Also, try to think with an initiative, and a careful, well thought-out, determined approach to your dream positions, you can get the best over a much stronger opponent on most days
I am reading Silman's book and my rating is going down.
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Nov 7, 2020
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#23
Not sure The Amateur's Mind is very helpful. It's interesting, but I found it anecdotal and difficult to engage with. His Reassess Your Chess is good, although I'm more partial to the 3rd edition than the majorly-reworked 4th. If you can find a used copy, grab it.
TheChessAnalyst wrote:
I have started reading Jeremy Silman's book The Amateur's Mind (the first chess book I plan on going cover to cover because of the good things mentioned here on Chess.com) and have been trying to implement the 'work the imbalances' into my games. Unfortunately, my rating is going down! A few reasons for the rating loss are obvious:
1) I am getting into time trouble a lot because I am spending so much time on my moves.
2) I am over looking some simple tactics because i am so focused on implementing the things that I have been reading.
These problems have nothing to do with Mr. Silman's advice in the book, and I am not blaming Mr. Silman (he didn't move the pieces for me ) or his book for my poor performance.
My questions are:
Is this normal, do people usually suffer losses in both rating and games while they are trying to assimilate new knowledge?
I didn't seem to have this problem when I was just playing through GM games and tactics every week are books worth the effort or is playing through thousands of GM games and doing tactics just as informative?
Thank you in advance for any thoughts, suggestions, or just plain old inspiration!
TCA
Yes but the problem probably has something to do with your thought process. Also it is normal since you are trying to use the knowledge. It might seem like your getting worse but eventually once the knowledge is accomodated in your head youll get better
Silman's concepts from Reassess Your Chess take into consideration all aspects of understanding and conversing with the board and the pieces on it. So I (and Silman) suggest reading Reassess Your Chess till page 52, read The Amateur's Mind cover to cover, jump back to Reassess, and complete the Workbook after you're done. Before you start, watch a couple of Silman style game videos by The Backyard Professor on YouTube, he breaks the Silman style of conversational thinking down pretty well. While you're reading the book, play your usual opening moves out, search for a proper youtube video that explains how to attack it. Also watch the best response your opponent has possible for them, so you also know how to defend against it.