December 16th, 2017

Over the last months I got to meet many chess players who came to me and
told me:

"Hi Alex, I'm Roger! You know, I really would like to improve at chess, I've
been trying to raise my rating for many months, but I always keep playing at
the same level. I really don't understand what I'm doing wrong... what can I
do?"

What I generally used to do when I met players like Roger was a 2-step
process like the following one:
1. I tried to understand better his point of view asking him to explain his
specific situation
2. Then I showed him an alternative point of view, telling him the reason why
this new perspective would have worked for him.

But unfortunately, this system DOES NOT WORK!

I mean... apparently it works because the new perspective can be useful for
you, but the problem is that I gave you the solution without giving you the
TIME to get to the solution yourself!
And this makes a HUGE difference, you know what I mean?!

Furthermore, I am convinced of one thing:

If you want to change you should have someone who shows you your
situation exactly as it is, without too many speeches. Sometimes being kind
and welcoming does NOT lead you to the result!

The direct way is often the only possible way to wake you up and help you
change your situation (if you really want to change it, clearly!).

Otherwise you will keep being as you have always been. You will keep
thinking that you can no longer reach your goals if you are 40 or more, or that
you don't have the talent to succeed and so on...

Sounds familiar?
Well, get ready: in this article I will be very direct!
But remember that I'll do it for you ;-)

Let's see right away which are "The 10 Reasons Why you're NOT YET
Improving At Chess."

1. You don't know how to study the openings

Let's start from a simple thing.

What people normally say about openings is that it is preferable to study the
main variations because they have already been tested by someone.
Then, you are also told that the secondary openings, such as Gambits and so,
don't have to be taken into consideration.

Now, these "inferior openings" have allowed me to get results that other
"deep and intellectual" openings have never allowed me to get.
In 2010, just thanks to the Wing Gambit - 1.e4 c5 2.b4 - I have got the
following amazing results:

• I Drew against Fabiano Caruana (ELO 2710)

• I Won against Illya Nyzhnyk (ELO 2538)
• I Drew against Negi Parimarjan (ELO 2596), in a winning position

The rating you see above refers to that period. At that time my rating was just
2280.

Am I telling you to play the Wing Gambit?!

No, absolutely!

I just want to tell you that the openings should be studied smartly, and not
just following common principles.

I want to make a small provocation: in your opinion, does it make sense to

study an opening that has 50 variations or would it be more efficient to study
a secondary one as good as the first, that may even surprise your opponent?!

My advice: stop studying what is commonly accepted and find YOUR way.
Be original, brilliant, do some research, try to understand what you really like
and what can make trouble for your opponent.

As soon as you start studying this way, 3 wonderful things will happen right
away:

• You'll become faster

• You'll get better results
• You'll enjoy studying!

This is what happened to me when I chose MY way.

If you're curious to know something more about my past experience and

you're interested in knowing how you can find YOUR way, take a look at
my Best Training Program.
2. You expect results will come immediately
That's interesting:

I train someone for a month, then he plays badly in a chess tournament and
just for that result he thinks he will never be good at chess...

Sometimes we make an experience and... just from that experience we draw

all the future path!

You cannot see the results just after a month of work, but not even after 2 or
3. You need time to elaborate what has been done.

"Remember that today you sow what you'll collect tomorrow."

This principle applies in any situation.

So if you don't see any results after 1 or 2 months, you cannot say anything
actually: you did not give yourself enough time.
But how much time do I need to wait?

That depends on you.

I can just say that the more and better you work, the less you have to wait
before seeing some results.

With that said, start by telling yourself (or writing, that would be even
better!) which are your chess GOALS for 2018!

This small action will allow you to define better your DIRECTION.
You will no longer be a sailor lost in the ocean, but you will know exactly
where your boat is going.

3. You don't know how to manage your time

How often do you spend a lot of time for the first 25 moves of the game, then
you have to play 15 moves in 5 minutes?
And maybe there is no extra time in that tournament!
When that happens, it is painful...

Anyway, it is never useful to run out of time.

If you build a nice position at the beginning, but when you need to make an
important choice you have no time to think, you are just risking to mess up
everything good you had built before!

The advice I can give you is trying to have always more time than you
opponent.

And if your opponent is someone who normally runs out of time, then it's
better to have much more time than your opponent!

Instead of looking for the best move in the world, find GOOD PRACTICAL
moves.

You'll realize you will no longer waste your time in repetitive thoughts, but
you'll be effective at the right point.
4. You interpret the "mistakes" as "failures"
Let me tell you a story:

Mark has 4 points out of 4 in a 6-round tournament, he is excited for his

current result and thinks he is about to win the tournament.
Unfortunately, a mistake of evaluation makes him lose the fifth game and at
that point something strange happens. Mark is so sad for his defeat at round
five that he ends up losing the last one too!

After the tournament, Mark keeps thinking about his final result, 4 out of 6.
For a whole week, he completely forgets the first 4 games he had been
victorious, but continues to remember only the mistake he made during the
fifth round, a mistake that has been fatal.

A few considerations:
Please.. stop saying "I threw the tournament away!"
Every mistake is the result of an OPPORTUNITY.

Mistakes are very important because they reveal the mechanisms you use
during your game, they are an opportunity to train yourself to face
challenging situations.
Along the path of becoming a strong chess player, you can't think every step
will be easy.

You will make a lot of mistakes.

You will lose your motivation a lot of times.
sometimes you'll be about to give up.

That's the reality and you have to accept it, there is nothing more to do!
Otherwise, everybody would be already a Grandmaster ;-)

Keep this in mind:

It is not important the result you get, but the kind of person you become
during the path you follow to get the result you want!
5. As soon as you start winning, you feel like
Superman
Is it true that you feel "improved" after you win a tournament?

You may think you have reached a "higher level"... instead, at the following
tournament you end up losing with people you would normally beat very
easily...

This happens because of your EGO.

We may believe we have reached the peak of a mountain, but actually the
road has yet to start!

If you want to keep getting good results, the best way to do that is to
constantly tell yourself that you didn't get anything.

Otherwise, as soon as you get something, you'll relax, release the tension and
fall back ... how many times did it happen to you?!
6. You give yourself lots of excuses
"I see, but I'm too old to get good results, I don't have the abilities any
more..."

It's not true that you don't have the potential to reach your goals. The point is
that you have consolidated many limiting beliefs about yourself over the
years. That's the reason why you don't feel "capable".

The main difference between a young and a more "adult" chess player is
another.

The young chess player has not yet lived experiences that have convinced
him that it is NOT POSSIBLE TO BE SUCCESSFUL.

Most of young people are basically idealist. This is often considered as a bad
attitude because it would lead to a "loss of contact with the reality".
In some cases it happens to see young people dreaming a lot about what they
can achieve.
But let's see also the other side of the coin: which is the positive aspect of
being a dreamer at chess?

Being a dreamer can be useful to find new ideas, explore still little-known
"lands" and find solutions faster.

The same reasoning we have dealt with for people who feel "old for chess"
can be applied to all the other kinds of excuses:

• I have no energy
• I do not get results
• I'm good at it
• Others?

At this point the question is: "When you tell yourself these things, do you like
your situation?"

If the answer is YES, that's totally fine. But if the answer is NO it means you
want to change. So don't just desire it, but make an active effort towards
your goal!
7. You focus only on technique
When someone starts talking with me about chess, 99 times out of 100 he ask
me what to do in the middlegame, where to study the endgames, which are
the best openings he can play, which are the main strategic ideas he has to
know and so on...

To be honest, sometimes these topics bore me.

Let me explain why.

Based on everything we said so far, you can guess a good chess player has to
consider another very important aspect in addition to the technical elements
of the game.

I'm talking about the PERSONAL GROWTH of the chess player.

In order to understand better what I'm talking about, let's consider the
example we made at point number 4.
Mark was doing a great tournament, he had 4 points out of 4 and he was
already savouring his victory.
But then he loses the fifth round and gets demoralized.
He felt so badly that the last round ended with a defeat as well.

When you play chess, you get to see many situations like this.
But these cases show us how important it is to manage our emotions
correctly.

If we consider a time frame of 1 year of training, it is more important to

dedicate that year to learn how to manage emotions during the game, rather
than studying any other "technical" aspect.

Why am I saying that?

Because the openings, the endgames, the pawn structures and so on... all of
that is something you can study whenever you want and with whomever you
want. On the other hand, there are still few people who know how to help you
manage your emotions and build a solid psychology at the chessboard.

After you make 1 YEAR OF TRAINING on both technical and personal

development aspects of the chess game, results will come for sure in one
way or another!

Thanks to this transformation, you'll get to grow a lot as a person. You'll be:

• More determined and motivated

• More relaxed at the chessboard
• Faster with calculation
• Open-minded towards opportunities
• More organized
• Sometimes unpredictable
• Brillant!

Let me ask you a question.

Who do you want to become?
Do you want to be like Mark in the example above, who gets influenced by
his mood, or you want to learn how to manage yourself at a higher level?

If you choose the first answer, I'm really sorry for you.
I'm sorry because during these 9+ years of chess training, I always try to help
my students bring out the best in them.

Knowing that you have unexpressed talents makes me sad.

But that's your choice and I respect it.

If you choose the second one, it means that you are ready to work on yourself
and that makes me really happy!

You probably understand the importance of following a path of personal

growth that helps you develop your potential and achieve your goals. For all
of you who are ready to start, I prepared a nice training program that can help
you achieve the results we've talked about above:

>> Discover The "Unknown Chess Secrets"

It deals with a method created to help you face all the obstacles you may
meet at chess during your personal path.

With this said, let's get back to our article and move on to another "technical"
aspect.
8. You don't consider your opponent's plans
Tell me the truth... when you analyse a position, do you also think about your
opponent's plan or do you focus only on yours?!

"Of course, I also keep in mind the plans of the opponent!"

That would be great! but I can tell you from my personal experience
that most of the mistakes we make depend on the fact WE DON'T
CONSIDER our opponent's plans.

It's normal after all. Our "healthy" selfishness places us at the center of the
world, while everything else simply rotates around :-)

So, how to solve this "problem"?

While you play chess, I would advice you to stop several times and ask
yourself the following questions:
 • What is my opponent's plan?
• What is he preparing for?
• Which are my weaknesses?
• How can I stop him from attacking me?
• How can I reach my goal before he reaches his?

I'm sure these simple questions will be very useful for you!

9. You don't team up with anyone

Until you are alone, you can improve up to a certain level, and NOT MORE.
You can't believe you'll be able to get anything you want without being
helped.

Think about your chess club, or the various blogs on the internet, or all the
people you meet at the tournaments... if you can find someone who has
similar goals, why not making a strategic alliance and start studying
together?
This will benefit both of you, because there will be 2 BRAINS WORKING
TOGETHER instead of just 1 alone.

You can meet (via Skype if you live far away each other) to work together on
specific topics, solve puzzles, analyse games and positions.
You can motivate each other during your growth path, and you can even
organise to participate in some chess tournaments together.

The options you have are endless, so if you think this can help you, start
looking for allies!

You will find out that there are many more than you imagine...

10. You say you want to start working, but

actually you don't take action!
Here we come to the real reason why you don't get results.
Many people dream, hope and wish, but a few really take action to achieve
their goals.

"But what do I need to do?"

That's very simple: roll up your sleeves start working, being aware that this
path will take time and energy.

And is it worth it?!

Absolutely yes!
There's one important lesson I've learned during these years of practice and
teaching experience:

"When you have a STRONG DESIRE to get results, no matter what obstacles
you have to face... you just do it!"

The main limiting obstacles may be:

• You have no time

• It requires too much effort
• You don't have enough money for the training

As regards the lack of time, know that it's never a problem.

You don't need to study 8 hours a day to improve at chess (unless you are
already a Grandmaster and aim at 2700 ELO points), but you just need to be
more organised.

Even a few, well structured hours every week can give you interesting results
within a few months... as long as you are CONSTANT.

"Yes Alex I understand, but the work may require too much effort".

If you get to say or think something like this, it means your desire to change
is not strong enough, and so dear Mark there is little to do... this path is not
for you.
"I have no money to invest right now".

Apparently this could be the most important obstacle.

From my point of view it is not...

First of all, one of the general accepted "laws" tells us that each of us pays for
what he receives.

If you have a clear goal, you should have certainly realised that some
expenses are useful for your life goals, others are much less useful
instead. Others again are just whims.

If your desire to improve at chess is strong, then you just need to eliminate
the whims and invest in your training.
You must do that for you, you know what I mean?!

Well, now you have everything you need to decide.

You may already know about my 12-month chess training program, the path I
created for those who want to start shifting gear and work at a higher level.

If you want to achieve a BREAKTHROUGH, then get on the ship and get
ready to sail!
>> 1-Year Chess Course

If you think this is not the right moment, it's okay.

But let me tell you something:

Regardless of who is (or will be) your trainer, start working on yourself right
away.

Find someone with whom you can work at 2 different levels at the same time:
 1. As a player
2. As a person

Remember that chess is not just technique, but it is much more...

If you follow this advice, I'm sure you'll see the first results just after the first
months of training.

Well, even the 10th chapter has ended!

I really hope this article has been helpful for you.

You know...
It came from my heart.
I did it for you.
For you who are curious, love knowledge, want to improve and change your
situation.

Try to take the most from this bunch of advice and above all start
immediately to TAKE ACTION!

If you feel like, write to me to let me know how your chess training is
proceeding ;-)