Aftermath

Recently, I’ve felt like I’m drowning in everything around me. But the game today is like a special reminder for me.

Most of my daily work tasks and personal concerns require me to make almost instant decisions. That’s why I take up bullet chess (1 minute, no extra time) as one of my hobbies. Some of my students tease me, joking that I play in “no brain” mode 🤡 Yep, in just one minute, how could I think about the textbook strategies when I’m just an amateur?

I’m just conducting super small-scale research, gauging whether there is a positive correlation between my bullet chess progress and my decisions’ effectiveness. Set aside the final findings as the expected results are still on trial, I gained a fascinating insight today.

To be honest, today, I woke up with hardly any energy. My very first thought at the beginning of the day was, “Oh, so today would be a bad day for me with this splitting headache. Anyway, just get up and fight…” To refrain from destroying my whole day with negativity, I decided to keep myself awake and active by exercising my brain first, though I was always reluctant to kick start a new day by playing chess. Getting defeated is a bitter pill for me to swallow all the time. However, I’ve tried hard to be accustomed to this uneasy feeling, and it’s like a little reward for me if I win a game. That’s it.

And in the one and only match today, I won by checkmate.

In brief, it’d be better to list the lessons I accumulated from the victory. Or maybe today’s game was just the reassurance of what I already knew.

1. Everything can appear hit-or-miss

“Just do it” popped into my head right after seeing the figure beside my opponent’s profile. Mine was only 300 or something (or even lower), and the gap was considerable. But there’s one thing for sure: we can learn by trial and error. In case I fail, it’s just another failure =)) Anw, I am always brave to accept the challenge, today joining a game in which I was a real underdog.

2. Being too defensive can lead to a fatal mistake

Initially, I was deeply affected by the Halo effect after getting some basic information about my opponent: both the nationality and the figure looked so overwhelming. Besides, their first few moves were quite threatening, but I don’t know why they castled after seeing my pieces in the middle. This unnecessarily protective move allowed me to prepare for my checkmate plan. My opponent’s King was like being put in a closed room with only one door, without any other way to escape.

3. Spending too much time on strategies might backfire

Judging from my opponent’s moves, I thought they could be thinking about some strategic tactics to trap me. However, it took them too long. Therefore, if I didn’t checkmate, I could still win the game by timeout. At the end of this post, I’ll add the screenshot of the match so you can see my remaining time even doubled that of my opponent.

From this point, I am even more convinced that to be flexible and go with the flow is never wrong. But in reality, we have to be cautious and prepare for undesirable circumstances, compared to just a game when I can play brainlessly and fail without adversely influencing anyone.

4. Higher ranking and win are not the same

As you can see from the picture below, my opponent was highly dominant. But still, I won over them by checkmate. So maybe the major lesson for me today is to do everything with the utmost caution no matter what I deal with.

5. Luck is important

Maybe my victory in this game is just a matter of luck. For example, was my opponent sleepy and had some blunders, or was he too arrogant to look down on my moves, which initially seemed stupidly harmless?

6. There are tons of variables to take into consideration when controlling everything

Needless to say, external and internal factors contribute to the outcome of everything we do. However, I think intrinsic elements are the only ones that I can manage and adjust, while their extrinsic counterparts are just some prompts for me to prepare beforehand for foreseeable risks or undesirable incidents. In this case, my moves are what I can control, and my opponent’s plan and even their blunders are what I can never expect. So these are the variables that I have to consider.

*Touchwood* In my life, I always have whatever and whoever I need in perfect timing. And I’m so grateful for all of this, especially today’s opportune reminder. These days, I’ve been through a critical phase, like a transition from a primary school kid to a middle schooler. With more responsibilities to take on and more anxiety to endure, I think I will grow better later. I wasn’t in the mood to do anything, let alone play chess when I accepted the challenge. However, my increased focus on the game fueled my moves, reaching an unexpected outcome. So I hope in real life, especially in times full of turbulence, like right now, whenever I am about to give up, I will find more motivation to move on and stay stronger.