What am I doing wrong, Help?

Post a few of your games ... getting better at chess is all about acquiring knowledge (plusses) and removing bad thought processes/habits/chess behaviors (minuses).

You can't just keep doing one and not addressing the other (a reason why 90% of the people who take up chess as a hobby reach a plateau inspite of buying/reading 100+ books) , so having stronger players   look at your games (LOSSES, don't just post victories!) will really help you find answers.

(Oh, and I assume the 2200 FIDE rating in your profile was not *ahem* accurate)

I don't think you should play blitz until you've spent some time on regular chess: blitz is about pattern recognition, and you don't have that unless you've played lots of slow games. Your rating is about the same as mine-and I try to do tactics training, and review my games with a stronger player. I should also be studying endgames, but I don't have a book and haven't found a good on-line resource for them. So I think that might work for you as well: tactics (a great site is chesstempo.com, you can do as many problems a day as you want), endgames, and reviewing your (slow) games  either here on the forums, or in person (is there a chess club in your area?).

Use a game database, like the one we have here, or Chessgames.com, to go over at least one master game a day. You don't even have to put a lot of thought into it. Chess is more or less a game of pattern recognition, and master games are a great way to learn more patterns.

Post a few losses with annotations on your plans for critical moves. That will very quickly reveal whether you're 2200 FIDE or much lower.

Incidentially, the FIDE rating floor is now 1200 I believe.

I think he definitely should put thought into it, little learning can occur without that! I don't believe he'll identify the patterns in the games if he doesn't look at them properly-he won't see what really happened, what part of the board he should focus on. Without that, he won't isolate the pattern.

You have a rating similar to mine. Some pieces of advice about how to improve your game given what I should do to improve mine:

=> stop playing blitz chess. It won't help you to improve it will help you to recognize patterns faster. This should be done once you have learnt a lot of things but want to learn to implement them into games, in fact when you need to acquire experience with new ideas you had already tried in regular chess.

=> allways play with a plan. Allways figure out what possible plan(s) are available to your opponent. Figure out which plans are bad and WHY, figure out which of his plans might be a real pain. As well, figure out what the position wants you to do, try to figure out how to accomplish that, and create your plan.

=> Allways try to foresee whose plan will be accomplished faster/stronger. And then, only if your plan is slower AND his plan wins the game if it successes then you stop about your play and try to see if you can prevent him. If not, then complicate the position to try to change plans availeble for both players (exchange sacrifices are usually good to give a new dynamic into the game).

=> Don't train too much on tactics. You should prefer playing games and looking for the tactics in every game you play. Once you saw tactics, just try to see if you can use it to go along with your plan (or if it goes against your plan, or if your opponent might crush your plan because of a tactic...etc...). Never fall into the trap of "setting traps up for your opponent". Allways assume he won't blow his position away by playing a bad move.

=> Before playing a move, try to check back in your mind about the tactics in the position, just to be sure your move doesn't hang a piece/pawn, or a positionnaly bad move (check for blunders in fact. I never do it and lose way too much games because of that!!!)

=> Try to create a repertoire of sound openings! You should choose openings you like or which often leads to positions you like to play, and stick to them, until you know quite well the theory in it, as well as common tactical schemes.

As an example, mine (which is not so good in fact):

As white:

1.e4 to go to ruy lopez. I play closed ruy lopez if possible, and don't trade my bishop to the c6 knight

vs 1....e6 I go for the Qe2 system

vs 1....c5 and most of other systems I go for the king's indian attack system

As black:

vs 1.e4 I play 1....g6 (the modern), to be able to choose my defensive setup depending on how he plays

vs 1.d4 I go 1....Nf6 to get into benoni systems (if possible into the benko gambit)

sometimes I use the 1.d4 c5 2.d5 f5? opening, when I know my opponent doesn't do very well into tactical games (this opening is bad and doesn't have theory to support opening play, so I just don't recommend it. Moreover, Your opponent is by no means forced into 2.d5 and this could lead to openings or variations that you don't like.)

vs 1.c4 I go Nf6 to try to get my benoni after 2.d4, if not then I generally go for a modern with 2....g6, or a nimzoindian with 2...e6

vs other openings I generally go for modern setup except that I try to take a part of the center with a pawn as well supported as possible

The advantage of this is (imo) that against any player I can either choose openings with tactical possibilities OR quiet positionnal play (at different degrees).

Hope it helps.

I wouldn't take advice from anyone "with a similar rating as mine." If the advice is so great, why aren't they better than me?

Well, perhaps they're still growing, while the poster says he's plateaued.

Possible, but when he says, "Don't focus on tactics" and recommends 2.Qe2 against the French...well...it looks like he's plateaued as well.

Platitudes don't make you better. Analysis makes you better.

Ignore everyone and just do tactics and read de La Maza's book, but ignore his advice also, and just do different tactics for several hours a day (don't ever do any problem twice until you've done every other problem once).

Also, instead of playing games or playing through games, just do more tactics.  It works.  You'll see...my rating is going to breakthrough any day now, seriously, just gotta get through the next 4 months of work, but then you'll see.  

Try it for 4 months, 2 hours daily, no more than 1 minute per exercise.  Tactics only.  Nothing else.  Any thing that you do that is not tactics will just take time away from tactics.   So don't.   Endgames are just super-long checkmates and checkmates are tactics, so do thousands of mates-in-1, then mates-in-2, then-mates-in-3, etc. in addition to practicing random tactics graded to your skill level (aka Tactics Trainer) and you will automatically work your way back-arse-wards to more complicated endgames/concrete analysis, then you'll be playing "positionally" naturally, avoiding bad endings and enemy tactics, and then you'll soon be doing all this from the start of the game("openings"), and then pretty soon you'll actually be playing real games...it may take 30 or more years but you'll be pretty good for someone who hasn't played in 30+ years.   Believe it.  Tactics. That's all, nothing else.

Just be sure you have fun.  If you don't enjoy the game no use playing... !!!

MDLM was single, unemployed, and on a nice severance package when he did his program and wrote his book. I've read blogs far and wide of the MDLM "Knights" who subscribe to the program... and none of them started OR finished above 1800 OTB. Sure, a few of them made 300-400 point gains (results not typical)...but it's not a magic bullet. The problem with MDLM is that you're not addressing a basic need, and that is just getting into the position for a tactic in the first place.

How about some actually useful thoughts from people with a proven track record of success? I'll go with NM Dan Heisman and IM David Pruess. DP's thoughts are at http://danheisman.home.comcast.net/~danheisman/Lessons/zadult_guide3.html#Preuss

The good stuff are titled trainers like DP plus the Majority Master Advice of "Play through and analyze your games, especially the ones you lost."

It is said that one is not a chessplayer until he has lost a thousand games. We must learn from our mistakes. Keep playing and avoid the same mistakes. A chess mentor or coach might help. I think developing a repetoire of openings cuts down the trial and error process.

I agree with alot, but not all, post 15.

First it's hard to say too much without seeing examples of what you're doing.  Posting a game will get you more specific feedback. 

So, generally I'd say that 10 minute chess isn't bad as long as that's not all you're doing.  Use speed chess to try out new ideas and work on SPECIFIC OPENINGS AND DEFENSES. 

That's my main point.  Learn 2 or 3 openings and stick to them.  If you want to simplify your task here I suggest learning how to play the g3/modern and use it from both sides of the board. 

Secondly be greedy.  Don't give away your pieces and pawns and snatch the free ones from your opponent.  Once you can get through your games without making simple blunders improvement can really start to happen.  If you can't avoid "hanging" your pieces it's hard to get better. 

I think that 5 or 10 minute games can help you with this if you do the following:   Don't think too much about attacking your opponent. Make you #1 goal to check and make sure you're not giving away your stuff.  Once you're pretty sure about that try to find a sensible move and think on the OTHER GUY'S time.  Try it and I think you'll see what I mean.

Practice tacitcs, checkmates and endgames here and at chesstempo.com. Opening theory beyond 3-4 moves can be fun to study, but does not have much practical use until a rating much higher than mine, since most of my games against opponents of similar rating leaves theory very early in the game.

I think we're going to need some actual moves.

Tactics and basic endgames would be the best way to go for your current level.

Learning how to win king and pawn v lone king endgames would be very useful (as well as how to draw them on the losing side). Your last game against AhmetZogu would of been a win if you knew the correct technique. Look at the position at move 59 after you have learnt it and you will see the way to have gotten the victory you deserved.