chess as therapy --a quote I like

" I suppose I'm one of those who sees chess as a form of therapy. Sometimes I wonder what people like you, people who don't play chess, do to escape from depression and madness."

from: The Flanders Panel, by Arturo Perez-Reverte

thats very weird. According to my experience, chess is a mental health hazard.

I see chess as a kind of therapy, a means to forget other problems. I add another quote from the same book:

" The games can last for hours, during which time, family, problems, work, all get left behind, pushed to one side. Thats common to everyone. What happens is that while some see it as a battle they have to win, others, like myself, see it as an arena rich in fantasy and spatial combinations, where victory and defeat are meaningless words." [p.158]

healthy attitude.

Have you heard of the novel "The Royal Game" or "Chess Story" by German author Stefan Zweig? There, the opposite takes place.

Also, observe the mental health problems of many great chess players such as Morphy, Fischer, and many others. I know people who suffered mental health problems because of chess.

Great that it works in the opposite direction for you!

Didn't like that book much.

Hmm, so do drugs and alcohol ;) Ontopic: I sometimes play chess with psychiatric patients at the place where I work. Some have a hard time understanding the rules, but once they sort of get it (I skipped castling and en passent) they enjoy it alot. But tbh I think it's mostly that they are spending time doing *something* instead of sitting in their rooms.

@Andy: Yes the Schachnovelle  is a bit hard to swallow and disturbing. But it points in the right direction, I think. 

Not sure what that is...I was referring to The Flanders Panel.

Oh, sorry. I thought you meant "The Royal Game".

You're sick man. Just kidding.

Chess can be disturbing if one is obsessed with it, or playing in too many tournaments, or desperate to win. But the attitude of Munoz in the book is different. He just looks at the beauty of the game, and the different combinations, as a mathematician would.

There are and were geniuses in all spheres of life, art, literature, music, who were in some way disturbed or eccentric. But I think there must be just as many who were not. The same possibly is true of chess.

One can't put chess in the same category as alcohol or drugs. Those dull the brain, while chess sharpens it.

Chess certainly does not have the negative health aspects that drugs have, whose cemistry have direct impact on the human body.

How can one gain the sane attitude on Chess that Munoz seems to have (had?) ? How can one keep away from the obsession and self-flaggelation or megalomania that seem to be accompanied by chess ?

kenpo, we are only discussing a character in a book. In the book, Munoz is a brilliant chess player. The quotes are only what he says, which is leading to an interesting discussion!

Why not, unless the intensity gets too much...then try knitting.

in response to Arturo Perez-Reverte question, I hit the gym. 

As someone who "suffers" from Asperger's Syndrome, I can say that for me at least, chess is extremely therapeutic. Since one of my symptoms is a high IQ, I find that it helps to have something difficult to think about. I can even understand things like  say, basic mating patterns, fundamental tactical themes, color complexes, weak/strong squares, minor piece battles, how material, time and quality relate to one another, static vs. dynamic imbalances, nuances of pawn structures or positional exchange sacrifices etc etc, and even chew gum at the same time. It even helps with my pathologically short attention span and hyper-focus. I was taught the game at age 5 by my first shrink for exactly these reasons. Obsession is a danger, but can be kept in check by those responsible for my well-being (and if I didn't obsess on chess I would just obsess on something else). Chess keeps me from factoring n-degree polynomials (n>3) over and over in my head, something that's nowhere near as pleasant as it might sound. I think that everyone is different, but for some of us "psychiatric patients", it truly helps.

A lot of us consider chess "fun", so there is a risk of overdoing it.  Consider there are men who spend too much time golfing or watching sports and drinking beer, or women who shop too much.  What is good in moderation becomes bad when overdone.  And for 99%, chess is a leisure activity, not a job (responsibility)   So at times there will be more important things to do than play chess.  It is a great game, but it is not life. 

davidnunnya, thanks for sharing. Pretty interesting story you have. As a carer, I have met young people who have Asperger's, and none of them was interested in chess or anything else "brainy". You give me some new insights.

Kenpo, your explanations are very interesting, too. The thing I do not agree with is that people who want to distract themselves would not be knowledgable of chess. The way I see it, many people play chess as a hobby, a distraction. Now that they get interested, they will pick up a book or a webpage that explains the topics you mentioned. They play further games and want to become better, get annoyed if they don't, feel like a superior being if they do, obsess over chess in order to maintain their status, etc. There seems to be no way out. Once you play, you start to obsess.

Bartleby, I would direct you to study the life of Alan Turing (my hero). He was an aspie who is considered to be the father of computer science and was the person who cracked the Enigma cryptography engine used by the Germans during WWII.

While I like to tell myself that it is the ordered, deterministic chaos of the chessboard that causes it to be so addictive, your hypothesis regarding why chess becomes an obsession for so many seems sound. I think that the sense of intellectual accomplishment that a few wins can offer can definitely become addictive. And that, I think, can create a serious aversion to losing. This aversion, in turn, can cause a person to go to any length to avoid losing. Reading books, studying master games, playing too much even to the exclusion of things in life that are objectively more important. I am reminded of Bobby Fischer's response to Boris Spassky's statement "Chess is like life" - "No, chess IS life"... sounds like obsession to me.

thanks for the input, David. Will look up Alan Turing.

I think this aversion to losing is mostly due to the absence of luck. when I couldnt bear chess anymore, I turned to dice-based wargames which allow me to curse the dice in case I lose.