Move by Move
Life Lessons On and Off the Chessboard
Maurice Ashley is a Chess Grandmaster, a chess commentator, a national championship coach, and an author. In 1999, at the age of 33, he became the first African American Chess Grandmaster in the game’s history, and in 2016 he was inducted into the US Chess Hall of Fame. This book is packed with wisdom on everything from how to embrace the power of mistakes (and the inevitability of losing!) to improving every day through the power of focus and endless learning. I’m excited to share some of my favorite Big Ideas, so let’s jump straight in!
Big Ideas
- Chess, A History OfA History of.
- Accumulation Theory+1. +1. +1.
- It Sucks to Lose but... It’s Exciting!It sucks and... It’s EXCITING!
- Sacrifice and RiskOn Your Heroic Quests.
“I first fell in love with chess as a fourteen-year-old sophomore at Brooklyn Technical High School. After an easy route at the hands of a classmate, I came across a chess book in the school library, and my love affair with learning everything I could about the game has not stopped to this day. I’ve shared the life lessons in this book with players everywhere from New York and Detroit to Kingston and Zanzibar, and I’ve spoken about the connections between chess and business with companies such as Amazon, Google, and Pinterest. Chess has changed me in fundamental ways, and its eternal truths have helped me navigate the complexities of life’s paths in more situations than I could have imagined.
While I believe in the uplifting power of chess ‘to make people happy,’ I have also witnessed the transformative power of chess in classrooms and prison cells. Thinking like a chess player can make you a better decision-maker, problem-solver, and strategist. It can help you think before you leap while also trusting your intuition, map out the future while staying firmly rooted in the present, and master yourself while seeing the world through the eyes of others. It is a game that can provide a lifetime of joyful entertainment while also being a serious discipline that can change lives.
Move by Move is a collection of the most compelling lessons chess has taught me. It contains insights on managing chaos and complexity, balancing sacrifices and risks, analyzing backward to solve problems, and embracing imperfection. You’ll learn how to build a winner’s mentality and how not to be derailed by success. You’ll come to understand the most critical elements of strategy and why learning through loss is a key path to greatness. And maybe most important, you’ll learn that to get to the top of the mountain, you must first conquer yourself.
I hope these lessons change your life the way they have changed mine.”
~ Maurice Ashley from Move by Move
Maurice Ashley is a Chess Grandmaster, a chess commentator, a national championship coach, and an author. In 1999, at the age of 33, he became the first African American Chess Grandmaster in the game’s history, and in 2016 he was inducted into the US Chess Hall of Fame.
As you know if you’ve been following along, my 11-year-old son, Emerson, is REALLY into chess. He wants to become a Chess Grandmaster like Maurice.
So... When I saw that this book was coming out in one of Emerson’s Chess Kid newsletters, I immediately got it. I read it in a single sitting. It’s FANTASTIC. (Get a copy here.)
As per that intro quote above, it’s packed with wisdom on everything from how to embrace the power of mistakes (and the inevitability of losing!) to improving every day through the power of focus and endless learning.
It’s packed with Big Ideas. I’m excited to share some of my favorites so let’s jump straight in!
P.S. Check out our Notes on The Art of Learning by *another* legendary chess player, Josh Waitzkin—the kid featured in the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer!
Download MP3
Download PDFWe don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.
There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self.
Get the BookChess, A History Of
“Thinking like a chess player can change your life.
I’m not writing these words just because I’ve spent more than four decades studying, playing, coaching, and commentating on chess. The 605 million people worldwide who play regularly would agree. School systems in several countries have included chess in their curricula because educators know that the game helps develop analytical and strategic thinking, abstract reasoning, concentration, focus, patience, grit, determination, memory, creativity, self-awareness, and respect for the genius of others. The United Nations has set aside a special date for chess, recognizing July 20 as World Chess Day. Not only does chess promote ‘fairness, inclusion, and mutual respect,’ the UN said, but it is ‘one of the most ancient, intellectual, and cultural games with a combination of sport, scientific thinking and elements of art.’
These days, everywhere you turn, chess is being used to explain war, business, sports, art, science, personal development, music, and even love. As the runaway popularity of the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit has shown, anyone can become enthralled by the subtle mysteries of the game. It’s not just high school chess geeks but also actors, musicians, artists, world leaders, and business tycoons who rave about what the game has done to help take their thinking to a higher level. Athletes in particular often attribute a mental edge to playing chess.”
The ancient version of chess was invented in India in the 7th century—around 1,500 years ago.
As per Wikipedia: “Precursors to chess originated in India. There, its early form in the 7th century CE was known [in Sanskrit] as chaturaṅgh, which translates to “four divisions (of the military)”: infantry, cavalry, elephantry, and chariotry. These forms are represented by the pieces that would evolve into the modern pawn, knight, bishop, and rook, respectively.”
“Chess was introduced to Persia from India and became a part of the princely or courtly education of Persian nobility. Around 600 CE in Sassanid Persia, the name for the game became chatrang (in Persian, which subsequently evolved to shatranj (in Arabic). ... The rules were developed further during this time; players started calling “Shāh!” (Persian for “King!”) when attacking the opponent’s king, and “Shāh Māt!” (Persian for “the king is helpless” – see checkmate) when the king was attacked and could not escape from attack. These exclamations persisted in chess as it traveled to other lands.”
The history of chess and its remarkable evolution over the last 1,500 years across the globe is as fascinating as the game itself. (Learn more with this Wikipedia entry on the History of Chess.)
Today, chess is played by over 605 MILLION people! To put that in perspective, “only” 250 million people play soccer—the world’s most popular sport.
Membership on popular online chess sites TRIPLED at the end of 2020 during COVID and “a million-dollar online chess tour sprang to life to take advantage of the increased interest.”
For curious souls, here’s the quick take on the Johnson family history of chess!
I didn’t play my first game of chess until I was a junior in college at UCLA. I was 21 years old. I can vividly remember learning how the pieces moved and then playing my roommate to a draw in my first match—wonderfully irritating him. (I typed that with a laugh.)
I played a bit with friends and online forever ago but never actually studied the game.
So...
I knew enough about chess to teach Emerson the fundamentals—controlling the center of the board, creating tempo with your pieces, etc. Eighteen months ago (I’m typing this on April 10th, 2024), he was good enough to beat everyone but me.
Then, one day (September 17th, 2022 to be precise!), I took the kids to a park in Austin on one of our weekend adventures. A group of guys had just finished playing chess and one of them asked Emerson if he’d like to play a game. Emerson said yes. They had a GREAT time. The guy told us that they played every Saturday and that we should come back next week to join them.
I have an album of pictures on my iPhone called “Chess Mastery Fun!” The VERY FIRST picture in that album is from the following weekend (September 24th, 2022). It’s a picture of Emerson playing an adult at that park with Eleanor watching intently. (Check it out here.)
Now... On that same day, I met the dad of an INSANELY great little chess player named Tharun. Tharun was only 5 or 6 years old at the time. He dominated Emerson (who was 9) in their first match. Emerson LOVED it. They were both giggling as they moved their pieces. It was truly awesome. (Note: Tharun is now one of the Top 100 7- or 8-year-olds in the country.)
Tharun’s dad told me about a website called ChessKid.com. He told me that was how Tharun got so good and that Emerson would probably love it, too.
Note: I just got goosebumps typing that because my little (Target swipe!) micro-moment of awesome with Tharun’s dad COMPLETELY changed our lives.
I hooked Emerson up with a ChessKid.com account when we got home that day and Emerson WENT OFF watching basically EVERY video FunMasterMike (the resident GENIUS chess teacher on the site) created. We homeschool Emerson and he would spend 2-4-6-8 hours on ChessKid.com EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.
After a few months, it was clear he was super into it, so we got him an INCREDIBLE coach. (Nick Matta: YOU ROCK!)
Fast forward a bit. Emerson starts playing informal tournaments. Then he plays in the novice division for the regionals here in Austin, Texas and won it. Then he played in the JV division for the Texas State Championships (his third tournament ever) and won that. More recently, last month he placed second in the Championship division in the Texas State Championships.
He absolutely LOVES the game and wants to be like Maurice: A Chess Grandmaster. I ABSOLUTELY love our boys-only chess weekend trips while enjoying the opportunity to support him in his Heroic quest while sharing all these ideas with him.
Note: Here’s my all-time favorite piece of wisdom from Emerson’s quest: Effort Counts Thrice.
I’ve had a lot of friends ask me so I want to make sure I make this explicit... If you’re a parent/grandparent/aunt/uncle/etc with a kid who shows some interest in chess, I HIGHLY (!!!) recommend ChessKid.com.
As I say in the first chapters of Areté, in which I share how I’m applying Heroic ideas to Emerson’s chess pursuits, FunMasterMike is one of THE BEST teachers I’ve ever seen.
That’s officially more than enough from me. Hope you enjoyed that quick little Johnson family chess history. It’s time to get back to work!
P.S. One more thing... Emerson has been able to DESTROY me for over a year now. In fact, he can beat me without a Queen. I’ve NEVER enjoyed losing so much. For curious souls, his peak chess.com rating is 2081—in the 99.8th percentile. (Yes, astonished and proud dad moment!)
P.P.S. One more one more thing... Alexandra and I had been patiently waiting for Emerson to show us what he was passionate about. So, when he expressed an interest in chess, we immediately noticed it and did everything we could to support his interest for the game.
P.P.P.S. Other fun facts you might find interesting: Emerson won the JV division for the Texas State Championships (at 10) before he could read at grade level. We never pushed him to master reading. In fact, he could build a fire with nothing but flint before he could read. He eventually got into it and advanced a few grade levels in several months with the help of his tutor.
You don’t get results by focusing on results. You get results by focusing on the actions that produce results.
If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it’s not your path.
People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing—that’s why we recommend it daily.
As Magnus Carlsen put it: ‘Not being willing to take risks is an extremely risky strategy.’ To be comfortable with risk is to be comfortable with uncertainty.
Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent, and original manner possible.
Don’t give children the benefits of your success. Give them the ingredients that made you successful.
Accumulation Theory
“We can use the two concepts of Accumulation Theory and kaizen in our everyday lives. While many people go overboard with strenuous workouts or employ crash diets in the hope of seeing immediate changes to their body, experts note that consistently exercising a little every day along with gradual shifts to healthy food choices will result in more lasting results. In finance, get-rich-quick schemes usually lose out to more patient strategies.
In his bestselling book, Atomic Habits, author James Clear coins his own term, the aggregation of marginal gains, to describe these commonsense approaches: ‘Improving by 1 percent isn’t particularly notable—sometimes it isn’t even noticeable—but it can be far more meaningful, especially in the long run. The difference a tiny improvement can make over time is astounding. Here’s how the math works out: If you can get 1 percent better each day for one year, you’ll end up thirty-seven times better by the time you’re done.’
Accumulation Theory and its sister ideas are so obviously powerful that one has to wonder why everyone doesn’t follow their core principles of slow but steady improvement. The truth is we live in an age of instant gratification, when building lifelong habits of hard work, patience, and consistency don’t seem to be as appealing. While we may sometimes be able to see amazing results with flashier methods, the gains that do not come through diligence, sacrifice, and determination are often less personally impactful. As Clear writes, ‘It is . . . easy to overestimate the importance of one defining moment and underestimate the value of making small improvements on a daily basis.’ Getting the benefits without the effort can actually be counterproductive in the long run.”
That’s from a great micro-chapter called “Improve Every Day.”
The idea of “Accumulation Theory” is from an Austrian chess player named Wilhelm Steinitz. Here’s a little more chess history with a little more practical wisdom...
Back in the 1800’s, elite competitors played chess super-aggressively. Everyone was always going for an all-out attack as quickly as possible. It was known as the “Romantic Style.”
Then Steinitz came along, studied the games, and saw that a much more effective strategy would be to systematically build up your forces patiently “so that once the final battle was eventually waged, one had as many pieces and pawns as possible to overwhelm the enemy’s resistance.”
This was known as the “Theory of the Accumulation of Small Advantages” or “Accumulation Theory” for short. Steinitz started playing with this style. Everyone mocked him. Then he started consistently beating them. Then they all copied him.
Spotlight on YOU...
How can YOU apply some more of this “Accumulation Theory”/ “Kaizen” / “Aggregation of Marginal Gains” wisdom to YOUR LIFE?
Here’s to aggregating and compounding tiny little +1 gains all day, every day over an extended period of time as we dominate the game of life. TODAY.
The most helpful thing I’ve learned from chess is to make good decisions based on incomplete data in a limited amount of time.
What is defeat? Nothing but education—nothing but the first step to something better.
It Sucks to Lose but... It’s Exciting!
“No one likes to lose. Yet how we handle our losses is one of the most powerful measures of our eventual success. Those who react badly after a loss, who pout, kick, scream, and throw things, generally get no benefit from the experience. The great champions often look at losing as a way to gain precious competitive insights so they can raise their game to new levels. Losing, much more so than winning, can be a catapult launching your game to new heights.
The late, great Kobe Bryant was once asked, ‘What does losing feel like to you?’ His reply: ‘It’s exciting . . . because it means you have different ways to get better. There’s certain weaknesses that were exposed that you need to shore up. . . . It sucks to lose, but at the same time the answers are there if you just look at them.’”
That’s from a micro-chapter called “Losing (Because You Will).”
First: I ABSOLUTELY LOVE Kobe Bryant’s response to losing. It SUCKS and... It’s EXCITING!
For the record... Developing a healthy relationship to failure/losing/mistakes is the #1 thing I’m MOST excited about with Emerson and his approach to Chess Grandmastery.
As we’ve discussed many times, my top parenting books are by Carol Dweck—the godmother of the “growth mindset.” Check out our Notes on Mindset and Self-theories.
As a guy who grew up with a hard-working but alcoholic father and a loving but anxious mother who did a wonderful job of installing a “fixed mindset” in my consciousness (!), I’ve been working hard for decades to replace that fixed mindset with a growth mindset.
As a parent, I have OBSESSED about cultivating a growth mindset in our kids. The primary ways I have done that include ALWAYS (!!!) celebrating EFFORT not talent, celebrating mistakes, rubbing my hands together (literally) when I face a challenge, and finding ways to OPERATIONALIZE the bumper sticker that “we win or we learn.”
Note: This +1 on Learning-Wins: How to Operationalize Winning or Learning is one of my ALL-TIME favorite +1’s.
Now... When I read this passage from a Chess Grandmaster about how losing “can be a catapult launching your game to new heights” I (goosebumps) IMMEDIATELY (!) thought of a Saturday night about 75 days ago.
Context: Emerson is playing in a tournament. He played a game against one of the best 9-year-olds in the country. This awesome, tiny little guy beat him.
Now... For whatever reason, after losing to this awesome little kid who was tactically superior to him and who had CLEARLY been working on this part of his game, Emerson KNEW it was time to finally start doing some of the stuff his coach had been telling him to do for months.
So... Long story a little shorter, Emerson and I did a quick 1-2-3 on what went well, what needed work, and what we’d do differently to improve. (We do that EVERY.SINGLE.TIME.) He KNEW that he needed to work on his tactical game.
He and his coach decided that Emerson would do ONE thing to take his game to the next level: He would do an HOUR of puzzles (on a website called ChessTempo.com) EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.
His coach PROMISED him that if he did it his game would go to the next level. Fast-forward 30 days. Emerson has done that hour of puzzles every.single.day. And... His chess.com rating went up 300 points—from 1600+ to 1900+. He’s now done those puzzles every.single.day for 73 days in a row. (His coach says he’s never seen ANYONE be *that* consistent—that’s like Emerson!) His chess.com rating is now consistently over 2000 and he continues to improve.
Back to YOU!!!
You WILL lose. That’s inevitable. The question is: How can you use your most significant “loss” to “catapult launching your game to new heights”? Seriously. How can you? What, SPECIFICALLY, will you DO to use that failure as fuel for your antifragile growth? Get on that. TODAY.
You may learn much more from a game you lose than from a game you win. You will have to lose hundreds of games before becoming a good player.
If you’re not making some notable mistakes along the way, you’re certainly not taking enough business and career chances.
The strategist starts with a goal in the distant future and works backwards to the present.
Sacrifice and Risk
“In contrast, real sacrifices promise no guarantee of a concrete return. My mother made an incalculably real sacrifice when she made the painful decision to leave my brother, sister, and me in Jamaica, where we’re from, to head to the United States in search of a better life. I was only two years old when she left. It would take her ten long years to gain citizenship and be able to sponsor us to join her in this land of opportunity. She could not have known how those ten years would play out and the infinite number of possible challenges we might all have to overcome. In fact, the very first day after she arrived in the United States, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot and killed in Memphis, setting off riots all around the country. The way she tells it, she was in shock that her dream began in such a devastating fashion. But she understood that this was not just about her emotions and fears; she had three young kids, being taken care of by her mother, who were relying on her to push on. And push on she did, with courage and determination and a sense of purpose, and a decade later she accomplished the task that she had set her mind to so many years before, and finally we were able to reunite as one family.”
That’s from a micro-chapter called “Sacrifice and Risk.”
Each chapter is preceded by a number of pithy quotes—many of which I have featured in the sidebar of this Note. This chapter’s preceding quotes include this one by Roland Gau: “If at some point you don’t ask yourself, ‘What have I gotten myself into?’ then you’re not doing it right.”
I know I have certainly asked myself that question a number of times as I look down at my HEROIC tattoo and the near-impossible 30-year Mission to which I have dedicated my life (51 | 2051!) and I can only imagine what Maurice’s mom must have been feeling when she took those courageous steps on HER Heroic quest.
Pause and think about what she and Maurice and his brother and sister went through... And, know this: While Maurice is the first African American Chess Grandmaster in history, his brother was a three-time kickboxing champion and his sister won six world titles in boxing. Each of them has been inducted into their respective fields’ Hall of Fame.
As Maurice says: “Her sacrifice, made with good intentions and a willingness to endure supreme struggle, paid off beyond her wildest imagination.”
Here’s to making the sacrifices and taking the risks required of us as we each take the next steps on our Heroic quests. It’s Day 1. We’re ALL IN. Let’s go, Heroes!
The successful warrior is like the average man, with laser-like focus.
About the author
