Improve Your Chess Now
Jonathan Tisdall
35 min
8 Key Points
4.5 RateWhat's inside?
Dive into strategic techniques and practical tips that can enhance your chess skills and take your game to the next level.
You'll learn
1. How to up your chess game2. Pro chess player secrets3. Self-check: analyzing your chess moves4. Chess 101: openings, middlegame, endgame5. The mind game in chess6. Mastering chess tactics.Key points
01The Myth of the Calculating Machine
We often believe that elite grandmasters possess supercomputer brains capable of flawlessly calculating millions of variations, but the reality is beautifully and surprisingly human. The true foundation of profound chess improvement begins with entirely debunking the myth of the robotic calculator. For decades, the chess world was heavily influenced by the teachings of Alexander Kotov, particularly his famous book Think Like a Grandmaster. Kotov introduced the concept of the "tree of analysis," a highly structured method where a player selects a few candidate moves, calculates the first one to its absolute conclusion, evaluates the final position, and then strictly forbids themselves from ever looking at that move again before moving on to the next. On the surface, this highly disciplined approach sounds incredibly logical and efficient. However, as Jonathan Tisdall brilliantly points out, there is a massive problem with this method: human beings are simply not silicon processors. When you sit at the board, your mind does not work in perfectly straight, uninterrupted lines of code. What happens if you calculate your first candidate move, move on to the second, and suddenly your subconscious whispers that you missed a sneaky knight fork in the first line? Kotov’s rigid rules dictate that you must ignore that whisper and press forward. Human nature, however, screams at you to go back and double-check. Tisdall liberates us from the guilt of not being able to think like a machine. He explains that the human brain naturally engages in a process of "looping." We scan the board, zero in on an interesting idea, calculate a little bit, wander over to a different sector of the board to see what the opponent is doing, and then loop back to our original idea with fresh insights. This is not a sign of a weak or undisciplined mind; it is a highly evolved, natural safety mechanism designed to prevent us from walking blindly into danger. By trying to force our minds into a rigid, robotic framework, we actually create massive internal friction, leading to severe mental exhaustion and anxiety. Have you ever found yourself sweating over a board, calculating the exact same line three or four times, just to be absolutely sure you did not miss anything? This repetitive looping often makes club players feel inadequate, as if they lack the mental fortitude of a grandmaster. Tisdall’s profoundly comforting message is that grandmasters loop too! The difference is not that they never double-check; the difference lies in how efficiently they manage that natural human tendency. They use their intuition to quickly discard bad ideas, reserving their deep, looping calculations only for the variations that truly matter. To truly improve, you must stop punishing yourself for having a human brain. Think about how you make complex decisions in everyday life, such as buying a house or choosing a career path. You do not list three options, evaluate the first one perfectly, and never think about it again. You compare, you contrast, you revisit, and you weigh newly discovered information. Chess is exactly the same. The board is a dynamic, living ecosystem, and your thought process must be equally fluid and adaptable. When you finally let go of the impossible standard of the perfect calculating machine, an incredible weight is lifted off your shoulders. You stop burning precious clock time trying to force a rigid method that fights against your own psychology. Instead, you learn to trust your intuitive scanning process. You allow your eyes to dance across the board, picking up tactical motifs and positional imbalances naturally. You gather the raw data through intuition, and only then do you apply structured calculation to verify your initial feelings. This shift in perspective is the critical first step toward mastery. By embracing your humanity, you conserve vast amounts of mental energy, keeping your mind fresh for the later stages of the game when complex calculations are genuinely required. However, accepting a more natural thought process does not mean abandoning discipline altogether. Once you have identified the right moves to calculate, you still need a reliable way to see deeply into the future without losing your way. This brings us to the fascinating challenge of visualization, and how we can prevent our mental images from turning into a blurry, confusing mess.
02Stepping Stones for Clearer Vision
Stepping into the dense, unpredictable fog of future chess variations can terrify even the most seasoned players, but what if you could drop permanent anchors along the way to guide you? Jonathan Tisdall’s revolutionary concept of "stepping stones" is arguably the most liberating and practical calculation tool you will ever learn. One of the most universal struggles for chess players of all levels is the dreaded phenomenon of visualization breakdown. You start calculating a complex sequence: "If I take the knight, he takes with the pawn, then I push my bishop, he moves his rook..." By the fourth or fifth move in your head, the mental chessboard becomes a hazy, swirling mess. You forget that a pawn was traded. You accidentally leave a bishop on a diagonal it vacated three moves ago. Suddenly, you drop a piece in your calculation, panic, and give up on the entire variation. Tisdall identifies this visualization blur as the primary barrier to deep calculation, and his solution is brilliantly elegant. Instead of trying to hold a continuously moving, chaotic movie in your head, you need to break the calculation down into manageable, static photographs. These photographs are your stepping stones. Here is exactly how this powerful technique works in practice: Identify a quiet moment: You begin calculating a forced line of moves captures, checks, or direct threats. Pause the mental movie: As soon as the sequence reaches a relatively stable or quiet position—where the immediate tactical fireworks have subsided—you completely stop calculating forward. Solidify the new reality: You take a few moments to deliberately and consciously paint this new position in your mind's eye. You mentally count the material to ensure equality. You scan the new pawn structure. You note which diagonals are now open and which squares are weak. Anchor the stone: You treat this newly imagined position with the exact same respect and solidity as the physical board sitting right in front of you. Once this stepping stone is firmly established in your mind, a magical thing happens. You no longer have to exert massive amounts of mental energy remembering how you arrived at this position. The complex sequence of moves that got you there is safely discarded from your working memory, freeing up your brain’s processing power. From this newly established, crystal-clear stepping stone, you can now begin a brand new calculation, looking another three or four moves deep. Think of this process like a daring mountain climber scaling a sheer cliff face. A seasoned climber does not stand at the base of the mountain, look thousands of feet up to the peak, and attempt to memorize every single handhold and foothold for the entire journey. That would be impossible and overwhelming. Instead, the climber maps out a route to the next safe ledge. They climb to that ledge, pull themselves up, secure their ropes, and take a deep breath. From that stable, anchored position, they assess the new landscape and plan the next phase of the ascent. Your chess calculations must operate with the exact same philosophy. Implementing the stepping stone technique requires deliberate, conscious practice. When you are analyzing a game at home or solving tactical puzzles, force yourself to stop halfway through a long variation. Close your eyes and describe the board state out loud. "The white knight is now on d5, the black pawn structure is doubled on the c-file, and the material is exactly even." By verbally or mentally confirming the details of the stepping stone, you cement it into your short-term memory. The psychological relief this technique provides during a grueling tournament game cannot be overstated. When you know you have a reliable method for venturing safely into deep, murky calculations, your confidence skyrockets. You stop fearing complex positions. You no longer shy away from calculating long, forcing lines because you know you will not get lost in the woods. You have a map, and you have your anchors. Furthermore, stepping stones allow you to compare different variations much more effectively. If you calculate line A and establish a stepping stone, and then calculate line B and establish a different stepping stone, you only have to compare those two static, final images. You do not have to juggle the entire chaotic journey of both lines simultaneously. This dramatically reduces the cognitive load, allowing you to make sharper, more objective evaluations. By mastering the art of the mental anchor, you dramatically extend the horizon of your chess vision, preparing your mind for the ultimate test of visualization.
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03Blindfold Chess and Mental Imagery
04Recognizing the Critical Moments
05Prophylaxis and Invisible Threats
06Pattern Recognition Versus Deep Calculation
07Conclusion
About Jonathan Tisdall
Jonathan Tisdall is an Irish-American chess Grandmaster, chess columnist, and chess book author. Born in 1958, he won the Norwegian Chess Championship three times and represented Norway in seven Chess Olympiads. He is known for his instructive writing style in chess literature.