How do I go from being a terrible stupid freaked up chess player to a great chess player

I have no skills no visualization ability no ability to calculate variations or god forbid I should even know how to spell 'positional' skills.

Nevertheless, I want to be great at chess. What's the key to this?

First: You aren't a terrible chess player. I think you know that. Your tactical scores show you have at least decent skills to be able to calculate.

What you may be is a very under confident chess player. Some people, for whatever reason, are very poor at evaluating where they really stand in terms of ability. You may be one of those people. Or maybe you are one of those people who need to be told they are doing OK on a frequent basis.

Second, I totally agree with Deirdre that you need to be patient. There are no quick answers in chess. Chess is a brutal mistress and takes a stupid amount of study to get good at it. If you really think there is a magic answer that is going to turn you from OK chess player to good/great chess player in a month or two, you are sadly mistaken. No such program exists. No such program can exist. If that is what you are looking for, you are playing the wrong game.

Occasionally, a player who has been stuck at a rating for a long time will suddenly blossom and increase greatly in strength (a couple hundred points) in a short time period. But when that happens, it is because of a great deal of study that suddenly integrates and they get it. Silman relates how that happened to him. And it is possible it will never happen. Chess is a cruel mistress.

Of course sometimes kids increase in strength quite rapidly. But if you look at what they are doing, that is no accident. They basically immerse themselves in chess.

All we can do as chess players is try to create a sane plan for improvement including both study and play of the right types and then do that plan relentlessly, trusting that it will eventually pay off.

I have been working my plan since around April. It has been paying off in the sense I can tell I am much stronger now than I was back then. How much a difference it will eventually make I don't know. And anybody that says they know is basically a snake-oil salesman.

The same is true for you. There are things you can do to maximize your chances. You need to do those things. How high it can take you and how long that will take nobody can really say with any certainty. But there are things you can certainly do in your plan that maximize or minimize your chances for success.

If the above isn't an acceptable answer, then you may want to strongly reconsider your commitment to this game.

Well yeah I like a few points you made. My coach also says to participate in a lot of tournaments but that's going to get in the way of other things like job, income etc.

There's another hangup I have. I have been through forced hospitalization and psychiatric treatment and medication. Without it, I believe that today I might have become at least 1700 FIDE. So everytime I now think I miss out on capturing a rook I blame the medications.

Well said.

Again, you are just going to need to accept the fact that there are more important things (like your mental well-being) than getting good at chess. At the end of the day, chess is just a game. Your mental well-being is no game.

Since we aren't mental health professionals, and since even if we were it would be unethical (and just plain wrong) to try and treat you through a forum like this, I would suggest you discuss this with your mental health professionals if this is really bothering you.

It isn't my place to tell you whether chess should/should not be important in your life. But you may need to accept that other things that are also important are going to limit your progress. That doesn't mean they have to limit your enjoyment.

yeah well madratter it's all cool. i've stabilized now. I'm now on maintenance doses and no I don't mind you giving advice. It's just hard for people who do not have this thing to understand what it is like for those who do. you don't want to be on the medication but at the same time not being on it you'll likely pay a heavy price.

I'm seriously glad to hear that. I have never had to take medication for a mental illness, and you are right. I can't put myself completely in your shoes, just like you probably can't completely understand what it is like to have had cancer twice (I have). I can try to empathize, and I have had loved ones who were institutionalized/hospitalized for mental health issues for a time. That perhaps lets me at least empathize a little more than someone who hasn't.

Please take care of yourself. And do try to have a right view of where you stand. You are not terrible at chess. You are well above average for around here. And around here is way above average for the population as a whole. This game can be a source of great joy for you if you let it. Just try to keep your expectations reasonable both on the upside and the downside.

Depends on your definition of "great"  But before you can achieve "greatness", you have to achieve mediocrity.  Set reasonable goals for yourself.  The vast majority of the games you play are blitz, and fast time controls.  At the risk of repeating myself...How do you expect to improve, when you're playing time controls that don't allow you to implement what you're trying to learn? 

When you learned how to read.  Did you learn to speed read first?  Or did you learn the basics first?

 My compliments for a very good answer. 

About those tough games and tournaments. It helps a lot if it is longhess over the board, and even better if you discuss and analyze with your opponent after the game. Join a nice chessclub

Cool what you said about mediocrity, because that is my goal for this year. I am now playing "Høstturneringen" in my club Nordstrand, and stands with 1,5 points after 3 rounds. My goal is 5,5 out of 11 and performing on par with the average of the bunch (ca 1650 fide).

Very sound, and reasonable goal.  Good luck!

I think you have mastered the "recipe of success" here:

Play nothing but blitz, and bullet.

Repeatedly ask "How to improve"

Ignore all advice given.

Repeat the above.

<facepalm>  I cant believe i forgot the holy grail of excuses...

I miss the days of: "I know the <inset opening here> 20 moves deep.  I'm still hanging material.  Do i need to study more openings?"

Or...

"I started playing the <insert opening here> 4 days ago.  I pretty much have it mastered, but im still losing.  Do i need to change openings?"

The best way to develop visualization skills, in my opinion, is to not only work a lot of tactics problems, but to go back after solving/failing each one and determining which tactics were used to solve it.  Slowly memorize the several dozen tactical motifs on these pages and use them in your tactics problems analysis - it will help your visualization a lot:

https://chesstempo.com/tactical-motifs.html#mateDovetail

https://www.chess.com/article/view/chess-tactics--definitions-and-examples

I recently pulled a game I was losing out of the fire and won by recognizing that if I sacrificed a Knight, I could achieve the position of the Dovetail Mate.  A couple years ago, I didn't know what a Dovetail Mate is and probably would not have seen the right move.