How Many Games does it take.

In sports they say you have to repeat something thousdands of times to get it right.  I'm wondering how many games it takes for someone to get into the deeper facets of chess.

I understand that you should play as often as you can as one of the steps at getting better at chess, but I just broke the 4,000 game mark (on chess.com) and my rankings are just now begining to improve.

I used to "learn" something new, then apply it, now I'm going on instinct alone and I'm doing better.  I believe it has to do with the number of games played, which makes me wonder, how many games does it take.

Is there a stat on the number of games played vs the rank of a player.  I mean, if you see a 1800 player can you assume 10,000+ games no matter what?  Or is it 100,000+ games?

I don't want to play a game just to have a total overall count increase, but I like 1 minute games so it's not hard to get a lot of games in.  I'd like to say I care about every single game I play, and every single move that's played, but I'm sure that's far from the truth.  If someone cares about each game played, and is playing an oponent that is stronger than them, how many games would it take to improve.