The hard way is the only way
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[00:00:00] Hey, and welcome back to another podcast episode. I'm Grandmas Noles Studer, and today I wanna talk about something. I thought about a lot recently, which is why chest improvement can be so frustrating for many people and now let me get it clear. Chess is super difficult, but I really don't believe that it's just because chess is difficult, that it's so frustrating for many.

Actually, I think it's something that we try to impose on chess. Chess becomes only frustrating when you're trying to make it easy. And so today I want to talk about how I see many different ways in the chess world of trying to make chess easy and the actual very simple [00:01:00] solution to it, which is just accepting that chess is a difficult game, but that you can make it simple.

Okay, so let's talk about this, uh, before we get into chess about something else. I have recently run a half marathon, but for the sake of making it even more clear, let's take a marathon. Right? Running a marathon is really. Difficult. Okay. Training for it. You have a huge plan. It's really going to be difficult, but it's not that complex, right?

You will get a training plan. You will be running a lot of the times. You'll look out for your nutrition, you'll look out, um, for how you sleep. There are many different things that are important for running such a long distance, so it's a difficult thing. But if you accept. The steps that you have to do to go there.

It actually, I think it's not such a frustrating experience to train for it. It's like, you know, it's hard, you accept it hard and you [00:02:00] do a hard thing. It can actually be, um, a thing that gives you a lot of motivation, a lot of joy, a lot of, I'm proud that I can do this, but if you now would think, well, I wanna run a marathon, but here's the thing, I only want to train 30 minutes a week.

Now it gets really complex and also frustrating because, well, at least as far as I know, that's no, not going to cut it as in terms of preparation, right? So the fact that you might want to make the whole experience easy. Something that is super hard running a marathon. If you try to make it easy, that's going to cause a lot of frustration, a lot of errors, a lot of, maybe you will get injured while you try running the marathon.

You might not be able to do it right. Um, I. There's all sorts of problems coming with that. So I would argue that most of the problems if you want to run a marathon, if you really face huge problems, is not because [00:03:00] you're sticking to a routine, but because you're trying to make it easy. And now let's bring that same thing to chess.

I see that in chess. Everywhere. And I think because it's a mental thing and because AI has developed so much and because there are so many courses, there is basically infinite knowledge that is thrown at you. It gives us more, the temptation more than something physical that we can make it easy. Right?

Let's say with the marathon example, there are many people that would say, well, it's obvious that a marathon is going to be hard. But in chess, there is so many things that at least point you towards a, Hey, chess could actually be easy if you only did this, right? So there are many different things, and we can talk about YouTube titles, right?

There's always more, um, ENT titles, articles, and so on. Usually there's more promises, right? Do this and then you will win in seven moves or do this and you will win all your games or whatever. These titles sometimes. Look like. Then we have, uh, courses as [00:04:00] well. The same thing. If you just learn this opening, everything will be easy for you, right?

Just memorize and then you'll not have problems anymore. Or the same for maybe end game courses, you name it. It's just most of the things. Um, actually if you see, you can see, for example, in, uh, in finances, you can see that what do scams have in common? Scams have in common that they promise you that everybody can do it.

That it's super easy and it's very quick. The quickness adds another layer of complexity on top, right? So if somebody says, Hey, you can earn so much money, just, you know, take my course, and then in one week you will earn X, Y, Z amount and you only have to work 30 minutes, 30 minutes a day. And that's very likely going to be a scam because it's promising you to something super easy.

Um, and something super quick for a solution that is just hard. You know, growing a business making money is something that is [00:05:00] difficult. If it wouldn't be, everybody would have a seven figure business and be super rich and, and super happy, right? Well, rich and happy is also not the same thing, but I hope you get what I mean.

So. That's the real problem, right? That the more knowledge there is, the more AI there is, and the more, um, people are competing for your attention, the more promises will be made. And the more these promises kind of activate something in your brain with the hope that, oh, if I just find the right method, if I find the right thing, it will be easy and I can make quick improvements.

And I think that's a never ending problem, right? Once you enter this. Kind of treadmill, this vicious cycle of searching for the thing that makes chess easy, makes everything flowing, makes you don't have to invest so much time anymore. It's going to be easy. It's going to be cool. You don't have problems anymore.

You will not feel like you are [00:06:00] stuck anymore. The whole experience will be rosy and perfect. Uh, as, as long as you, you know, buy into this kind of explanation or this dream, uh, you will have problems because the reality is chess is difficult and it will always remain difficult. I have now spent more than 20 years of my life playing chess or thinking about chess.

And I'm a grandmaster and I still look at positions and I still think this game is super difficult. There are many positions that I can follow now, especially also with the CHEST nine 60 coming up. I can look at positions and just honestly tell you, I have absolutely no freaking idea what's going on. So chess is super difficult.

It is a difficult game. It forces you to think on your own and to get into new positions and to find ways. And so that will always remain, and I truly believe that [00:07:00] this is the only way to be able to get rid of that form mode to get out of this vicious cycle. To get out of this trap is just to accept.

Okay. Chess is a difficult game, right? When I play chess, I will face moments where I don't know what I should do. It's going to be hard. I'm going to make mistakes, and improvement is not coming easy and quick because once you accept this, you can actually go back focusing on the basics and go back focusing on the things that actually help your game.

There's this thing that I often say it's like chest improvement. Is not easy, but it can be super simple, right? I'm talking about this on this podcast. I have my simplified chess improvement system, the course. Um, and this is my whole point. It's like once you accept that chess is not going to be [00:08:00] easy, it's not going to be, there's not the secret recipe that you are missing.

You can actually go back focusing on the things that matter. You can sit down and. Do training that is actually hard because you're not trying to make it easy, and that's when you can actually put in the time, put in the effort and see improvements long. Term, but as long as you have that wish to find something easy to find the quick hack, to find the opening course that works every single time for your level.

And when you grow, you will be in a vicious cycle. And it might even be that for a little bit it works, but at some point you will hit the plateau and it will not work anymore and you will just spend more time, more energy, more money. On finding the easy and quick solution that doesn't exist. It will be a limitless search and you will be, you know, frustrated because you waste again, waste your time, waste your money, and [00:09:00] then maybe through so much pain, and you guys listening might be in this situation right now, is through so much pain.

You're like, either you give up or you're saying, okay, let's try the simple way. Accepting that this is going to be hard. And then it will be hard, but you will improve. You will be happy that you did something hard. You will gain confidence, you will expand your comfort zone, and the whole journey will actually become much, much more positive.

So this is basically a 10 minute ramble from me to just tell you one single thing. Try to accept that chess is difficult. It'll always be difficult and don't try to make it easy or don't try to make quick improvements. Once you let go of these two things, of these two fantasies, you will be able to improve, and more importantly, you will not fall for the people that promise.

This quick [00:10:00] and easy stuff really look out for this, the more somebody promises easy and quick. The more you should be kinda skeptical what is going on there. 'cause I believe, and I've seen it with so many students, that when you try to go for the quick and easier route, it might work initially, but you will get to a plateau for sure, and you will be stuck and frustrated.

So that's it for today. Accept that chess is difficult, keep it simple, and then slowly but surely, you'll improve your chess. See you next week. Hey guys, just two quick things before you take off. If you enjoyed this episode and want more structured chess improvement tips from myself, check out my newsletter@nextlevelchess.com slash newsletter.

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