Life In 19x19

When I was 30 years old my wife took our oldest son (then 1) out to visit my mother-in-law over the summer break. I suddenly had a lot of free time on my hands like I used to in my college days. I wasn't really looking for a video game. I was not thrilled with the state of card games and miniature games at the time. My interest in Chess had been virtually nil since graduating high school. I'd had a little passing familiarity with Go and Shoji depictions in anime and poked around the Internet a pit after the subject. This lead to two consequences: binge-watching Hikaru no Go on Hulu and visiting the local chapter of the American Go Association out at the university.

I received a few lessons, read some good introductory books, started up accounts on KGS and IGS and became a bit obsessive (like I always do studying a new game) for a few months until life got back to normal. I made a good friend at the AGA Club that was 2 Dan and willing to teach. I took game records from my mistakes and analyzed them. I took my time and I was willing to learn things like a child when necessary. Even with the family commitments and general half-assing that I'd do I managed to put in my time as a Double Digit Kyu in about a year and a half.

Then things go super-busy for a while. Special-needs diagnosis for kids. Foreclosure. Bankruptcy. Etc. It wasn't the best environment to study Go in to get better, but at the same time I think my Go studies alongside my religious life kept me sane. I'm not sure exactly how to describe it. Sometimes when I couldn't find the words to express myself my Go work things out for me. I dunno, it sounds pretty darn hokey in retrospect, but whatever helps you cope at the time, right?

Things have been more laid back over the last two years. I guess I'm a 6k according the AGA right now. I'm a filthy casual right now, but I tend to at least watch a game a day on KGS or IGS on my phone or an iPad just to keep in the swing. I'll sometimes revisit some of my favorite books in those quite moments when the kids are all in bed before I manage to pass out.

In terms of time commitments, Go really didn't demand that I set aside a hard schedule - blocks of hours at a time to study or play. It required me to put in regular effort. Play a few games with records. Find a mistake. Learn from a mistake. Play a teaching game with an open mind. Listen. Learn. I'd say if you can squirrel away enough time to read a newspaper, you can watch a game a day. If you can put aside enough time to play a round of Golf, you've got the time to visit a Dan-level friend, cook steaks on the grill, and play 2-3 teaching games. Put "Fundamental Principles of Go," by Yulin Yang in your bathroom. Read "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go," by Kageyama Toshiro, the next time you travel on an airplane or a train.

I think my biggest hang-up early was learning shape. I had to learn my way through the core dead and living shapes before I could put an end to the frustrating habit of losing groups I had no business losing. At least the 3-6 stone life and death shapes needed to be beaten into my skull along with the tiger's mouth, bamboo join, monkey jump, and when a one-space jump could actually be cut. I recommend getting Life and Death, Tetsuji, and Attack and Defense by James Davies on an SmartGo Books for iOS. The fact that you can actually play-back the diagrams interactively instead of just seeing a static numbered diagram is a really nice feature of the electronic copies of those books.

Best of luck to you! Enjoy the ride.

Marty Lund

agewisdom wrote: Just a couple of questions:
1. Could you give an example of what sort of 'bad habits' are? And how they arose? I'm assuming they arose naturally over time as you played many games of Go without an instructor reviewing the game?

I was fortunate not to pick up or develop too many bad habits when I was learning. You never really unlearn bad habits, you plaster over them.

Go is in many respects a Goldilocks game. Plays should not be too much this way, or too much that way, but just right. That said, most beginners have certain tendencies, but you may be different. For instance, most beginners play too passively, they develop too slowly, they grab stones instead of sacrificing them, they play too long in one area instead of shifting to greener pastures, they strengthen their opponent's stones and leave weaknesses behind in their own positions, they play stones too close together, they play them too far apart, etc., etc.

2. What sort of activities would be safe, to minimise these bad habits? I'm thinking of doing Go problems. Still a bit blur but probably start with the books problems such as Graded Go problems for beginners. These are probably NON hazardous, right?

The main reason I did not pick up too many bad habits was that I picked up good habits from my opponents. Except for a game or two, my weakest opponent was a 5 kyu and my most frequent opponent was a 2 dan. So during your first year of play avoid playing against players who are not at least 5 stones better than you. You can still pick up bad habits from them, but mostly you will be picking up good things.

Books are good. Try to get a comprehensive set that covers the basics of life and death, the endgame, the opening, joseki, invasion and reduction, shape and tesuji.

Also, play over lots of professional games. You won't pick up bad habits from them. Pro games have everything, although much of their thinking is hidden. They are also inspirational.

I once read a letter to a go magazine by a man who retired at 50 and started studying go in earnest with a pro teacher. He had played in college but had not played after graduation. In one year he had made shodan, in another year he had made 2 dan, in another year 3 dan, in another year 4 dan, and in another year he made 5 dan at age 55. (And this was at a time when amateur 6 dan overlapped pro strength.)

Good luck!

I started playing at the age of 38, approximately 10 years ago. It took me eight months to reach 9k, another 16 months to reach 5k, and another 42 months to reach 1d (so about 5.5 years altogether). Currently 2d, optimistic of making 3d, but it does seem a very long way away.

My introduction was rather unexciting, I got shown the game by a chess playing friend. I beat him in our first game, which certainly was a nice start. I joined a local club shortly thereafter, and would say that was the biggest key to steady improvement over the years. There were many helpful and competitive players to point out my errors and provide me with targets to aim at. Getting to know real players has always much more enjoyable than playing people on the Internet. Rivals help enormously. I do play online, but generally struggle to motivate myself to put everything into it.

I did study the game quite obsessively in the early years, although looking back on it now I would say I actually studied more trying to get to 1d than to get to 9k, its just that the first year or so was probably the most exciting. That was when I'd dream about go stones and shapes. Having said that, the stronger I got the more I enjoyed the game, as in the beginning, essentially every move from pro games was a baffling mystery. Now I understand at least some of the most basic aspects of a few of their moves

I don't recall any roadblocks of note. Although looking back at my records I see I got demoted from 18k to 19k at one point

I have been fortunate to have had some good teachers along the way. When I was still a ddk in my first year, a 6d Japanese amateur came out to South Africa for six months, just to teach go to South Africans (an amazing story in itself). I played many games against him, and I credit him with a lot, both in attitude to the game and technical ability. He taught me how to really whack the stone down onto the board

More recently (when I was about 2k), I spent a month in China at a go school with Jeff Chang and MilanMilan (of KGS fame). That was an excellent experience, making many new go friends, finding new teachers, and learning lots of new skills. It was amazing to meet so many fascinating individuals, and of course China itself was a wonderful place to visit. I went in 2010 just before the Olympic Games, so the pollution in Beijing was more or less non-existent.

Most recently, I got to go to the World Amateur Go Championships in Japan as the South African representative. This too was a wonderful experience, again, for the opportunity to make new Go friends, visit a fascinating culture and, of course, to play some tough and competitive go, and get some pros to review my games. Possibly the best part, the teacher from eight years previously, who was now back in Japan, came along to meet me. It was very cool to play him again as a much stronger player. This time it was only a three stone game, and it was very close - I think I lost by two points, but no doubt he planned it that way

Apart from those highlights, I find taking lessons online the most effective way of sustaining interest and keeping the skills steadily improving. There are many teachers and courses available now, I can recommend in PM's if you're interested. So I do something like that approximately once a year.

I've also kept up my interest by volunteering to part of the council of the South African Go Association. Obviously the admin takes time away from playing or learning go, but I think it's important to give something back if you can, and I'm quite good at that sort of thing. One of my recent successes in this regard was motivating to get South Africa to become part of the European Go Federation. This has opened up many new opportunities for us, for instance, we're now taking part in the Pandanet European Team Championship, which we're enjoying enormously.

During this time I've also been raising two young kids (one is a teenager now), so I've certainly battled with finding enough time along the way. Mostly I just got used to getting by with less sleep My wife jokes that she is a "go widow" but I don't think she minds too much to the time I spend on Go (we're still married!) - and she didn't me going to China on my own for a month.

mlund wrote:This lead to two consequences: binge-watching Hikaru no Go on Hulu and visiting the local chapter of the American Go Association out at the university.

In terms of time commitments, Go really didn't demand that I set aside a hard schedule - blocks of hours at a time to study or play. It required me to put in regular effort. Play a few games with records. Find a mistake. Learn from a mistake. Play a teaching game with an open mind. Listen. Learn. I'd say if you can squirrel away enough time to read a newspaper, you can watch a game a day.

Best of luck to you! Enjoy the ride.

Marty Lund

1. Nice to meet another Hikaru no Go fan. After watching the whole anime, I realize it covered almost the entire aspect of the Go game, ranging from Go cafe's, Internet Go, Insei system etc. Only thing it missed out was on helpful Go forums like this one and Internet Go schools. Hikaru didn't need any I guess, with Sai at his side.

2. Thank you for the sagely advice. Sort of like physical exercise I guess, it's best to do things regularly with progressively small overload to improve rather than binge and get injured. With Go, probably it's mental damage...

quantumf wrote:I started playing at the age of 38, approximately 10 years ago. It took me eight months to reach 9k, another 16 months to reach 5k, and another 42 months to reach 1d (so about 5.5 years altogether). Currently 2d, optimistic of making 3d, but it does seem a very long way away.

Wow, what an amazing story! Seriously, 2 Dan after only 5+ years at age 38? You're my role model. Can you be my part time sensei?

To be truthful, I'm on the wrong side of 30's, so hearing your story is quite motivational. Maybe there's hope for an 'old' man like me after all.

quantumf wrote:I have been fortunate to have had some good teachers along the way. When I was still a ddk in my first year, a 6d Japanese amateur came out to South Africa for six months, just to teach go to South Africans (an amazing story in itself). I played many games against him, and I credit him with a lot, both in attitude to the game and technical ability. He taught me how to really whack the stone down onto the board

I see! So it really helps to play against a good player. I like to but I'm quite a shy guy and afraid I would be:
1. Wasting the good player's time - He'd be snoozing away or worst...
2. Feeling bad after getting crushed

But maybe I need to reconsider after hearing your amazing story!

quantumf wrote:Apart from those highlights, I find taking lessons online the most effective way of sustaining interest and keeping the skills steadily improving. There are many teachers and courses available now, I can recommend in PM's if you're interested. So I do something like that approximately once a year.

There's a Go club at my place but going there takes a concerted effort. Right now, I am looking at some Go schools. Do PM me, I would like to ask your personal opinion about an Internet Go school that I found interesting.

quantumf wrote:During this time I've also been raising two young kids (one is a teenager now), so I've certainly battled with finding enough time along the way. Mostly I just got used to getting by with less sleep My wife jokes that she is a "go widow" but I don't think she minds too much to the time I spend on Go (we're still married!) - and she didn't me going to China on my own for a month.

Get your wife interested in Go too Seriously though, Go is such an interesting game and I believe on the four cultured pursuits to being a Gentleman, so your wife shouldn't mind...

Bill Spight wrote: Go is in many respects a Goldilocks game. Plays should not be too much this way, or too much that way, but just right. That said, most beginners have certain tendencies, but you may be different.

Sounds a lot like real life. Reminds me a lot of the following well-known story about a lute player) who was discouraged with his meditation practice and went to the Buddha to ask for instruction.

“What happens when you tune your instrument too tightly?” the Buddha asked.

“The strings break,” the musician replied.

“And what happens when you string it too loosely?”

“When it’s too loose, no sound comes out,” the musician answered. “The string that produces a tuneful sound is not too tight and not too loose.”

“That,” said the Buddha, “is how to practice: not too tight and not too loose.”

Bill Spight wrote: I once read a letter to a go magazine by a man who retired at 50 and started studying go in earnest with a pro teacher. He had played in college but had not played after graduation. In one year he had made shodan, in another year he had made 2 dan, in another year 3 dan, in another year 4 dan, and in another year he made 5 dan at age 55. (And this was at a time when amateur 6 dan overlapped pro strength.)
Good luck!

Wow. This is seriously some amazing stuff. Is this translated and available on the Internet? Guess one can still improve if one put their mind on it.

agewisdom wrote:1. Nice to meet another Hikaru no Go fan. After watching the whole anime, I realize it covered almost the entire aspect of the Go game, ranging from Go cafe's, Internet Go, Insei system etc. Only thing it missed out was on helpful Go forums like this one and Internet Go schools. Hikaru didn't need any I guess, with Sai at his side.

It was pretty cool to get all these depictions of different aspects of life where Go would crop up - home, school, go salons up through the pro camps and international events. It was pretty cool to see them fit all that stuff into what's essentially a fantasy shonen "sports" drama.

2. Thank you for the sagely advice. Sort of like physical exercise I guess, it's best to do things regularly with progressively small overload to improve rather than binge and get injured. With Go, probably it's mental damage...

Eh, there's a time and a place for both. With my life and schedule I don't have much time to go on a full-scale Baduk Binge and then recover from it. If nothing else the emotional stress it causes can be hard for me to manage alongside the things that can come up trying to keep up with being a husband and a father. At this stage in my life I need Go to help me drive my anxiety in the other direction.

Marty Lund

mlund wrote:Eh, there's a time and a place for both. With my life and schedule I don't have much time to go on a full-scale Baduk Binge and then recover from it. If nothing else the emotional stress it causes can be hard for me to manage alongside the things that can come up trying to keep up with being a husband and a father. At this stage in my life I need Go to help me drive my anxiety in the other direction.

Marty Lund

Just take things one step at a time. Sometimes too much of a good thing, even Go(!) would be bad. Glad to see how you're managing both Go whilst being busy with family life. Must be a tough juggling act.

These stories are quite fascinating. Thanks for starting this thread!

2. What sort of activities would be safe, to minimise these bad habits? I'm thinking of doing Go problems. Still a bit blur but probably start with the books problems such as Graded Go problems for beginners. These are probably NON hazardous, right?

Regarding this, I think that a lot of the tips that others have made regarding bad habits are great. I especially liked the golf analogy - it's good to play with good form! But I wanted to just give a warning from personal experience... After I started go, I heard similar advice about bad habits. I didn't want to get stuck into the "bad habit trap"! While I think the fear may have some merits, I also feel that my fear of playing badly, and of gaining bad habits, deterred me from playing go much at all!
I would only want to play in the "optimal conditions", after sufficient amount of study, etc., etc. But after awhile, I realized that if I continue to fear having bad habits, and let it keep me from playing, I would never play go at all.

To come back to the golf analogy, having good form is great. It's hard to unlearn bad form, so you might as well try to have the best form you can. If you have the resources to have a golf teacher, then that's great. Go for it. But don't let fear of bad form keep you from playing golf. Bad form is not good, but not playing golf, in my opinion, is even worse.

I guess, as with many things, the idea of balance is useful. My advice would be to try your best not to learn bad habits, but don't let it deter you from playing and learning.

Kirby wrote:These stories are quite fascinating. Thanks for starting this thread!

Yes, it's nice reading these stories Thank you ALL, for making me feel so welcome! I didn't think I'd receive so many replies and sagely advice.

Kirby wrote:Bad form is not good, but not playing golf, in my opinion, is even worse.

I guess, as with many things, the idea of balance is useful. My advice would be to try your best not to learn bad habits, but don't let it deter you from playing and learning.

Sagely advice! I'm keeping both of these in mind. I think I'll try to be mindful when playing a Go game and try to understand where I went wrong instead of blindly going onto the next game. Probably this would keep bad habits at a minimum.

agewisdom wrote:

Kirby wrote:Bad form is not good, but not playing golf, in my opinion, is even worse.

I guess, as with many things, the idea of balance is useful. My advice would be to try your best not to learn bad habits, but don't let it deter you from playing and learning.

Sagely advice! I'm keeping both of these in mind. I think I'll try to be mindful when playing a Go game and try to understand where I went wrong instead of blindly going onto the next game. Probably this would keep bad habits at a minimum.

I heartily second your idea of trying to understand your last game before playing the next one. Review your own games or get them reviewed. People say, "Play 100 games quickly." It is true that at the start you learn a lot just by playing. But if you play a lot when you are playing badly, you get a lot of practice playing badly. And if your opponent also plays badly, he or she won't punish your mistakes or be able to explain what is wrong with them. To get to 4 kyu I played fewer than 200 games. I didn't do problems or study books much, either. What I did do was to play stronger opponents and go over our games with them afterwards. (Not that I am disparaging doing problems and studying books. I just did not have much study material available at that time. )

Bill Spight wrote:To get to 4 kyu I played fewer than 200 games. I didn't do problems or study books much, either. What I did do was to play stronger opponents and go over our games with them afterwards. (Not that I am disparaging doing problems and studying books. I just did not have much study material available at that time. )

This seems to be an excellent approach, so I'm going to try and bug some higher ranked players on KGS in the near future...

I guess playing against other beginners is somewhat like the adage, GIGO (Garbage in, garbage out). It's not meant to be disparaging, but probably all beginners would just play more or less 'blindly', so it's the case of the blind leading the blind and the one-eyed man is king.

here's my story from an older thread...
http://lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 62#p121262

xed_over wrote:here's my story from an older thread...
http://lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 62#p121262

Thanks! Jumping over to read it now!

I swear you just wrot my story, timeline and all. Thanks for starting this thread!