In the previous article we talked about the typical problems many chess players have. You may want to refer to the first part
here. In short, people read A LOT of chess books, but the benefit is MARGINAL
at best. Why is this the case?
I’ll tell you something seemingly obvious, yet it will have a tremendous effect! There is a HUGE (I mean, extremely HUGE) difference between
reading and
studying. Unfortunately, most players don’t fully understand this, so let me explain this difference in detail:
1. TIME
How much time do you spend reading a book? Usually you will spend for one book from a few days till several weeks. Thus, reading can be quick.
Studying a text book can take a month or a lifetime! I’m not exaggerating. For instance, studying a religious book can take a lifetime, and even then you may still not fully understand it. This is closely connected with the next item.
2. REPETITION
Once you have read a book, you never read it again. It seems boring and unnecessary. When you study certain material, you try to implement it in your practice. In this case you’ll need to repeat the process several times to make sure that you understood completely before proceeding.
Once you’ve applied this knowledge in a practical application, you will develop new questions. You will then need to study this material
again to find solutions for your new questions. This process may occur many times until you finally get
100% effect out of this knowledge (book).
3. YOUR ACTIVENESS
When you read a book or watch a video, the author of this material is active. He prepared some materials and is providing them to you. You go over this material, however, by yourself, without really doing anything active. This is passive learning, much the same as when you watch a new Hollywood movie – you are a passive viewer.
When you study something, you are independently active. You try and develop solutions yourself, and only after that will you compare your ideas with those of the author. You try to understand every author’s idea. If you don’t understand something – you don’t skip it, but study the material over and over again until all insight come to you.
You try to understand and remember everything. After that you go and try it in practice. You may fail, but you keep trying until you train this new skill enough to get good results.
Studying requires one to be very active.
4. LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY
As you may have guessed, reading is easy. That’s why most of people like it so much! You read something, you feel like you should be getting smarter. You digest ready-made material with little or no effort required from you. This comfortable situation makes you feel good because it is not difficult.
Studying is much harder. Here
you have to face your weaknesses, admit them and then put in a hard effort to confront them. You need to spend a lot of
time and
effort, do unusual things and
develop new habits. Inwardly you have to admit that somebody is smarter than you in this area, which is painful for a lot of people.
Reading is entertainment. Studying is a hard work.
5. MEMORISING
A few months after you read something, you only remember the most general ideas from that material.
Let’s create a little test. Have you
studied any of
my paid courses? Do you remember the titles of each video lesson? What rules were presented in each lesson? How many practical tasks were presented in this course?
Unfortunately, most people can only give very general answers. It means you have NOT studied these lessons. When you study something seriously, you won’t forget it later because it is learned. It becomes a part of your nature, your new habit.
In many countries people shake hands after a meeting. You never forget to do this. You don’t need to write it in your notebook – it is automatic and becomes a habit.
Studying develops new habits. Reading develops… nothing.
6. FREE/PAID
Not always, but often you can get reading material for free. More often than not, you have to pay for your study course materials.
There is some good news for you here. I’ve been an active chess coach for the past 12 years. During this period I’ve charged $0 (in other words, helped for free) and as much as $100 per hour. I’ve noticed an interesting thing: the more the student pays, the better results he/she gets.
I always try to do my best, so my coaching is the same but the students’ ATTITUDE is very different. For instance, those who paid a lot never come late to the lesson. Free students sometimes even skip the lessons.
Those who made serious investments write down all important information. Some of them even use a voice recorder, so as to repeat the lesson later on. Those who paid little never do. After an expensive lesson, a student always performs his home tasks (even when it seems unnecessary for him).
In the same way, you will probably eat the dish if you paid a lot for it in a restaurant (even if the dish looks unusual for you). It seems silly to pay for something and then not use it. We avoid making silly mistakes.
After a free lesson, a student decides by himself which tasks to perform and how. So he distorts the training and doesn’t get any real results.
All in all, when you pay for something you take it much more seriously. That’s why some tricky guys download tons of free chess materials from the internet, but their real progress is miserable. It’s just fair.
7. EFFECTIVENESS
After you
study something new, you can take a qualitative leap forward. You develop new (more effective) skills. You change (improve) your way of playing. You start getting outstandingly great results.
After reading something, you feel good. You may be enthusiastic. But when it comes to practice – nothing changes.You still get the same results as before. This upsets you. You want to bring your mood up again and… you start reading another exciting book…
CONCLUSION
Now that we have discussed this topic in great detail, it’s time for you to ask yourself “Am I reading or studying chess materials?” Be honest with yourself. Be objective and take all criteria (your results) into account.
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He won the Lloyds Under-18 national UK tournament in 1989, and was awarded with the trophy by Grandmaster and PHD Mathematician Dr John Nunn. He also played twice in the main British Chess Championship.
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However, only a very small group of players (less than 5%) will experience any significant progress. 
In reply to this obvious question, this 2nd group of players will start providing various lame excuses such as: