What Chess Taught Me About My ADHD Brain

“Just 10 more minutes.”
“Just one more game.”
“Just until I get my rating up to 850.”

I told myself these things about playing chess this weekend, as I recovered from my wisdom teeth removal. I took off from work for two days in anticipation of pain and complications from the procedure, and as a marathon runner, I am currently adhering to the doctor’s protocol to not run for the five days after the surgery. I had four wisdom teeth removed, so I had to get sedated and get a ride home.

Thus, without being able to work and run, I had a significant amount of free time I don’t normally have, so I had to find a way to pass the time. I had to limit my physical exertion to basically nothing and only eat very soft foods, so I had a hard time getting enough caloric intake as well.

The first two days, I spent what must have been three or four hours eating — just eating, while watching TV or YouTube videos. Since I could only eat things like pudding, ice cream, refried beans, and peanut/almond butter, it took a really long time to get the amount of calories I usually eat.

Downtime can get pretty difficult for me, so I tried to keep myself occupied with a couple of things: reading a book, watching TV, playing video games, or writing. I didn’t really get too into any — I could watch a show for an episode, read a book for 20–30 minutes, or write for 20 minutes, but ultimately I didn’t get “hooked” on any of them. That’s fine — all I needed to do was ride out the days until I was able to go back to normal life.

But in my boredom, I was playing chess. and taking it more seriously. I have been playing chess for four years, and it’s one area of my life, unlike others, where I have made virtually no improvement. I have improved on a personal and professional level in my relationships, as a runner, and at work, but my chess rating has stayed the same throughout the last several years.

I play mostly 10-minute rapid games and daily games, and my rating has hovered around the mid 600s, which is an advanced beginner in chess. I showed a lot of promise beyond my rating, playing against

Chandrayan Gupta

and other better players, but I often made critical mistakes or didn’t know how to close games well in my endgames.

I must have played close to 1000 games by now, so staying stagnant in the mid-600s means the lack of improvement was tough. I have fun playing chess, for sure, and a close loss can be as thrilling as a win.

However, I figured that during this time, when I had virtually nothing to do, I could focus on getting better at chess. I could keep hammering games, but the best thing I could do was review games. With a free subscription to chess.com, however, I was limited to reviewing one game a day and could only do a few puzzles. I also did not have access to a lot of lessons.

Thus, I decided to pay for a Chess.com subscription to get better. This gave me access to unlimited reviews, unlimited lessons, and unlimited puzzles. I did spend time learning new openings, new endgames, and new tactics. I won’t get into the specifics of chess too much, but once I started playing, reviewing, and doing lessons, I could not stop once I got the premium subscription.

I was winning a lot of games and went from a mid 600s to low 800s in a very short amount of time. Of course, I would lose, but I won a lot more than I lost. I just couldn’t stop. I was on a roll, a huge roll, and I kept trying to set a boundary on myself to stop playing. But after another game, usually one I more often than not won, I would keep playing. It often wasn’t the games themselves that allured me, but the feeling that I had seen patterns and strategies I had not before, and hitting ratings I never hit before.

For two days straight, this process repeated itself until I went to bed. I played around 6 hours of daily chess games a day while also trying to give energy to reading and various chores around the house.

Sure, that probably would have been fine when I was 12 years old, but I am now 29 with a lot of adult responsibilities, including working, taking care of a house, managing finances, and a lot more.

Four years ago, I was diagnosed with ADHD. It validated a lot of the self-regulation and impulsiveness problems I had throughout my life. I struggled with focus. And in that time, I have developed strategies to manage those systems, including breaking my day into 20–30 minute segments devoted to particular tasks, taking breaks when overstimulated, and leveraging high pressure, high adrenaline situations when understimulated.

As a result, when I lack the regulation I’ve built in the last several years, it’s frustrating.

The actual result of not doing much for two days wasn’t the big concern for me — it was how it felt. I felt not in control, completely absorbed in another world, and, well, like I was playing video games when I was a lot younger, where a whole weekend could go by with me playing 12 hours a day.

I was completely addicted to video games at certain points in my life, particularly MMORPGs. During those times, I would be absorbed, and my main priority was to advance myself in games like MapleStory, level up my character, improve my standing in my guild, and improve the amount of damage I could deal to enemies and the quests I could complete. I neglected homework and socializing with my friends just so I could play MapleStory all day.

I recognized something about my addiction to video games and tapping into those addictive tendencies with my Chess.com premium subscription. At the core of this video game addiction was, of course, an escape from real life, a distraction from unhappiness at home with parents who did not get along at all.

But there was something else I recognized: if I could channel all this motivation towards improving myself in this video game, if I could re-direct those energies to homework, reading a book, playing an instrument, playing a sport, then I could accomplish quite a lot. Of course, the problem was that those things were not nearly as interesting as playing a video game.

But I always clung to that feeling of leveling up and getting better. I recognized even as young as 8 years old, when I would wake up at 5 a.m. to play PlayStation 2 games like Grant Theft Auto: San Andreas and keep the volume on silent so my parents wouldn’t find out, that I had a ton of motivation and energy directed towards this gaming hobby.

ADHD hyperfocus is a symptom I’ve recognized when I am fully absorbed and in the zone. I have learned to channel a lot of that addictive personality and energy into my work, becoming a marathon runner, running. I still struggle with balance because I can go overboard, and no, it’s not fun to work or run all the time. But no matter what it is, I do always get a huge rush from the same things that leveling up in those video games two decades ago gave me.

The feeling of improving, getting better, reaching new horizons I did not know I was capable of before. I guess you can say self-improvement, but I feel like that “leveling up” feeling always went a bit deeper — it felt like exploring my limits and potential, that I was climbing a mountain and getting closer and closer to the top. I wasn’t there yet, but I was closer, and even if I needed a quick break, there was nothing more I wanted than to keep climbing.

I think that’s why playing chess the last two days has been without limits and a lack of control. I’ve been winning and getting a lot better. I have more resources to study my strategy and game. I don’t think it helps that chess ability is often seen as correlated with intelligence and analytical ability, so there is a part of it too — if I were better at chess, it would make me more confident in an identity as a smart guy with strong analytical skills. I am getting better after four years of being stagnant, so while the chess itself is fun, the improvement is more addictive.

As much as the break is nice, I want more balance, and I would rather read more books, spend more time committed to learning a language, or do something else with more utility. I will say that, even on days I spent 12 hours playing video games, there was always an element of regret that has not gone away. If all the fun and leveling up didn’t feel great in the moment, I wouldn’t do it. But it was the lack of balance and dysregulation that would cause me to regret.

I have now established a boundary: no more rapid games. Only daily games. I need to wait for the opponent to play me back, often hours later or the next day. That way, I can be more deliberate about my moves and strategy, but I can also stave off that phenomenon that causes me to lose control.

It is just chess, and there are worse things to spend all day doing. It’s just about how it feels and how my brain responds. There is a signal that it’s time to stop and that either my body or mind has its limits. I can go on a run, and my body won’t want to run more (unless it’s in my training plan).

I can watch a TV show I like and be able to stop and not want to watch more. I can have a drink and not want to drink more. But I cannot play certain video games or rapid games of chess and not come away feeling like I just want to play one more round. My brain can regulate most things, but this was not one of them.

—

This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

—

Don’t like ads? Become a supporter and enjoy The Good Men Project ad free