I’d like to take a few minutes to talk about motivation.  Why do you play chess?  That will most likely be based upon how you view the game – as a sport, a science, an art, or just a game.  If you see it as a sport, naturally you’ll put your focus on winning and on improvement as a concomitant part of that.

Probably a majority of players view it that way.  But for that to be fulfilling, you have to have the skill and knowledge to keep progressing.  Otherwise, you will probably ultimately plateau, become discouraged by your losses and inability to go beyond that level, and lose interest in the game, as has happened to a number of players that I know of from club players to Experts. 

From my viewpoint that would be disappointing since you’d then lose out on the pleasure, intellectual satisfaction and other benefits that the game provides.  

I personally have evolved through that particular motivation to view the game as more of a science or an art.  Then I’m not disappointed if I don’t reach a higher skill level and can focus on the benefits that my viewpoint provides, e.g. the joy that comes from solving a problem on the board, since a game is basically a series of those. 

Working on independent chess problems brings the same pleasure as well.  I won’t solve them all, but there’ll be intellectual satisfaction from any that I do solve and a continuing challenge to work on more.  

I also see the game as an art, and from that viewpoint can view a relatively error-free game or one with a clever tactical coup as aesthetically pleasing.  And it doesn’t even have to be in a winning effort.  Both players can find satisfaction in contributing to the creation of a work of art.  It’s a joint effort. 

The loser Kieseritzky shares the glory equally with the victor Anderssen in the creation of the “Immortal Game”.  

And if one is playing just for fun, since it is a game after all, why that’s perfectly fine as well and can provide more than enough pleasure.  

So I see all of this in its totality as another of the joys of chess, that you can choose whatever aspect brings you the most pleasure and focus on that, including collecting its accouterments, such as various chess sets, thereby ensuring that you don’t lose the opportunity to continue participating in this wonderful game.”

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