I’m constantly fascinated by the sheer power of our minds. That power leads to a lot of good, but also some things that go against us.
Recently I wrote an article on how ratings are great, just our interpretations of them are not. Today, I want to expand on that and share a personal annecdote of how the stories I create in my mind create stress.
If you ever feel rating anxiety, or just general anxiety, I’m sure you’ll relate.
Top Of The World
In my professional chess career, I often felt on the top of the world after a good tournament. I felt invincible. Because I had particularly big swings in results, for example winning an international tournament with 8/9 points, the story was extreme as well.
I would often catch myself calculating how many rating points I’d win if I could just keep this same level of performance up.
“I’ll be 2700 in 1 year if I continue like this”
My expectations were at times so sky high, that even performing at 50-100 points higher than my current rating felt like a disaster – because it was 100 points below the story I fabricated in my head.
Happiness = Expectations – Results. It is only with a little distance that I realize I fell for a very common psychological phenomena. More to that later on.
Everything Is Going To Shit
Because there is an opposite story that is as fictional – and maybe even more distructive. I had it less in chess playing, but definitely feel it right now with my Coaching and content creation.
YouTube is especially prone to help you create this type of story in your head. As every video is ranked on a scale of 1-10 and there are analytics on basically anything you can think of, it is easy to spot a “trend”.
All it takes are two videos that perform below average, and my mind immediately screams:
“You suck! Nobody wants to see your videos. You need to change something right now or your business goes downhill and you are unemployed soon.”
I believe this is what leads a lot of creators into clickbait and quick hacks. It is so painful to be at this moment that we instinctively search for a quick release of that pain. The short-term way to do that is to make a video that gets a lot of views. If you get two in a row, you are now again on top of the world…
Two Consecutive Results = Story
Now, why does this happen? Our minds are made to help us navigate an extremely complex world. To do that, it constantly tries to connect dots and create stories out of different events. This fallacy is sometimes referred to as the “narrative fallacy”. Here is what famous late researcher and author of the amazing book, Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahnemann wrote:
“Narrative fallacies arise inevitably from our continuous attempt to make sense of the world. The explanatory stories that people find compelling are simple; are concrete rather than abstract; assign a larger role to talent, stupidity, and intentions than to luck; and focus on a few striking events that happened rather than on the countless events that failed to happen. Any recent salient event is a candidate to become the kernel of a causal narrative. Taleb suggests that we humans constantly fool ourselves by constructing flimsy accounts of the past and believing they are true.” – Daniel Kahnemann in Thinking, Fast and Slow.
One such way is to take two consecutive results – positive or negative – as a clear trend. That’s what happened in both my personal anecdotes. These stories can be so strong that we fully feel they are the reality – while outside observers have a hard time understanding us.
The problem with these stories is twofold:
- We over adjust in both directions
- It leads to emotional, short-term focused decisions
Changing Openings Like Underwear
One such example I see often in chess improvers is changing your openings way too often.
Very often, one or two bad games are enough to convince someone that their openings are horrible, they will always get out-prepared and that they now have to study 55 hours of Najdorf theory to avoid getting crushed every single game.
That’s why my first reaction to the question:
“I want to change openings, which one should I pick”
Is always to ask:
“Is the current opening really not working? Can you analyze your last 20-30 games and see a clear trend?”
In 90% of the cases, there is absolutely no issue with the opening students play. It simply hurts so much to get outprepared once or twice in the same line that our mind creates this fictional story.
For the opposite case, I often see chess improvers think chess will be simple if they win a few hundred points early on. Again, this is simply human. Won 100 points in two consecutive months? That’s a clear story. It simply must continue like that, right?… You all know the answer to that.
The Solution? Awareness!
So, what can we do to avoid making wrong decisions based on these stories?
It would be too good to be true if I had the remedy to never again formulate such a story. But that’s just impossible. I have no way to hijack your mind. Instead, there are a few things I try to do for myself that might help you as well. And it all starts with the awareness of what is happening.
Realize this is just a story
If you take your stories as 100% truth, it is very hard to avoid overcorrection. After all, it feels to you as if you see a clear, true trend and need to do something against it. In your mind, that’s as clear cut as 1+1 = 2.
So whenever you create these stories, stortly take a moment to remind yourself that this is indeed only a story in your mind, not the ultimate truth.
Don’t decide in the moment
The biggest danger for me is to do something the moment I craft a new story. So when I feel everything is going to shit, my instinct tells me to do something right now that reverses the trend. That’s when I’d start making a video just for views – and likely I’d use clickbait to make sure it gets more views.
In your situation, that can mean keeping on with playing until you finally break the losing streak (which usually prolongs it way more). Or to buy a huge opening course the moment you feel your opening sucks, to throw your whole plan out the window and spend the next 3 weeks only studying this course.
The remedy is rather simple (not easy!). I have a clear plan for content I deem important and want to create. I always set myself a maximum of 6 games to play in a blitz training session. And I always take a day or two to process a big decision I want to take, to avoid making emotional changes I regret later on.
Have a clear plan
It is good to have a plan in place before any such story is created, but in the moment it happens, the plan only matters as a third step. When you have a clear plan you can fall back on, it is so much easier to say no to whatever quick hack comes up and stick the course.
That’s why I’m such a fan of chess improvers having a clear training plan. Without it, it is so easy for good marketers to catch you in a moment of frustration, create the feeling of FOMO, promise you a lot and get you to buy dozens of things you’ll never finish (maybe not even start).
Regression To The Mean
If you manage to stay on course, another common phenomena will happen (very likely).
Here is a simple to understand definition for that:
Regression to the mean is a statistical phenomenon where unusually extreme results (very high or very low) tend to be followed by results closer to the average, because chance or luck plays a role in extreme outcomes.
What that means is after these two extreme results, it is very likely that more normal results will happen.
After two amazing wins, some losses will follow. And after two losses some wins will follow. As long as you have a decent plan and follow that, your good or bad streak will come to an end.
As so often is the case, what matters is that we keep our cool, continue putting in the right effort and focus less on the outcome. It is so simple, yet so hard. With better systems and awareness, we at least have a better chance of doing it.
Keep improving,
GM Noël
PS: This article was initially sent out to my Newsletter list. If you want to get chess improvement advice for free in your inbox, join 17,000+ chess improvers by signing up for Friday Grandmaster Insights here.
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