of an amazing therapist, wonderful friends and my own hard work. After some thought, the simple solution presented itself. A solution so simple that, at the time, I didn’t think it would work. On its own, it didn’t, but it opened the floodgates toward what would eventually be my breakthroughs in therapy.

I started small, by chipping away at the mountain.

What I mean by this is that, instead of seeing things as this big, insurmountable thing, I shrunk things down into much more manageable steps. Rather than seeing the issue as a giant mountain, it was rather a set of steps on path and a series of footholds to climb. This change in perspective made my therapy much more bearable, much more approachable and ultimately much more successful than ever before.

That’s my plan for this blog. Rather than seeing the content I want to generate a this massive bundle of articles that “must” be finished in a certain amount of time — which in its own way puts on an unnecessary expectation — I’m going to chip away at the content bit by bit in a much more, to me, manageable fashion. What this will mean for me is a much more enjoyable time of things, and for you, a much more consistent stream of content. :)

This blog isn’t just a love letter to space games and the people who make them, I’m discovering this blog is also a journey into my own writing, not just from a standpoint of improving my skills, but my attitudes as well. I want to thank you all for sharing that journey with me, for the amazing support and patience you all have shown, and for your hopefully continued visitation. I feel like I’m just getting started on my journey with this blog, and with your help, I’m hoping it’ll be an amazing one for us all.

Thanks for reading, and have a lovely day.

Author: Brian Rubin

11 thoughts on “State of the Blog: August, 2013

  1. You have nothing to prove to most of us readers. We enjoy the content whether it’s daily, weekly, or every so often.

    Just keep up the good work and over time you’ll find your groove.

  2. Brian, what is important for me is how much you care about it. Take your time and do the best possible blog alongside of balanced life. Good luck on your SGJ journey! I hope my English make sense. :-)

  3. No problem, whatever you feel like putting out there is fine. I don’t think that any of your readers care about the volume, more the passion. How to find it? Everybody is different, but I must say that I started playing Starbase Orion on my wife’s Ipad this week and am having a hoot! And this is after several months of desultory 4x action, I was wondering whether I had lost my love for the genre finally after almost 50 years. There is nothing like MOO2, or now SO, to put you in that “just one more turn” mode.
    good luck!

  4. Brian, rough to hear that man! You do good work, so sucks to hear that it was beating you down. After working (what seems like forever) with every spare minute put into Broken Crown, I hit that same wall, where I just wanted to step away and not do it. But its crazy how much you miss it too, and how much it becomes a part of you. Can’t really give up a piece of yourself (or at least I know I couldn’t).

    So its great to hear you found a way back onto the horse. Just try not to forget what made it fun in the first place – that’s my only suggestion!

    Love this blog, so keep it up.

  5. Keep up the good work, Brian! Yours is one of the few blogs that I follow semi-religiously. As long as you do what you love and stay true to your passion, then the content will come. You don’t need to force yourself into some crazy impossible schedule (spoken by the guy who is way past due on his own “schedule”).

  6. Hang in there brother. You’re among friends here and this shouldn’t feel like a burden, but a refuge. Thanks for giving us a place to hang out!

  7. Dude I love this blog. I’ve just been tied up with life changes and what not but I haven’t forgot about you. PS I got a new marketing job woohoo! Hope things are going well for you too Brian!

  8. I stumbled upon your blog roughly a year ago and have loved digging into your reviews. After a few mishap purchases that sounded awesome but ended poorly, your blog has helped weed things out a lot. I’ve seen a lot of growth in the information that you put out and hope that you find that balance of still having fun while not red-lining. As a huge MOO and SINS fan, I hope you stick with it- cause it’s hard to find people with this much love for the genre.

    1. Hey Izelway, welcome to the comments, and thank you for the kind words, I’m really thrilled you’ve been enjoying the blog, and don’t worry, I don’t plan on stopping any time soon. :)

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