adapt this excerpt this a blog post that I can use: Note I am not gm smirnov but have permission to modify his work: Lesson 1: How to Use Your Brain Effectively?

Hi and welcome to the course “Self-taught Grandmaster”! This is Igor
Smirnov – an International Grandmaster and a very active chess coach.

Effective Training – this is the central theme of this course. Within the
next couple of lessons, I will REVEAL...

- How to get the MAXIMUM benefit from your chess training.

- How you can succeed in chess even if you live in a small city, don't have a
chess coach near you, don't have a lot of training time to spare, and so on.

YES, despite all of these obstacles, it is possible to make SIGNIFICANT
chess progress. And I will be more than happy to hand-hold you through
the process.

The principles of effective learning – this is one of my favorite topics for
discussion. Matter of fact, I have dedicated years of efforts (and even took
up psychology in a university) to discover the BEST chess training
techniques! And it's a great pleasure to share this unique and extremely
useful knowledge with you.

Without further ado, let's get rolling.

In this first lesson, I will tell you the general principles of an effective
study. I will show you how your brain works (explained in an easy to
understand way) and how a learning process goes.

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I know you are itching to get your hands on some secret training
techniques right now  . However, please, be patient and take this lesson
slowly and seriously. This knowledge is a necessary foundation for your
future and significant chess progress. It will allow you:

- To coach yourself well.

- To coach other people.

- And it will help you to improve ANY skill (NOT just chess skills) effectively!

I will not bother you with unfathomable scientific theories, but will explain
you everything in a user friendly way.

First, let's check out how the brain works. This will give us an idea how to
study chess MORE effectively.

(NOTE: In the next couple of lessons I will give you all the concrete chess
recommendations, so just relax and don’t worry about it.)

OK, here we go! How does your brain work? Long story made simple: a
brain works with images and associations.

Let’s make a quick test: right now, please, think about an apple. How did
you do it? Most likely, you visualized a picture of an apple. Maybe you felt
its taste or your feelings while eating an apple.

In any case, you don’t think about a word “apple”, you don’t visualize the
letters a-p-p-l-e. You use pictures and feelings. That’s why I said that a
brain works with images.

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You see, your brain creates associations between different images. For
example, it can create a connection between “an apple” and “your taste
feeling about an apple”. That’s why if you think about an apple for some
time, you will automatically somewhat feel its taste.

By the way, this a really perfect system, because it allows you brain to
accumulate unlimited quantity of information and to keep it well
structured.

Next, when your brain creates a chain with several images and
connections between them – it becomes “a program” for you (an
algorithm of your actions). Similar to a computer, human brain uses
programs.

Here's an example: when your phone rings – you take it and bring it to
your ear. It’s a simple program, and of course we operate with much more
complex programs as well.

By the way, it’s really “a program”, because you don’t think “How exactly I
should take the phone by my fingers?” or “Should I bring the phone to a
left or right ear?” and so on. You just do what you have to do.

You make everything automatically.

Here we come to another important idea: when you realize and practice
one brain 'program' a couple of times – it becomes automated. It takes
about 3 weeks to automate such a program. After that it becomes your
SKILL. Of course it all relates to your chess skills as well.

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That’s why it’s definitely not enough to simply read a chess book about a
certain topic in order to fully assimilate it. You need to practice the same
element for the next 23 days and only after that you will be able to use it
practically.

That’s why often it seems for you like you know something when really
you don’t (so you can’t use it really).

In my free e-mail lessons I gave a simple test: calculate how often did you
use a positional sacrifice in your last 50 games. If you did such sacrifices in
less than 5 games, then of course you do NOT know “what a positional
sacrifice” is. More precisely, you don’t have this skill.

Summing things up, here's how YOU can assimilate chess skills properly:

1. You need to know a new idea (possibly from a chess book).

2. You need to integrate this idea in your thinking process. Thus it will
become a part of your “mental program”.

3. You need to practice this new program regularly during next 3 weeks.
Only then you may honestly say “I know it!”.

Now we come to the next important question: “How to learn chess
effectively?”

There are 2 possible ways...

First, you can test different thinking algorithms in practice and choose
better ones. Here you will need to get new ideas from chess educational
materials, then test them in practice, then correct the elements which

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didn’t work well, then test it again and so on. This is certainly a possible
way. This is how Steinitz, Capablanca and other old masters learned chess.

This is the harder way.

However, you don’t really need to go through this long process.

Instead you may copy the thinking process of a strong player (who already
tried different thinking rules and already found the best ones). You don't
need to fix what is NOT broken.

By the way, many famous players have used this method with great
results. Tigran Petrosian studied Nimzovitch’s book “My System” very
thoroughly and has copied Nimzovitch’s style. And guess what, Petrosian
got an International Master’s title and became a strong player.

Anatoly Karpov in his childhood read Capablanca’s books many times and
copied the thinking process of the 2nd World Champion.

The list of examples can go on and on...

Of course it’s not that simple to imitate a strong player. Here we arrive to
the main problem in teaching:

When you automate a skill, you forget its elements!

Graphically it can be presented like this. Here is your mental program. It
contains some actions (images) and associations. When you automate this
program, your brain starts treating it as a single line. After that you can’t
focus on every single element anymore.

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And we should be thankful! This allows you to realize this mental program
quickly and automatically, without thinking about it. It would be pretty
annoying to think how to lace up your shoes every morning 

From the other hand, this makes it difficult for you to teach another
person how to make something. You just do something, and you can’t
even explain in details how exactly you are doing this.

All chess players suffer from this situation. Let’s say you are reading a
Kasparov’s book and you see a sentence: “Here I made a great move
16.Rg5. This is a beginning of a right plan of an attack on a king-side.”

This sentence looks good, but it’s useless for you.

It doesn’t explain: (1) Why this move is actually so great? (2) How
Kasparov came to this plan? (3) How he decided that this plan is better
than other possible plans? And so on.

I remember how I trained with one famous Grandmaster some years ago.
When I asked him to explain me how does he find the right move, he
answered something like: “Well, you know, I feel that the rook should be
here...”

Gee, thanks. Very helpful.

You see, often strong players can play well, but they can’t help you to do
the same. That’s why only very few coaches can really teach you
something.

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Nevertheless, everything is not that bad for you. In my courses I show you
the Grandmaster’s thinking process in details. So you can easily train it and
copy it.

However, there is one obstacle here also. Our brain tries to use the
existing automated programs mainly.

This allows a brain to work quickly and with little stress. Thus if there is a
choice between your existing automated skill and something else – your
brain will use your automated skill.

That’s why it’s very difficult to retrain yourself and to replace your old
thinking habits with new ones. It’s natural for a human’s mind to cling
onto old habits. There is one interesting dictum about it: “People always
decline changes, including changes for the better.”

Very often chess players continue making the same mistakes again and
again. And they can’t change the situation even if they know about it. It’s
the biggest problem of every chess pupil.

How can you overcome this situation? There are 3 main ideas here:

1. In order to progress in chess you should always be ready to replace your
old thinking habits with new ones.

2. This process may be uncomfortable and confusing. Inwardly you will
dislike it. Don't worry. That is perfectly NORMAL.

3. In order to develop new thinking habits you should use your
WILLPOWER. Practice the new mental program for 3 weeks.

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From the beginning this may be confusing. However, little later you will
start realizing the new program easily and you will even like
it...especially when you start winning MORE games!

And here is the final question: What should be the result of your training?

Bottom line: you want to create your thinking system, which will allow
you to find the best move in any situation.

Such a thinking system will contain a set of simple thinking algorithms. For
example: After an opponent’s move I should ask myself “What is an
opponent’s idea?” This helps you to prevent blunders and this is an
example of a portion of your thinking system.

You need to piece together these thinking algorithms, which in the end
will form your whole thinking system. Also you need to train and automate
each algorithm, and your thinking system in whole. After that you will
constantly play well and make SIGNIFICANT chess progress.

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Now let’s make up some conclusions.

1. The main goal of your training is to create your perfect thinking
system.

2. You can create such a system by 2 main methods:

A. Copy the thinking algorithms of strong players. This is the main way.

B. And secondly, test your thinking system in practice and replace
ineffective thinking habits by new ones.

3. Use the following ideas to develop new skills:

1) Be ready to replace your old and ineffective thinking habits.

2) This process may be uncomfortable and confusing. YES, you will not
like it (and that is normal) and it will take a lot of effort.

3) WILLPOWER is the key. You need to have the willpower to practice
the new mental program for 3 weeks. Again, it will be confusing. BUT
once you have automated the MUCH more efficient thinking system,
you will play better chess and get BETTER RESULTS!

That’s it! It shows what chess training actually is. It’s very useful to deeply
understand these fundamentals. It helps us to detect the most effective
training techniques. Check out the next lessons...