I can not believe that 1900 puzzle rating is possible without visualizing.
Ok, you must be right then and I'm just confused. I really don't talk puzzles through instead of visualizing, because you say it's impossible, and I'm really secretly very good at visualizing but don't know it because I'm totally unaware that I do it or anything that's going on in my head ever.
In addition, the time and effort I spent figuring out mathematically how puzzles are different from games was totally wasted and I must be wrong about that too, because you say it's just the same, and there's no arguing with Habanababananero's gut feeling on this subject, it's definitely correct.
This all makes sense and is definitely the most likely explanation, thanks for letting me know. This has been super-helpful in every way, I'm glad it just took finally meeting someone with such impeccable logic to let me know everything I was experiencing was a fake lie and thereby solving all my problems.
You should be a therapist. Have a great day.
OK.
One guy told me when he was still fairly new (and rated 1600) he could play up to 4 blindfold games at the same time... so definitely I think there are physiological (dis)advantages and limits for people. My ability to calculate has improved over the years, but when I play a blindfold game I'm not "seeing" it any better than when I was about 1300 (in fact I don't really "see" the board at all... hard to explain). Meanwhile others tell me when they play blindfold they see an actual board with pieces... and when I question them a few times, they emphasize they really do see a board (and I definitely don't).
There's a guy right now on another forum post that has been playing half the time I have (ie. since 2019) and went from 600 to 2100 rapid. I'm.... still at 600. He describes what he's been doing to train, and it's just depressing - so painfully obvious that there is natural inborn chess talent an I just don't have a drop of it, he gets ten times the result for way less effort.
IDK if you're serious about checking in once a week or whatever I'd be interested / would stick around for that, but it's probably a total waste of your time, I'm hopeless. =/
Yeah, that's how I define talent, as a multiplier for work. It's painfully obvious that if you take 1000 people, and have them all do the same thing (whether it's chess, or sports, or speaking a new language etc) that there will be a wide range of proficiency at the end. There's no such thing as getting better without work... but some people improve a lot for just a little.
Let me look at some of your games, and maybe think about what would be interesting as exercise / homework and you could let me know if it sounds useful... of course it's easier if we lived near each other, set up a board, and point at squares while talking, but that's unlikely to be possible.