Something I've learned in chess is you have to be active. There's no use passively moving and defending. You need to go out, try things, see what works, and constantly struggle to move forward on the board. There's no point to backing down when all that lies there is defeat.

I have noticed in life i am a passive player. I need to try actively living it.

I've had a similar experience playing Go.

After not playing the game for a long time, I got back into it and started playing online. In one of my first games, I didn't stop to assess the board and see the approximate scores, so I kept on attacking. I tried to take over everything I could. I made a mistake - and my opponent saved a huge group of stones. It must have swung the score by about 80 points. I ended up losing.

I could have had a big win - but I tried to make it gigantic, and I ended up losing.
My lessons:
- don't be greedy. A win is a win.
- Always have an estimate of the score / relative standing, so you know how to play going forward...

Lessons equally applicable to life...
Thanks for your story,
Gord.

One thing I learned from chess is the how a certain player evolution applies to quality control and variance in results.

One milestone toward becoming an intermediate chess player is playing what Dan Heisman calls 'Real Chess'. Beginners play 'Flip-Coin Chess', where a move is played quickly without serious thought. The winner is the one that is lucky enough to blunder the least. 'Hope Chess' is when you make a move and don't look at what your opponent might threaten on his next move, and whether you can meet that threat on
your next move. A chain of moves is only as strong as the weakest link, and when the opponent makes a threat you had not considered, he usually gets a decisive advantage.

Playing 'Real Chess' means evaluating every move well enough to see every possible threat the opponent could make after your move, and knowing how to respond to it. If you can't do this, your standard rating will never rise above 1400, because around that level, most opponents will find that threat, and break that single weak link in the chain to you victory.

This shows that in at least some types of expertise, the intermediate level is characterized by a level of 'six sigma'-style quality control, where a certain known and codefied process sets the minimum bar for everything that is shipped. Any hole will directly benefit the competition.

Great analogy, yeah. Passivity is death to pretty much everything of value. Fully agree.

Great lessons Gord, really good stuff.

> - don’t be greedy. A win is a win.

> - Always have an estimate of the score / relative standing, so you know how to play going forward…

Know your numbers/score/objectives, and then make sure you meet your objectives - much more important to win to the level you want than to reach beyond that and not get it. Great comment.

Greetings Sebastian,

New at posting here, but I've been reading on and off. I do enjoy your writings so do keep it up. Games are incredibly deep especially when you want to get good at them and many of the best lessons in my life have come from analyzing the mechanics of different games to win. I used to play a lot of "Texas Hold'em" Poker and the best points I learned from that game were:

1. You have to learn to make decisions with incomplete information
Corollary 1: Learn to live with those decisions, especially if things go bad
Corollary 2: There is no point in worrying about "what if" or "I should have..."
2. You can have a 90% chance to win, make the best decision*and still* lose
Corollary 1: If you lose you still might have made the right choice
Corollary 2: Even if you win, you might have been lucky
Corollary 3: Learn to accept bad outcomes with the "right choice"
3. Learn to take risks and be able to survive them if things go wrong
However: There will be times where you need to go "all in"
4. Not losing is just as important as winning
5. The projection of your image to others affects the way they respond
6. There is also an inner game; dealing with your own psychology, especially your own fear

There are probably more things to the game. I haven't played in 5 years but I used to consistently make $1,200/month playing. I decided to quit because I had learned everything I wanted to learn from the game and there was a world outside to explore. If you're in Tokyo, send me an e-mail and we could play. You could teach me a few things in chess.

Cheers,

Justin