I hope you did take this advice kirk...I guess you did.
There comes a time in all of our lives where we get a little burnt out.
And chess is the most stressfull pastime to pick up...we as humans
have to win..Hell we are on top of the food chain. So losing...as I said
before sucks the big one.
But every now and then you need a fresh perspective...you need to
break free from it.
That is the best thing about this site...7 days.
You look at a position...it hurts your head...forget about it...go to the
park..hide behind some bushes..jump out and scare some joggers
(kinda fun actually...get the hell out quick though if they have cell
phones)...or go throw three bottles of Dawn dishwashing liquid in the
town fountain...I am just kidding on these..please...no illegal stuff (
although I did that when I was 13...shut that baby down for two weeks!
Paducah KY!)
What I am saying is is that when you feel you are to involved...don't
forget you inner child...spend time with the kids...fly a kite...tell the
mailman you was with his wi..uuhh..oops...just forget about chess for
a bit and remember what is important in life.
Dave
I went through a phase where I found that I was getting furious when I
felt I let myself down or didn't perform to what I thought I was capable
of. It only happened in certain scenarios though and it was this that
made me realise what the problem was (for me at any rate)
I was fortunate to be able to have the opportunity to play tennis to a
pretty high level and found that I wasn't hard on myself whether I won
or lost. In other things though I would get so mad that I would bang
my fist and the side of my hand on my desk so hard that it really
really hurt.
The difference was that I enjoyed hitting tennis balls and enjoyed who
I hit them with. I wasn't enjoying the other things; silly things like a
computer game or a mistake in my homework just made me blow up.
As John (vaknso) keeps reminding me the important thing is to enjoy
your chess. I saw the checkmate combo against Marc (mwmiller) and
seeing as though Marc is a great guy I'm guessing that the chat and
the game up to then was enjoyable. My advice is let that be enough. I
make loads of mistakes (lost 250 odd games through mistakes and
not being good enough!), even the top guys like Paul (Knighmare_NJ)
make mistakes (rarely I admit!).
Enjoy the chat. Enjoy the opportunity to play chess against people
from all over the world for free. You waved goodbye to your queen;
imagine being a parent waving goodbye to your child as (s)he dies
from starvation. Puts the chess into perspective!
Mark
The Squirrel Lover
Chess is a mind game against another individual, sometimes you can
not see a face across the board as is in internet chess. And when one
loses, its hard to fathom a loss to "someone" you can not see. The
person you are playing against is real....when you lose...he/she beat
you! Chess IS a game, like other games...you have winners and
losers! Instead of pacing around the room, study chess openings and
in particular the middle game where most games are lost. Put your
ego aside and place more emphasis on chess theory and tactics and
you will be surprised on how many more games you will win.....Paul
Losing sucks..yes...but by our mistakes we do learn. When my Dad
taught me when I was four...I really wanted to beat him (allright...no
Searching For Bobby Fischer fanatics jumping on this)...but I never
could. He was always taking me to bars...back then he could get me in
to play with these old guys...and they would kick my butt. And then
this one old guy gave me "The Game of Chess" by Siegbert Tarrasch
(March 5th birthday...same as mine) and a whole new world opened
up. I saw what an attack was...I saw how to defend a position...and I
lost more games then ever...why? Because I had learned chess...And
in that you think about it different than just throwing pieces out
there...and hoping you might be able to take something.
After that and alot of losses...i started to play well...and some more
studying of other books..Nimzo...Bobby...Tal...I learned alot more.
Tourney play is rough...pressure unbelieveable...especially with your
dad cowering over your shoulder. But I believed in myself and not
him..it helped alot. he made me play football baseball and
basketball...but I loved Chess.
So don't feel bad for losing...when you just start to realize what the
game is really about...you will lose alot...untill you can finally apply it.
It will come...and I can help ya get there!
Dave
(Small part of the Dave story for all)
One of my first games here in RHP (december 2001 or so) I had a good combination worked out, and was sure to win. But I had overseen
a small thing: my opponent checkmated me the next move.... It's a shock, and it takes a while to digest. But later on I looked at the
game again as wellas to other games that I lost or drawed, and studied how this could have happened. And I realized it was more than
just an oversight. It was an angle at which I did not look sufficiently deep into my game. So I learned from that. Perhaps you can
learn from this by looking deeper. Sin.
All of us have made terrible blunders from one time or another in a
game -- most of us in many games! I know I have. But because I
hate to lose, I try my best to let the emotional anger about my
stupidity go -- I know I'm not the smartest person there is, and that's
that. Instead, what I really try to do is understand how the blunder
happened, from a logical point of view. Remember, your emotional
self will simply take time away from you that you need to for keeping
a level head. You should find this very true in tournament play over-
the-board.
I ask myself questions, for which, with hindsight, I now know the
answers. One, in my younger days, I found myself asking often:
Was I too preoccupied with what I wanted to do (my attack) that I
didn’t see what my opponent was planning? So many times this was
true that I started to look deeper into a position for what my opponent
could do to me. When I played a lot of correspondence chess back in
the '80s, I found myself becoming very nervous about a position when
my response seemed too easy. I would study the position for
any "hidden" plays (traps) my opponent might have. I would take
great care with extremely good opponents, as those are the ones very
likely to have something up their sleeve.
So, my advice to you is this: 1) Yes, we ALL have had our bad
games! This means that while it does not feel good for you to lose
the way you did, the same has happened to most of us. 2) Simply
realize that you are not at the level of play you would like to be at,
and, because of your anger, you think you should be at. If you truly
understand that statement, then use your failure in these games to
propel you into stronger play. Let the emotion about your loses go –
it will only delay your development! 3) Study more. 4) Take your
time – if your play is going too smoothly, be very wary of what your
opponent is planning. Actually, you should be looking for what your
opponent could do to you, that is, how he can get a strong or winning
position against you with every move you make. Offense is only one
half of the game. Defense is the other. Also, realize ideal moves are
those that usually do more than one thing. Most of us understand the
double attack, such as a knight or queen fork or a bishop skewer, but
there are positional moves that both defend and attack at the same
time – try to look for these. A good middle game book would be very
instructive. 5) Let the emotions go!! – I cannot stress how important
this is. Think of it this way: If you were a surgeon you would use your
logical mind to the utmost and keep your emotions at bay for the
sake of your patient. You would also be very well trained. So, throw
out the emotions and STUDY. You can become the chessplayer you
want to be, but it doesn’t just happen!
Maybe I can give you some advice. Forget for a while your
chessgames.
There is probably some little work you've postponed because you
don't like to do it. Well do that little work now. When it is done, you
will have a good feeling about it, and you will feel relaxed.
That is something that works for me.
lioness
I take the view that nobody beats me. I beat myself when I make a
stupid move. Tough. The real problem is staring at a moniter in a
tense making situation. To quiet the jim-jams, I go to a vast
wasteland with a softball bat and some used golf balls. (Three for a
dollar if they are real 'smilers'. Whack a fun-go, then try to find the
damn ball. By the time I am out of balls I do not care about my
monitor or my desk or my credit card. It takes all that I have to just
lug that huge, heavy warclub all the way back to the house.