Derlend: If the 'believe' isn't backed by the requisite chess skills, then 'no' the believe, in and of itself, will not be decisive, in fact it may be a detriment, if you think that 'belief' will get you results that more chess skills would deliver, whether you 'believed' or not.
Confidence in your game is important to maximize your skills, whatever those are, but is no substitute for having the requisite chess skills also.
BTW: typo, it's 'psychologic'.
Yes,yes absolutely.It does make A BIG DIFFERENCE and in many instances you may find it decisive.Just believe in your strength and you will find yourself in a better place than you deserve.
Greg, beliving is actually pursuing an initiative, and its a force that helps keep pressure. When the doubt comes in too much, it is difficult to keep direction and pressure.
To day we had two matches (2+1hours ), I met Sverre, rated stronger than me , and Alisha, rated belov me.
I did believe, and against Sverre I got good play, and was in a winning attack up to move 26 or 27, but I faced three problems, he defended and counterplayed very well, I had to do 13 very difficult moves in 15 minutes, and my attackingskills is not good enough. With other words, a player at Sverres level would have won taking my pieces on move 26.
I think the believeplan did work successfully, and I will post the game later, or link to it.
The second game, against Alisha:
Believeing is like playing cards, you gamble that you have a winning hand, and you push the plan.
Against Alisha; she had the initiative in the opening, maybe for 20 moves, and I struggled to equalize. She was impressingly good in that opening. Suddendly I made a strange decision. I gave my knight for two pawns and centercontrol. I did not know if it was ok or an error, but I just did it.
The little girl defended well and there was no way to crush trough with the attack. She buildt the strongest fortress I ever seen .
I switched,
Went for queenside pawnhunt with full pressure. The pressure made her somewhat passive. defending , defending, defending and I was able to clear the way for a queenwalk.
A hard game. Mate in 86.
My believe was challenged. Actually I believed I would loose in the first 25 moves of the game, and that my knightsac was a mistake. But I was able to keep on pushing anyway. Despite of low belief, I acted as if I believed, and that pressure was the only thin tread that stopped her taking advantage of beeing an officer up.
About believing and evaluating. You will probably find a couple advantages/plans both for yourself and your opponent, the one that believes will push to get the plan rolling, and the plan that rolls first has a lead, that might hold all the way.
I think I dominated most of both games, and I also think that I have to improve my attacking skills . I will improve, but it takes effort and time.
In some games things are happening all over the board , both players has strenghts and weaknesses.
I lost today, beacause I believed that his strenght was so bad that I chose to trade down, to minimize.
If I had believed in my own strenght, I could have pushed it all in, and won.
To believe is a keyword. if you believe you dominate, then you dominate, if you dont believe it, you willl fade away.
Tomorrow is a new game. My plan is to belive that I dominate, and do it, because I believe it.
(there were other flaws with the game, but mistakes happened on both sides)
What do you think? Is what you believe decisive? Does it make the difference?