The worst form of self torture: Becoming a chess pro!
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Blitz and Rapid would not make chess more popular. The current Blitz and Rapid events don’t get televised.
Pashak1989 wrote:
*Sighhhhh.* So, is that friend Anatoly Karpov?
We all know that guy who tries to convince you that chess is an art, a sport and a science at the same time. Yes, we all have that ridiculous friend who tells you that chess is a sport because after a 5 hour game you feel exhausted!
But it's Ok. Some day that person will grow up and will stop having such ridiculous fantasies.
The real problem is unfortunately something much more serious and sad. A boy discovers chess and starts playing it just for fun, after some time he starts improving and even wins some games. Then he gets greedy, he wants more and more and more.
He starts discovering new openings, tactics, he gets extremely amazed by the beauty of Kasparov's games and suddenly the tragic day arrives: He decides that he wants to become a chess professional!
Fortunately there are some cases where such a horrendous idea is just temporary, but there are other cases where parents even support that atrocious idea and that is how the kid starts spending his childhood years on a board game that he thinks is an art.
Years pass, and very quickly this amazing art/sport/science is starting to become a complete nightmare.
Constant mental breakdowns, nerve wracking moments, stress, insane obsession, absolute lack of a healthy life style....he starts realizing that he has spent so so so many hours training, his parents spent so much money on trainers and travels and chess material, and still he is so so far from the level he wants. There are so many people that are way stronger than him, there are so many things that he needs to learn.
But let's be positive. After so many years of tears, stress and suffering he finally achieved a good enough ELO rating to be considered a chess pro.
He is highly respected by casuals on chess.com because there are red letters next to his nickname that prove he is a titled player and not some random Joe.
But what happens next? One would think that after achieving a high level he can finally have a good life, with financial security, and all that killing of childhood and teen years was absolutely worth it.
Not even close!!
He is a good player but he is not even in the Top 30 of best players in the world. He plays tournaments but never wins because there are always people stronger than him.
The amount of money he makes is really slim. He is a very strong player but he can barely afford a very very small appartment.
Plus, because he spent all his youth years on chess now he is socially very awkward and has a very difficult time socializing with people outside of his chess circle.
He gets really depressed when he realizes that there is no money in chess, that the vast majority of people in the world do not care at all about chess, that women are not attracted even a bit to him and that he spent his best years of life on nothing more than a board game who brought him nothing.
Now he does not know anything in life outside of the 52936394 variations of every chess opening.
He needs to somehow survive. He can become a chess scammer in parks, he can write blogs or articles for some website or magazine, or he can teach chess to little kids who, like him, are in their way of making a catastrophic life choice...
this is the opee's autobiography.
I don't understand why people don't think chess is a sport. It's just not a physical sport where knowing how to cope with physical suffering is hailed as the only useful thing in life, or hailed as the only type of strength. Yes it's useful to be able to run away from a fight if needed, but only praising physical sports is highly primitive. Chess is simply not a physical sport, a mental one. It takes intelligence. And both types of sport require mental strength, just in different ways.
its not like we can't have knight and spoon races anyway.
Pashak1989 wrote:
We all know that guy who tries to convince you that chess is an art, a sport and a science at the same time. Yes, we all have that ridiculous friend who tells you that chess is a sport because after a 5 hour game you feel exhausted!
But it's Ok. Some day that person will grow up and will stop having such ridiculous fantasies.
The real problem is unfortunately something much more serious and sad. A boy discovers chess and starts playing it just for fun, after some time he starts improving and even wins some games. Then he gets greedy, he wants more and more and more.
He starts discovering new openings, tactics, he gets extremely amazed by the beauty of Kasparov's games and suddenly the tragic day arrives: He decides that he wants to become a chess professional!
Fortunately there are some cases where such a horrendous idea is just temporary, but there are other cases where parents even support that atrocious idea and that is how the kid starts spending his childhood years on a board game that he thinks is an art.
Years pass, and very quickly this amazing art/sport/science is starting to become a complete nightmare.
Constant mental breakdowns, nerve wracking moments, stress, insane obsession, absolute lack of a healthy life style....he starts realizing that he has spent so so so many hours training, his parents spent so much money on trainers and travels and chess material, and still he is so so far from the level he wants. There are so many people that are way stronger than him, there are so many things that he needs to learn.
But let's be positive. After so many years of tears, stress and suffering he finally achieved a good enough ELO rating to be considered a chess pro.
He is highly respected by casuals on chess.com because there are red letters next to his nickname that prove he is a titled player and not some random Joe.
But what happens next? One would think that after achieving a high level he can finally have a good life, with financial security, and all that killing of childhood and teen years was absolutely worth it.
Not even close!!
He is a good player but he is not even in the Top 30 of best players in the world. He plays tournaments but never wins because there are always people stronger than him.
The amount of money he makes is really slim. He is a very strong player but he can barely afford a very very small appartment.
Plus, because he spent all his youth years on chess now he is socially very awkward and has a very difficult time socializing with people outside of his chess circle.
He gets really depressed when he realizes that there is no money in chess, that the vast majority of people in the world do not care at all about chess, that women are not attracted even a bit to him and that he spent his best years of life on nothing more than a board game who brought him nothing.
Now he does not know anything in life outside of the 52936394 variations of every chess opening.
He needs to somehow survive. He can become a chess scammer in parks, he can write blogs or articles for some website or magazine, or he can teach chess to little kids who, like him, are in their way of making a catastrophic life choice...
..................................
If you are determined enough to become a master at the game then you will be determined enough to find an outlet for money. Yes getting to the top is very hard. But there are plenty of smaller tournaments. Of course there are also PLENTY of other ways to make money off of chess - online lessons, in person lessons, making videos, writing books, commentating and analyzing, articles.. list goes on. Just look at Masters that work for this site. Do you think they do it for free? Anytime you pay a price and make progress there is a line of people behind you that want to get to where you are, many of them are willing to pay. So it's a matter of using creativity and thinking outside the box.
OP has chosen the absolute worst case scenario.
You speak like you know that everything that you wrote is true but is not, I have 1800 after 3 years and make decent money with chess, I have met chess teachers that have a lot of money from lessons and tournaments, enough to buy a big house, cars, go to other country s every year, going to all cities to play their tournaments and they also have sponsors that paid everything in those tournaments, they studied hard, its true, 10 years but now after that they only enjoy, I can play a lot of games a day, been paid for that would be a dream, get paid for playing and doing something that you love and its amazing like chess, and now you wrote that is bad to be a chess pro? if you were a chess pro I would said "ok, at least he knows what it feels", but you are not, you are just pretending you understand everything about chess.
Worst form of self torture, becoming a chess pro???
I would defy our esteemed OP to name a better form of self torture, than becoming a chess pro!!!
Watching baseball. Really sucks and is boring to death but at least you know it just lasts a couple hours.