One very successful path others have taken:

CT-Chess Art DVD.  Perfect for tactical training 1400-2000.

NIC Tactics in the Chess Openings Series.  (Pick which openings you play, pick the book in the series that covers it.  Not an opening tome, but use for TACTICS in the opening!) Play entire games, go over the notes regarding the tactics. Disregard the idiotic reviews on Amazon.  These books are excellent for club players.

That's astounding-- about 1.2 seconds per problem for the whole book?

i guess that's the book with 1001 mates from the one and the same position :)

Yes.  I know people that can do it in under 10 mins.

Listen, after 30 years of doing it, maybe 500+ X, one will get it. 

It will pay off immensely at the board.  Go look at some of my games here on this site.  They usually end in the middlegame with a tactical shot.

Here is a recent 16 move game: http://www.chess.com/echess/game.html?id=16161397

I am not always the benefactor of said shot, but that time I was.

Here is a dirty little secret, but don't tell anyone.

Memorize the problems.  You will find that after you memorize the answers, it will take you about 1.2 seconds to remember the answers.

Another secret:  If you memorize something, you know it.

Napoleon said to his barber:

"shave me slowly because I am in a hurry"

I am sure you will understand what I mean!!

Like I said, astounding. I guess what I was considering was actually solving, note memorizing. I'm not going to get into an argument here about memorization vs knowing except to note that they aren't necessarily the same thing. Let's say I memorize all 1001 positions as apparently you and some others with too much time on their hands have done. Does that mean I "know" them? Not necessarily... depends on the definition.

More important than the mere semantics, will that memorization help me in my games? In general, I doubt it. But I suspect through the act of memorizing I'd be learning something in spite of myself, so it might help a bit. I have students who can memorize the multiple choice sequence. They don't really know much more after they do than they did before they started...

I suggest studying a book such as Euwe and Meiden's The Road to Chess Mastery (David McKay Company, 1966).  It explains basic principles through detailed annotations of 25 real games between amateur and master players.  Unlike typical chess annotations, these are designed to help amateurs improve their play.

GM's have about 300,000 Kerns memorized.

Memorization leads to knowing.  Watch how kids learn. 

If you get the right answer, because you know it is the right answer, then you know the right answer. 

Note:  Knowing something does not mean one knows how to APPLY it correctly.

That requires: Wisdom.  Wisdom comes from: Experience.

Study, Memorize, Learn, Practice.

This is a time honored way to get better at things.  If you do not think so you are free to find another way.

 Correct study?

12,000 hours?

 Play, study, learn, REST, play, study, learn, REST, play...etc

A rating of 1352 isn't to be sniffed at, it puts you into the top 50% of players on this site. 

Good point. 

The rest part is one of the most important, and often overlooked, as I just foolishly did.  It allows our brain to "defrag" and to re-allocate all the data we have crammed in there.

I know how kids learn. It's my job. But there is a difference between memorizing the right answer and knowing the meaning of-- and the path to-- that right answer. It's the difference between knowing the answer is 'B' of the choices given and knowing the value of that answer. The first might get a good score on the test just as memorizing the position will let you "solve" the chess problem in 1 second, but the the second will allow you to recognize the lateral, orthogonal and tangential application of that knowledge in new situations, reason backward from it, etc.

That being said, in the end I appreciate your suggestions for study and have no quibble with them.

If you get yourself taught by a good chess teacher,it may help.

Excellent advice and motivation to the questioner.  Study the correct materials, learn those principles of development and then play, play, play.  Old skills will eventually be replaced as you develop new ones.  I played in world class table tennis tournaments because I learned NEW SKILLS.  I still have the skills I taught myself by trial and error, but it was the new skills that were taught to me that improved by ability to become a Class A and eventually International Class player. Keep learning new principles in theory (not just a few moves) and eventually you will be able to recognize the "truth of most situations" as Kasparov states.  It does require thousands of hours of truth seeking in chess situations.  Forcing your opponent to make fewer choices gives you great confidence and lots of wins!

Well I can say that you have played quite a few games.  I thing I would agree on is to focus more on your games instead of the rating you have.  Focus on making the best move, which it seems you do.  Maybe you could review opening theory or middle and end games tactics. 

Do not give up on chess, each person progresses at a different level.  Keep at it you will improve.

I believe we have brokered an agreement. 

While I respectuflly disagree with some of your points I also wholly agree with some others.  Please understand that I hold this to be a more nuanced and deeper subject than I would normally enter into on the intrawebs. I do not wish to over simplify your argument or positions in an attempt to refute them, not would it make sense for you to do likewise, else we both be the fool.

Let me just finish by saying that learning is a very complicated process, but that if one cannot remember what is put in I am not sure how much learning can take place.  So, at the very bottom of my OVER SIMPLIFIED learning pyramid I have:

Exposure, Absorption, and Memory.

If these do not take "seed", where do we go from there? 

This is where the specialist steps in and I step out and back into the world of playing chess.

~ richie_and_oprah

What you need to do is learn 1 or 2 openings first. After that? TACTICS, TACTICS, TACTICS. Forget about opening theory. Read lots and lots of puzzles. Go to Chessgames.com and solve the puzzle there EVERY DAY, regardless of difficulty as well as the ones on this site. You will see a marked improvement.