For a while, I played chess like any other board game. All I knew was how to move the pieces, without any knowledge on openings, strategies or tactics. I would only play on weekends with my father, and that was as far as I went with chess.

Eventually I learned some basic patterns such as the king and rook checkmate, castling long and even the first couple of moves in the Scholar's Mate. I obtained this knowledge only from playing games, no outside study. As my experience grew, I learned even more patterns, such as back-rank mate, and somehow en-passant.

I only really started studying chess when I was in high school. We had a nice chess set that we would play with during our breaks, and I was there most of the time watching. I would only play sometimes, but every time I would, I got completely destroyed by the older kids who were very good at chess (I believe then their chess.com ratings averaged out to be 1300-1700).

These failures taught me something interesting. I never realized how much depth there was to this simple board game. This got me inspired, and I began browsing through YouTube to absorb as much chess knowledge as I could. I created a chess.com account, and my rating went up from around 500-600, to 900! From learning basic opening traps, such as the fried liver attack, to key points such as controlling the center and doubled pawns, my chess knowledge was growing rapidly.

One problem I struggled with a lot was I never really learned any openings. Sure I knew a dozen by name and a handful by the first couple moves, but none with more than 3 moves of theory. This held me back tremendously, and my rating barely changed. I learned some basic ideas of the French Defense, as well as the Italian Game. This kept me going.

Things pretty much stayed the same until the year 2022. I started to take chess a bit more seriously. I bought diamond membership on chess.com, giving me perks such as infinite puzzles, game review, and practice bots. It also gave me access to the openings explorer, which is key to learning openings. Going through lesson after lesson, I was seriously upping my game. Now I stand at (an estimate of) 1200 in blitz, 1200 in bullet, 1400 in rapid and 2400 in puzzles!

Analyzing games is also a key point into growing in chess. In one of my games, I actually found three brilliant moves in one game!

I'm still growing in my chess career, and at the age of 16 I'd say I've just begun. I have a long way to go, but I'm ready to take on the challenge. As I climb the rating ladder, I face more skilled and prepared opponents, both in quantity and quality.

This is all not to say chess has become a main factor of my life, and I'm some chess prodigy becoming a GM in a couple years. Honestly, I still just play chess for fun. Ratings and statuses are nice and all, but sometimes people focus too much on the competitive, side points of life and forget about the really important stuff. For the people who are super smart and grow up to be famous grand masters, good for them. For normal people like me, I'd say chess shouldn't be taken too seriously. I do admit that I may have gone a little bit overboard with the intense studying, but I would say that just sticking with the learning basic principles throughout the game, as well solid openings--such as the Vienna for white and the Caro-Kann for black--with other opening knowledge against openings that opponents might play is more than enough for anyone who just wants to play chess for fun.

If you've read this far, wow! I appreciate the fact that you thought I was important enough to read my story. With that being said, I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day (or night)!

-Moshe

RamBakhi