Chess.com has turned me into a rabid, starving dog. I take any opportunity to annihilate my opponent, and feel crushed by any defeat. What you speak of is a foreign notion to me.
are there other totally non-competitive people here? How do you play?
Sort:
I'm realising that I have a huge problem with winning. I really hate winning. It makes me sad, down, miserable, and feel I've done something evil and bad. To be fair, there's an element of control-freak in me, I don't like being forced to lose either. I enjoy exploring a nice position in a game, but that's really the only reason I play.
The result of this is that if an opening looks boring, I often resign because I don't want to play it. If I am playing and reach a position where I think I will probably win, I often either resign or offer a draw. If my opponent resigns, I feel let down, and feel obliged to resign the next game to balance things up; this means that as I approach a definite winning position, I'm tempted to resign before it's even become definitely-winning, in case my opponent beats me to it! If I'm losing, obviously I resign. So basically I'm resigned to resigning. I only ever play to win when my rating has dropped so low I feel I'm not going to get paired with people who give me a good game - then I play my way up again before the cycle of resignation begins again.
Are there other people here who hate winning? Have you met people who hate winning? What did they do to overcome the problem? Or did they just live with it? Or give up chess? Is there a chess-like game somewhere that doesn't involve winning and losing? Is there room for non-competitive people, somewhere?