From 800 to 1700 ELO — here's what actually worked

I want to share what got me unstuck because 
nothing else was working.

I was playing 5+ games a day on chess.com, 
watching hours of GothamChess and Daniel 
Naroditsky, doing puzzles. My rating barely 
moved.

The problem wasn't lack of knowledge. 
It was that I kept making the SAME mistakes. 
Every game. The principles I "knew" 
weren't actually instinctive yet.

What changed everything : I started forcing 
myself to apply principles BEFORE every move. 
Not after the loss in analysis — before.

3 questions I asked myself :
1. Is every piece defended ?
2. Am I controlling the center ?
3. Is my king safe ?

Sounds basic but I literally wasn't doing it.

This got me from 800 up to 1700 ish

I eventually built a small app to force this 
discipline (it physically blocks bad moves) 
because I'm a developer. If anyone wants to 
try it : elovate.app — it's free.

But honestly the technique works without any 
app. Just slow down before each move.

What worked for you guys to break through 
your plateau ?

RIP Mr Daniel naroditsky, good ideas none the less. Tbh my country keeps shutting the internet down for like multiple weeks and every time I play again after the huge gap,I lose like 100 elo

Yo