BAD TITO

Just when you thought it was safe to hide, BAD TITO makes its return! Yes, yet another edition, as I think this column just might survive once again. Sometimes, it gets very hard to write with time becoming a major factor. Summertime has arrived, so I have just a little bit more freetime to write this badboy. Before, I'd suffer a little bit of what I will talk about in this edition. I can sum it up into two words:

Burn Out.

So what exactly is burn out? No, it's not smoking something, so get your mind out of the gutter. Burn out is defined as a mental block which disables you from thinking analytically or creatively. Why am I discussing this in today's Bad Tito? Because internet columnists, including myself, suffer from this difficulty.

Columnists work hard, each week or each day, to present you their latest opinions in their wrestling columns. With many factors, including work, school, personal life, and just simply the loss of thoughts about the wrestling world. Daily columnists, including myself, must fight this about everyday. Weekly columnists, who have one shot to impress everyone, can become burned out as well producing and long and eventful column once a week.

For myself, it's somewhat of a task to write the Phat Daily Column everyday, especially with the pressures of work and school taking up a lot of time. School alone is a major killer of time, and when you have to write a few papers here and there, your thoughts are centered around school, and not just the hobby that is writing a wrestling column. School, especially a full class load, and also work, take up all of your time. If I was up studying for a while or I worked late into the night, I had to literally crawl out of bed to do a column before I'd go to work or school that morning.

Yes, there has been times where I've literally pounded my head into the wall to write the column. I made the decision to write each and every day about wrestling, and that's something that I had to put upon myself. To make sure I'd get a column out everyday, I woke up early in the morning, around 7 am, to write the Phat Daily Column. Writing that each day has me on the computer for an hour doing non-stop typing to get the column done. After that, it's off to school or work, where I'll put in a good 8 or 9 hours each day. This is 7 days a week too.

It was rather odd when I took that fateful day off, which ended my column streak. It felt strange to not be up early in the morning typing it, and it was odd during the day not worrying how readers would take a certain opinion that I just wrote. Leading up to that day, I was somewhat frustrated when writing the Phat Daily Column. School was really getting to me then, as I had many deadlines to fulfill. I felt as though my mind was going in circles.

Burn out is what caused me to be very grumpy for the past few months. Many were seeing my columns as being very harsh and too critical of the wrestling world. Everything I saw on wrestling, I'd rip the hell out of. I never held back, and everything I personally hated, I bashed. Everything I enjoyed, I praised and bitched about it not being pushed. I was cranky, yes, but it was all from being burnt out.

I'm not the only one who suffers from burn out. I've talked to many former columnists over the past year, and they told me that they couldn't write no more because it wasn't fun. Considering this profession is a hobby, it should be fun, right? Well, when you just don't feel like writing it anymore, it's no longer fun because that individual is burnt out.

When you write internet columns, you not only have to keep writing a column, but you must get the benefits of being a columnist. No, I'm not talking about big money, awards and so forth. I'm talking about constant criticism and lots of e-mails about your opinions. Much of that can be very harsh, and to someone who doesn't prefer that, they can snap instantly, and then start to hate writing about wrestling.

What can be done about burn out? Well, first off all, keep a good mind set. Don't let criticism get to you. I let it get to me at times, and then again, I used the criticism to keep on truckin'. Criticism, no matter what you do, will always exist as an internet columnist. Learn to live with it, and learn to accept it.

As for readers e-mailing you about your opinions. I've definitely learned that readers DO NOT have the same opinions that I write in my columns. So if someone totally rips your ideas about the wrestling world, just accept it as though you are reading their column, with their opinions. And if they curse you about because of their opinions, then they shouldn't be able to get to you because they are doing it from a nice comfortable chair behind a computer desk.

Write what you want to write, and not what others think. If you continually write what others want to hear, that will get old, and those individuals will move on. If you write something striking or completely off the wall from their opinions, then you will be read much more. Plus, you write what others want you to write, then you will become burnt out because you can't have fun with your column now by not writing what you truly want.

Pace yourself. Don't let the column become a burden on time. Allow yourself some free time to write it, and have a good mind when you do it. I enjoy writing the best when I'm relaxed and not screwed for time. When you only have a set time to write, the column is done quickly under pressure, and that will show in your columns because it won't seem as though you enjoy writing anymore.

The final one, of course, is to have fun writing about wrestling. Don't do it because you seem forced to do it; write it because you want to write it. That's the best advise I can give to someone, as I've always had to revert back to this whenever I was burned out from writing.

Just remember that there isn't a writer in the world who doesn't suffer from this annoying condition. Even the pros can't produce every once in a while, and they receive money to do their work. Us internet columnists, who do it as a hobby, don't.

As for myself, I'm much better with the full time schedule at college now becoming over. Of course, I'll probably suffer once again once the Fall Quarter hits, but hey, shit happens.

Quote the Tito Nevermore

MrTito@lordsofpain.net