can we really improve??

There will always be players trying to sell you something.

But don't need to pay a dime to improve at chess. With today's free resources (databases, engines, YouTube videos, free chess websites), improvement will come to those who want it.

But you need to be conscious about how you approach things. If you're just putzing around and trying to "grind" (playing, playing, playing), you're inevitably going to build bad habits and laziness.

Here's my recommendation:

1) Choose a simple opening repertoire that you want to focus on. It doesn't have to be knee-deep in theory. Just decide on the first few moves that you enjoy playing. Your repertoire will likely continue to change and evolve over the years, so you don't have to fret too much about this step - it won't be set in stone. The main thing is to choose a repertoire that interests and excites you. The point of this is consistency - by playing consistent openings, you'll be able to build a framework of familiarity and understanding.

2) Review and analyze every game you play, immediately after you play it. Every single game. I repeat: every single game. Don't skip this step, as this where a large chunk of your improvement will come from.

Reviewing and analyzing is where you learn new ideas and level up. Playing is simply where you practice the ideas that you've learned.

3) Don't fear losing, or get upset about it - losing is extremely important to improving. Lost games help you identify the areas of your game that you need to strengthen.

4) Train your tactical vision. Tactics abound in chess, and most of your games will have missed opportunities. The more you expose yourself to tactical puzzles - and the more you force yourself to try to find the correct solutions - the more prepared you'll be to identify tactical opportunities when they arise.

But you should do puzzles correctly: by trying to see the entire solution, before clicking the first move. Don't try to guess your way through tactical puzzles - as that defeats the purpose of the exercise.

5) Make friends with higher-rated players, and play casual games with them. Ask for advice or tips. Assuming they aren't trying to sell you something, they'll be able to give you ideas that you hadn't thought of before.

ive decreased in elo so much due to low motivation and boredom. try to keep yourself enjoying the game

Relatively good advice. It be best though to explain point 2 in little more detail. Lots of people who watch YouTube get wrong idea how to study and when they see masters like Alex looking up moves with engine after the game, they get the sense of: this is how chess should be done.

What they do not see is hours spent for each individual master to reach that level and the reason why they are looking up straight at engine moves

That is where coaches come handy or material that is focused on analysis of your own games.

I approach chess as a videogame. Every time I come to a game, I am trying to be stronger so I can level up faster. Each rating point that I gain is leveling up in a sense.

The joy for me is learning and leveling up. It is up to you to make your learning fun experience. You can always do easier and more fun part first and when you get stronger, you may find joy in the 'more' technical stuff

You are an absolute clown.

Your course is called "I will be your chess coach and gain 1800 Elo fast". Your Blitz rating is not even 1500. If we run your Blitz and Rapid ratings through the ChessGoal dataset, we get an estimated Elo of 1500. So your course is not only very shallow, but actual fraud.

And what learning methods do you offer us in your $30 course? Should we give you our account information so that you can gain the rating for us? Because you don't just get better without work and effort.

The reason you've ever won against 2000 rated players is either because they gave up their queen for no reason in a position where you were completely lost or you flagged them. Of course you don't need any opening knowledge if you play the London System over and over again and then regularly are in a losing position on move 15. And I don't know if arithmetic is a concept to you, but even if you were to somehow transfer 90% of your knowledge to an amateur, that wouldn't be equal to a rating of 1800.

If you don't know anything about learning, why offer to help others learn? You're a plateau player, remember that?

Jesus...

[Removed - DB]

Are you telling me I should keep that medal for someone else?

OP probably already paid and is on his way to 1800

It sounded too good to NOT to be true

You can definitely improve at any level - I think talent plays a part in how quickly you improve though, might take one kid 1-2 years and might take another 6-7 years

I do agree that talent plays role in speed of learning however I also believe that most of the part you call talent is rare.

We all have ability to learn and albeit some of us will be slower, I have learned during teaching various students that each of us have habits and blocks that need to be removed first in order to get better at the game.

One of the most natural enemy of self development and what I call talent are our own thoughts, worries and inadequacies.

If you were to learn to full potential you have to be incquisitive, disciplined, open to new ideas and most of all honest to yourself and your coach or material you are working with. Talented people are usually the most passionate about what they are doing.

We can take Magnet Carlsen as an example. In multiple interviews he admits of thinking about chess all the time, he is passionate about the game and is willing to explore and analyse most positions you put in front of him.

Most of us dont work that way. We want to improve but we want to do it with minimal resources and minimal effort. It is usually the time you put in that will return results. But yes. Do it smart way. Dont just watch some clown doing Bongcloud speedruns. It is meant to be for entertainment, not serious study. No offense or pun intended

I agree. However, I don't believe in talent, I believe in effort.

My singing teacher used to say that singing comes down to 10% mindset and 90% effort. And I think it's the same in chess.

Talent is a discouragement for those who have not mastered a skill. Because it fundamentally separates the skill from the associated effort. And if you believe in talent, it means that you don't want to admit to your laziness. After all, if you don't believe in it, mastery would be tangible.

i got to 1900 in 6 months just because of how much i worked to become better in chess

How many of those 2500 games have you truly analysed on your own without any help?

Solved puzzles up to 2000 what do you mean by that?

Did you ever try and do tons of puzzles one day then play one game and do the same the next?

Or did you just throw in couple of puzzles and then tons of games?

Know that I already might know the answer without looking at single one of those stats. It is the part I was talking about. Be honest about the real chess work you do, then you might start improving..

1000 player here so obv not good lol. But I had a hard time getting better. Tried learning openings from my dad. Did nothing. Sure, I know how not to die in the first 10 moves but I would just end up losing in the middle game, quick. But I think the thing I decided is people learn differently. My dad was this guy I could never beat he would play like he is setting up a master plan. I can't do that. Mostly because my default is I see blood everywhere. I guess you could say hyper aggressive.
Anyway, this I think a lot of people miss when they are starting. "I am losing my games and I am stuck, I should drop everything I know and change the way I am to learn from a master on youtube to get better" NO! You need to evaluate the base player you are and strengthen those. For me as an example (Do not follow as it is me not you, my point is to find you) I have 2,500 to 2,700 in rating on puzzles in lichess. My brain is hardwired to be able to find crazy lines to end the game. SO I spent my time not trying to fight that and pivot and just try to fill the holes that I miss not try to rewire my brain. Also fighting my inner impatience has also helped a lot, not that that is everyone. But my biggest downfall for sure. ADHD is a b****
Anyway I would caution those that learn without a real coach (like my father not a real coach) to take YT videos and books with caution. A coach (I think) would find your strengths and build off of them I am pretty sure. ALL I AM SAYING is self learning you might spend most of your effort fighting an up hill battle struggling with your nature.

The hell kind of question is "can we improve"?

Humans can improve in anything. The better you get the more work you have to put in to improve. Youre probably at a point where you have to go out of your comfort zone to improve. 2000 is a decently high level, you need some real consistency to get there.

This post is just "I'm frustrated because analyzing a few games hasnt got me to 2000. Hopefully there some magic trick to get me there other than dedication".

I guess this is supposed to be some motivational talk but obviously talent and effort are both real variants that determine where you end up. Effort is the only thing you can have an impact on but our build is not the same.

I get your sentiment. We are basically talking about begginners here as I believe anything under 800-1000 or even higher (Used to be 1250) should and could be potentially a beginner level no matter how many hours they spent playing chess.

First thing you should not recommend begginners to spend too much time on are, yes you guessed it, OPENINGS.

It used to be a norm that you show opening principles to begginner player on Ruy Lopez Classical Line and move on from there.

Second point you were making I have to gently disagree with. I am self learner and learned from 100s of books. I was blessed to get series of books that introduced me well into the game. I was 1500 level before I entered my first tournament or played my first serious game thanks to first few books I have read. The books taught me everything about chessboard, analysis, playing blindfold, basic concepts in opening, middle game, endgame, basic endgames etc. Then progressed to more advanced strategy, tactics, endgames etc. From first two days I was able to study on my own, because I was already told how to analyse my own games.

I have read more than 5 books for beginners alone even when I already have obtained National Title.

The main issue people have nowadays is lack of patience, motivation and the right kind of information.

Don't get me wrong on this point. There are great books out there, you just have to find the appropriate one for your level and I would always recommend starting with beginners books as there are the most important principles and advice on how to improve your game.

There is lots of information but beware GMs don't give their information for free, you will rarely see helpful information for begginners online and it is difficult to choose from all the material that is out there. People tend to consume all sorts of informations and aren't able to make sense of it or follow simply one advice and work with it.

On your third point I have to absolutely agree. We all are made differently so we all learn differently. But it is responsibility of each individual or their coach to unlock their potential and suit their training to their needs.

The easiest excuse is to say: this can't be done, look at me! And with that... give up and sulk about being awful at it.

The games on your account don't make much sense to me.

Here's one game of yours:

You lost on time, but you completely outplayed White. I see improvements that could've been made, but for the most part, Black played a very good game. It wasn't even close. The player with the Black pieces (you) was clearly several levels stronger than White.

Now here's another game of yours:

You (White) intentionally threw away all your pieces, for no apparent logic or reason.

Here's another game of yours.

Again, you (White) intentionally threw away all your pieces, as if trying to lose as quickly as possible.

I don't know your reasoning for doing this, but you shouldn't be on here, trying to discourage other players by mentioning your own apparent lack of progress, when your games clearly demonstrate that you're trying to lose on purpose, to lower your own rating ...

Talent is excuse for those who don't try hard enough. People with talent who made it know about the hardwork they had to do in order to get there.

Did you read any of the advice people gave? You play perhaps too many games a day. The amount of games you played today I didnt play that many in last two weeks together. I did my daily 300+ puzzles, analysed the games I have played.

We can agree that your lack of progress is real but if you believe that players learn only by playing, there is unfortunately only very few cases able to do that and even then. Those who reached certain heights like titles, these guys spent counless hours away from their opponents, studying. This is reality, you may choose to keep ignoring it but.. You will be still where you at if you perpetuate your habits, maybe little bit harder.

The most important thing you should take away from your games are lessons!

I see.

Well, I recommend you avoid playing when frustrated. And certainly try to stop yourself from throwing away games on purpose - that's not going to help you at all.

Losing on time happens to all of us, but if you find it a recurring event, then I would consider playing longer timers, or adding longer increments - until you're more comfortable with shorter games.

I've looked at your games and you're a far stronger player than your rating indicates. You may think you have not made any progress but I can see experience and skill in your moves - so I disagree.