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January 19 - February 6, 2020
As a long-term strategy, being predictable is not of much advantage – for your career or business or even for yourself. Once in a while, you’ve got to take the counter-intuitive path, but not without owning responsibility for the consequences – and certainly not without preparation.
1
It always makes sense to keep working at goals without obsessing over how far you’re from it or how hopelessly you’re missing the mark each time. If you persevere, it will eventually be yours.
2
There’s something to be said about working towards achieving a goal without obsessing over how far you’re from it or how hopelessly you’re missing the mark each time. Once you shut out the clamour of the result and simply persevere, success is bound to be yours.
3
The only guarantee to remembering is periodic revision. The intervals can be lengthened, but at the end of each break there should be a refresher course waiting.
4
Even the things we know inside out are worth refreshing.
5
we can’t connect the dots looking forward, but only join them looking backwards – we have to trust that somehow the dots will connect in the future.
5
The path to a happy, unplanned discovery starts with learning. It doesn’t matter if what you’re learning now isn’t of immediate relevance to the pool of resources you draw upon. In the end, these bits – the book you wanted to browse through but ended up buying, the language course you took to kill time on weekends or the guitar lessons you signed up for in college – might just come together one day, unexpectedly, beautifully, almost by accident.
7
Here’s a lesson in serendipity and limitless learning. Nothing you do, however unconnected it is to your livelihood or your life’s goal, goes waste. You never know when an idea that you’ve read about or heard of, or an activity you’ve dabbled in, will pay off. It’s wise, then, to keep your interests and your learning as varied and broad as you can.
9
I’ve played my most inspired games when my enthusiasm for the sport resurfaced, without the bindings of titles or wins or ratings tying me down, and I’ve just wanted to play a good game and have been excited about learning something new or applying something fresh.
There’s no quick path to finding motivation, but the moment you surrender to your love for your sport – or your career or choice of activity, for that matter – is where the highest probability lies.
9
Giving yourself time to recover emotionally is worth a lot more than the flash of a great idea. You may have the best preparation in place but if you’re emotionally distraught it’s unlikely you’ll be able to summon up the means or the will to execute any of it.
10
Bottling up emotions, even if done bit by bit, one tiny instance after another, can cumulatively turn into a giant, unwieldy heap of rocks you can no longer tow. You just keep pushing down the angst, pretending nothing has happened, but the truth is it’s going nowhere. If you bury it for too long, the collection of repressed emotions will simmer and eventually boil over in a fiercer form, often at the most ill-timed moments when you can barely afford it.
11
Emotions tend to get in the way of clear thinking. Whether it’s impatience, frustration, fury, self-loathing or even premature elation – allowing these to consume the mind results in a loss of focus and distraction from learning, and keeps you from taking the right decisions and achieving your goal. Training your mind to take a step back at the crucial moment and developing cues to organize your thoughts is more advantageous than making a move while your mind is in turmoil.
12
It’s about thinking what my opponent could be aiming for, knowing what my objectives are and then preparing to get what I want out of the game.
13
What struck me when we sat down for our first training camp was that nothing shook him from a task till he had completed it. One of the first things he did as my second was take away my Walkman.
14
the deeper you trudge into the details of preparatory work, the more confident you will feel, which in turn raises the probability of your success.
15
In life as well, some underutilized resource you may possess, might be the element to bring into play in a difficult situation. The key then is self-knowledge – a deep awareness of the resources you possess, whether you’re actively using them or not.
16
Striving for perfection as a means of self-improvement is valid, but if you have a deadline to meet or an emergent situation to deal with, it’s probably the worst occasion to try to be perfect.
17
Before a game, I’ve found that training for short bursts can be as effective as trying to work for a long time, especially when it comes to intense work where you absolutely block all distractions and focus on the problem.
18
Routine is another crucial aspect of preparation. It may appear to be the not-so-flashy facet, but following a routine is really about discipline and focus. If you stick to a routine, you can save a lot of energy on a whole host of things and you are able to think when you’re at the board.
19
I was already working myself up to display my potential, and this swipe only reinforced the conviction I already had deep within – that nothing else mattered any more, I just had to win a title now. I had done all the admirable things short of winning, but I was acutely aware that my efforts wouldn’t speak for me if I couldn’t finish the job.
19
It also became evident to me that the transition from being a strong player to becoming a champion wasn’t going to happen on its own. I had to want it ardently enough.
21
Doing everything admirably well matters very little if you can’t finish the job.
22
The way I see it, talent is a lot like a plant. When it’s watered with hard work, it grows, branches out and blooms. Deprived of nourishment, the plant simply withers away. With hard work, talent gains in depth and scope, and uncovers abilities that were earlier unexplored. Talent and hard work, therefore, aren’t conflicting forces orbiting in separate galaxies; they are complementary to each other and provide one another with sustenance.
23
Eventually, hard work is not just about plugging away at something. It’s thinking intelligently about what you want to achieve, the goals you’re setting yourself, how you’re improving and how you can incorporate all of this into the list of things that will help you scale that peak.
24
In general, though, a person who’s working hard and doing all the right things will invariably pull ahead of someone who may be talented but is not putting in as much effort.
25
It’s here that hard work pops up and waves at you. The harder you work, the greater the chances of getting these breaks. Without them, it’s easy to fall out of love with your passion and disown your talent.
26
The way I see it, talent is a lot like a plant. When it’s watered with hard work, it grows and blooms. Deprived of nourishment, the plant simply withers away. With hard work, talent gains in depth and scope, and uncovers newer abilities that were earlier unexplored. And hard work is not just about plugging away at something. It involves thinking intelligently about what you want to achieve, the goals you’re setting, how you’re improving on your innate skills or talents, and how you can incorporate all of this into the list of things that will help you scale that peak.
27
In any situation in life, being adaptable is the only way to grow and succeed. You may have skills that you’ve perfected, a certain worldview that worked for you at a particular stage – but the reality is that circumstances change, and you can’t be prepared for everything. Lowering your resistance to change, removing bias and being willing to adapt will help you tackle whatever comes your way. Once you’ve assessed the resources at your disposal and weighed what is feasible against what is risky you will see the path.
27
Besides, it’s always pleasing to have your opponent bite the bait. This is perhaps the greatest beauty of risk-taking. You never know the mistakes your opponent may be capable of unless you put yourself out there and take a chance.
29
The greatest danger of a premature celebratory mood is that it might distract you and lead you to falter. There is a huge difference between having an overwhelming margin and the arbiter actually stopping the clock and you signing the scoresheet. Some things just aren’t over till they’re over. In these moments, when you’re gloating over a lead or a win before it happens, as though it were a mere formality, it’s important to find a goal that will propel you onwards, because even if you’re leading all it takes is one moment of carelessness in one game to plunge you into trouble. Every advantage
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30
The lead this game gave me was a luxury, but I restrained myself from celebrating too quickly. I’d suffered from the consequences of doing that earlier – relaxing when I should have been focused, or letting the excitement of an anticipated win take over. There is a difference between having an overwhelming lead and actually finishing a game on top. In these moments, it’s important to be acutely mindful of your present, find calm and keep yourself grounded. If you’re too busy visualizing future success it may eventually give you the slip.
33
If you’ve done the right preparation following the best methods, you have to go out there and believe in what you know.
3
Resilience is the only answer to adversity. When tough situations arise – and they sometimes arrive like a hailstorm – your primary focus should be on accepting that although it is not the way you would want things to be, it is what you have to deal with, and then tackle it with practicality. It’s also important to remember that no matter what you’re up against, you have to give yourself some odds of success. Look deep for the resources that will pull you through – if you talk yourself out of everything, you’re undermining the advantages you have on your side.
33
Success can often lull you into believing in what is non-existent – that you have no chink in your armour; that your occasional wins make you invincible; that there is nothing for you to improve upon. Life does not raise red flags unprompted. Look for the cues – they will ask you to identify and work on your weaknesses, disallow passivity in your attitude, thought and preparation for success. Even when you hit the lowest point, they will offer a handy start to hitting the road
34
If I have to name a single virtue that’s carried me through my years of playing chess, it’s curiosity. There has to be a willingness to learn things you’re not good at or you thought you were not good at. The process will invariably involve a certain degree of unlearning, and the readiness to do that is extremely important.
35
Any knowledge, unless updated, becomes worthless.
There comes a point when you realize that passion, not perfection, will carry you through. You need to have something that moves you, that you’re passionate about and wouldn’t mind engaging with all your life.
In life, as in chess, learning must be constant – both new things and fresh ways of learning them. The process will invariably involve a certain degree of unlearning, and possessing the readiness to do that is utterly important. If your way of doing things isn’t working, clinging to your conclusions is only going to hold you back. You have to get to the root of a snag in order to make a breakthrough, because it’s possible that what you thought you knew isn’t actually the way it is. Unlearning is perhaps the hardest thing to do, but it is a necessity if growth and success are your goals.
