The game of chess is not just a game meant to be played for the sake of playing or to kill boredom. It is a game, which not only provides you with fun and challenge to your mind, but also works in the background and sharpens many skills that go a long way in making your life a successful one. Just as physical exercises like the push-ups, pull-ups and walking exercises tone your body and keep your muscles and bones fit, a game of chess tones up your mental stimulus and helps in sharpening your mind and improving your intelligence.
The salient feature of the game of chess is that the player’s capability and his application of mind alone determines the fate of the game. In other words, if the player makes a mistake, then he will be losing the game. A wrong calculation, a wrong move or a move in haste without thinking is all that leads to a loss. No other extraneous factors such as the size of the board, the atmosphere around or hand of god, luck or chance have any impact on the game or its outcome. In other words, as a player, you should own responsibility for the moves you make in the board. This idea of owning responsibility for a person’s move is not only applicable for the game, but also for the life. A wrong decision in life, either regarding career, regarding spending or regarding choice of partner might turn a heaven to hell.
In the game of chess, a player needs to apply his mind, think twice, assess the consequences of the move and the possible counter moves from the opponent, calculate and visualize the end and then make that move. A similar approach in life will make it most successful. Playing chess regularly cultivates this important trait and nurtures your mind to think twice before making any move or decision.
This characteristic feature of making mistakes, owning responsibility for the same and reaping the results – good or bad – of the mistake is what makes chess is a fascinating game and is referred to as a miniature of life. If you extend this logic to the life as such, you will find a lost of similarity between the game and the life. We, as human beings, sometimes take decisions out of passion, anger or haste and then ruin the rest of the life reaping the fruits of that one bad decision. Playing chess helps in cultivating the noble virtue of thinking before acting and imbibes into the natural character of a person, provided he develops an interest for the game and plays the game regularly.
Now the technology and spread of computers and internet has made it more easy and affordable for chess lovers to play the game as and when they feel like without waiting for a partner and ideal time suitable for both. Playing chess online with a partner over the internet at any convenient time is now a reality.
Coming back to the game of chess, it is common that the pawn – eight of them for each player – have the least value, and many players in their beginning stage do not give the proper importance for the pawn and lose it cheaply.
Pawn has two important features that other pieces do not have in the board. Only the two knights share one of the two features. In 9 out of 10 games, the pawn makes the first move and starts the game. The only other piece that has the privilege of opening the game is the knight because of its special movement, hopping over the pieces in between squares. However mean may be the pawn, only it is given the authority to start the game.
And yet another salient feature of pawn is that it is the only piece, rather eight of them in total, that have the special characteristic of getting promoted to a queen or any other major piece, provided it works its way through the other end of the board. Is it not a great advantage and special characteristic of the pawn? This special feature has a message for life as well. However, mean may be a person in terms of his qualifications or capabilities in comparison to others, hard work and determination will reward him with a promotion – is that moral.
Chess, thus, has many things like this to offer to a man’s life and make it a beautiful one.
Now, with internet, playing chess online makes it easier for any person having interest in the game to take up this route to grow up the ladder of success both in the game as well as in life.
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