I just wanted to toss a little bit of chess philosophy at chess.com to chew on.

How good would you consider yourself to be if you or your opponents didn't have a rating?

Roughly where I am now, I feel like I'm ~1400 strength if I take away stupid queen blunders.

Let the idea of numbers drop away. The point of this exercise is to really take a stab at understanding how much you know chess, not your results in games, but how well you speak the language of chess. I think this is very usefull for chess improvement if people are open enough to give it an honest chance.

Pretty good, but not great. My sacrifices are still too speculative and not forcing enough, and too often I flail around without a plan. If I could simply stop randomly hanging pieces, I would feel a lot better about my play: I'd say randomly hanging pieces accounts for at least half to 2/3 of my losses.

I don't know much about chess its self just how to play.

I wish i understood it better but you.

I'll give it a shot and you can let me know if this is along the lines of what you are looking for.

I'm better than most.  Often against lesser foes I have a hard time trying to see why they may have picked that move to use against me.  I know I am in real trouble in other games when I find myself without a target on the board or a way to create a target or weakness.  I feel like I am close to "breaking through" to the next level.  I have often found that my understanding of chess does not slowly improve--it goes flat for a period of time then shoots up quickly when something clicks to me and I can then attach this knowledge to already existing knowledge.

My endgame needs considerable work.  I often find myself in spots where I think I should know the proper response by now but don't. While the other phases of the game need work as well I think the endgame knowledge would backfill a few holes in my game.

I do pretty good overall with tactics.  Getting much better at seeing and creating overworked pieces.  Also trapping pieces, for that matter.  ALthough the move sequnece did not play out, had two games recently when I would have had a nice xray style attack which was good.  Further have been getting better at exploiting weak squares.  Strangely can still miss a mating net if there is a piece gain in there to sidetrack me.

If my opponents had no rating I would always consider myself to be the weaker player, to not be very good at chess.  I practice everyday, and my play always reflects my emotional state.  When I am at my strongest I feel I can do things on the board, that I have power to manifest my will; when I am at my weakest I always feel I am at the mercy of my opponent, whether it's the computer or another human being.  I think this is true of any endeavor that it's not what we do, but how we do it.  If I win, but am feeling weak, I will always dismiss the win with an excuse, usually that the opponent wasn't worthy of playing someone of my level, or if the opponent has a higher ranking that I was lucky to have taken advantage of a mistake, that had very little to do with my actual play.  If I lose, but am feeling strong, I can always find something to take away from the game, and am eager to get right back into the fray.

I think what you're getting at, learning to play the board and not the player, is a difficult thing to do, especially since we're trained to learn things from contextual cues.  The spiritual and emotional training that it takes to be great at anything, from chess to swordplay to arranging flowers, requires not just practice at the rote maneuvers of the black and white pieces, but study of, understanding of, and care and compassion for the self.

A.

There was a memory program that Kevin Trudeau did, and in it he listed four levels of learning, which I think are a good measure in any endeavour.

Stage 1- Unconscious incompetence (you are unaware of your own ignorance)

Stage 2- Conscious incompetence (you're aware of how little you know)

Stage 3- Conscious compentence (the start of mastery. you're aware of what you're doing)

Stage 4- Unconscious competence (mastery, the skill takes place at a subconscious level, intuitively)

I find myself to be in stage 2. I have spots of masterly play from time to time, but for the most part, it's a hack job. I am really close to abandoning online play and pouring myself fully into my study program.

This is an important idea that is brought up. I would like to make the observation that chess exsists in a vacuum. There is nothing hidden on the board, and nothing is decided by random outside factors. As Tal stated once, "Fischer is Fischer, but a knight is still a knight". Our ability may differ, but for the lot of us, it is ALL the same game. Whether it be myself, or a skilled player, plopped in front of a board 8 moves into the Ruy Lopez, the board is exactly the same. What does this mean for you, the chess enthusiast? What it means is that you should focus on the one variable that you have control over...YOU. The task at hand is learn how to fine tune your own chess instrument that is your person. Remember to train the whole of your being. There are physiological as well as pyschological aspects that must be taken into account if you want to bring the best possible 'you' to the chessboard. Check out my posted game against NM Bardwick in which I drew (lost in my eyes) a game in a simul because midway through my offensive manuevre I started playing my opponent instead of playing chess. I failed due to a psychological trap of overestimating my opponent. I learned in that game to just play my ideas, and if I take a crack for it, I'll learn something, but NEVER play based off of your opponents skill level, good or bad.

Without the ratings I would probably think worse of myself. My rating and it's gradual but consistent improvement has encouraged me more than if I didn't have any way to compare. My opponent's rating has a different effect. When I get killed, I'm glad to see when my opponent was rated much higher. When I have an easy game, my opponent's lower rating explains it. When I'm losing to a lower rated player I try much more desperately to find a win. When I play a close game against a high rated player, that's really a thrill. In general, I feel the ratings have a positive influence.

without ratings, I would consider myself fairly ok. not yet good enough.

am fairly ok in tactical situations and deceptively adept at handling positional situations. in the openings and middlegames.
My sacrificial style of play is way too speculative and sometimes it feels like i need to be at least a pawn down to "enjoy" the torture. (not good for the results)
however I feel my endgame can do so much better. I have almost nearly got a fair understanding of R+P endgames and K+P endings.Other minor piece endings seem to elude my  brain.
Above all am trying to learn to be patient !!