Om

Lately, I've been studying chess again, and it really feels good. I've also been practicing meditation more, which feels great. It helps me shed off guilts, fears and anxieties I don't really realize I have unless I meditate.

I'm studying chess...well, if you're not a serious/tournament player, you might not understand, but it's a lot of fun. It's something you practice and get used to. It's like reading a book, and once you're sort of okay at it, it becomes a little more natural. Anyway, all serious players study. World Champions study lots of hours a day, though they all have different programs. In that way it's kind of like sports. Grandmaster Gufeld, and my own mentor, both said the best way to study is to memorize games; and once again, once you do it some it becomes natural. One who doesn't understand would say that that is a bad way to learn, because then what do you do if someone doesn't follow the games you know? Well, for one, you are studying to learn patterns, and openings, and most of all, understanding the game. You learn patterns of different attacks, strategies, you learn what is standard for different pawn formations, piece plays, and things like that. You learn about positional play, too; again, the pawn formations as well as different weaknesses. Currently I'm studying a few different books I have here; Alekhine's games, the Zurich International Chess Tournament of 1953, a tournament book by Bronstein (a tournament book is one written usually by one of the players [Bronstein was 2nd of 15 players] where all of the games are annotated, at least a little), which was a famous tournament because it was so strong and had lots of the world's greats, as well as Gary Kasparov's Volume II of [I]On My Great Predecessors[/I], covering Euwe, Botvinnik, Smyslov, and Tal. I'm most familiar with Alekhine's games, and now it's great to go back and look at them, especially since there are a few in Kasparov's book, where he battles with Euwe for the World Championship.

One of the main things to be honest is openings. You must know what you're doing, and the openings do help the rest of your game, especially if you study entire games, because then you see how it translates into the middlegame, etc. I actually have a friend who is coming back to town soon, from Boston, who is supposed to have gotten a lot better. So I will really have to crack down if I want to compete with him when he gets back. It'll be fun.