Tactics won't help with positional thinking.
Play through well commented games of highly rated players. Try to guess the next move. Think why they made their move before reading the comments.
Resources for center tension?
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The key to resolving tension (in the center, or in fact, any location on the board) lies in the concept of "pawn breaks", aka "break moves". You can learn all about that topic in the following article...
Pawn Play and Structure - for Beginners and Beyond...
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell/chess-books-on-pawn-play-and-structure
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell
You can quickly get the idea from the following good example of a specific type of pawn break - the concept of the "hook", i.e., attacking and exchanging off an opponent's advanced pawn with one of your own, in order to open a file, creating an open line of attack for your rooks, Queen, etc. In order to successfully accomplish this, you must first have established superior development - that is, your pieces must be in a position to quickly and cooperatively exploit the newly opened line(s) of attack...
Nov 13, 2022
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#4
What you are describing sounds to me like you're at the level where you need to do some opening study. If you are just in the development stage and things are going south it's likely there's already been a mistake that your opponent is able to capitalize on. At lower rating levels it won't matter much because you can equalize lots of mistakes. As you get better that is less and less true. Eventually just losing a pawn in the opening will often prove catastrophic.
Games are their most complicated at the stage you're talking about. Maybe a couple pawns traded and one set of minor pieces off the board. Just enough open squares to really give all the pieces lots of options and lots of pieces to take advantage of those options. It's the whole reason opening Theory exists is that nobody can calculate all that stuff and unfortunately nowadays most people are studying it. Opening study is about as much fun as taking a sharp stick in the eye but it's a necessary evil. You don't need to know every opening, but you should have a grasp on a few so you can get past the exact stage you're talking about.
That's not to say the other suggestions above weren't also valid, but the entire purpose of studying opening Theory is because even Grandmasters can't figure out all of the complications down the road from various opening moves.
I bet if you post up a couple example games of what you're talking about, opening Theory would say the problem started by move five or six. I'm just guessing there.
Nov 14, 2022
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#5
Looking at your last three loses you are losing your games because of not seeing tactics or dropping pieces. It looked like you were not always calculating out the entire exchange before responding to the threat. Most 1200 players will calculate the exchange before going into it, and when forced they chose the exchange or exchange order that loses them the least amount of material. Focus on calculating out every exchange.
@1
"I got my rating up near 950" ++ A rating of 950 is a sign of frequent blunders.
Always check your intended move is no blunder before you play it.
"I've been losing pretty much every game"
++ Analyse your lost games to learn from your mistakes.
"I feel like I don't blunder nearly as much" ++ You are wrong. Weed out blunders.
"a lot of my losses have been the result of me misplaying positions" ++ Tactical errors
"videos or courses on this topic?"
++ You cannot learn chess from a video, just like you cannot learn to swim, to ride a bicycle, or to drive a car from a video.
You have to play and then analyse your lost games and learn from your mistakes.
"I know tactic puzzles are a must and am already doing them."
++ Four tactics puzzles are a good warm-up, but do not overdo it. Chess is not tactics puzzles like soccer is not penalty kicks. In a real game nobody tells you there is a tactic or for which side.
I've been really playing for about 3 months now. A week or so ago I got my rating up near 950 but since then I've been losing pretty much every game. I could be wrong, but I feel like I don't blunder nearly as much as people say sub 1200 players typically do yet I'm still losing. It seems to me like a lot of my losses have been the result of me misplaying positions where it is the start of the middle game and there's a lot of tension at the center of the board. Any suggestions for resources like videos or courses on this topic? I know tactic puzzles are a must and am already doing them. Also if anyone thinks I have a different problem based on my games I'm open to any criticism no matter how harsh.