How Life Imitates Chess: Making the Right Moves, from the Board to the Boardroom

by Garry Kasparov

You won’t know what you are looking for until you are aware what conditions will satisfy you.

If you aren’t questioning your moves consistently, you will lose to the player who is playing with a coherent plan.

Pablo Picasso nailed it when he said that “computers are useless. They can only give you answers.” Questions are what matter.

energy can’t spontaneously be created or destroyed, only transferred from one place to another or transmuted from one form into another.

With so much precedent and history available at anyone’s fingertips, the power of surprise is more difficult to harness, but it also packs a greater punch when you do find something new.

How could the world champion and his challenger both miss something so important in the endgame despite having so few pieces on the board to create complications? I think it’s because the aridity of the endgame, its lack of dynamism, leads players to become blind to opportunity. The technical phase can be boring because there is little opportunity for creativity, for art. Boredom leads to complacency and mistakes. The same is true in the workplace. If one is faced with a repetitive job, it can be difficult to stay alert to opportunities to solve problems creatively. Your instincts slowly go numb when every analysis returns the same answers over and over. What should be a search for excellence and the best solution eventually turns into a “good enough” mentality. We must strive to keep things fresh so we can rely on and enhance our instincts instead of falling into mental ruts.

Austria’s Rudolf Spielmann wrote we must “play the opening like a book, the middle game like a magician, and the endgame like a machine.” Your goal should be not just to perform well in each phase but to make the transitions seamless.

defense followed by a well-timed counterattack against an overaggressive opponent could be more effective than always trying to meet fire with fire.

Greater knowledge carries the burden of additional things to consider, and that opens the door for doubt to creep in. Overthinking numbs our instincts and turns what should be a quick decision into a mental committee meeting.

very important

The old saying “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” should be left to the plumbing trade and never applied to how we lead our lives at home and at work.

It takes great willpower and self-confidence to surround ourselves with smart, talented people who we know will confront us.