For people who are genuinely passionate about chess and are willing to work hard with utmost dedication, a career in chess offers a lifetime of professional satisfaction, fame and recognition indeed. Imagine you are getting paid for playing the game you love so much! Doesn’t it sound truly exciting? More and more people are chucking conventional and cushy job options to pursue a career in chess, some for the love of the game and others for the limelight chess players enjoy. For it’s a known fact that chess players today enjoy a worldwide celebrity status and are faces of many sports companies and other brands. They run their own celebrity chess academies taking in the best budding talents and groom them for their future tournaments. Victory in one prestigious international tournament ensures their speedy rise to fame and if they continue to excel, it will ensure a lifetime of celebrity stardom and popularity.

Of course, all these come at a price. One has to work really hard, sometimes for days and years and do all it takes to be the best in the game and beat his/her opponents. Only then he/she will have a chance to get noticed. Nowadays people are treating chess as a serious career option. They join different chess clubs and other professional chess academies where they get professional training from ex chess stalwarts. They get to participate in various local, regional, national and ultimately international tournaments. People can interact with their peers, other professional players for getting useful tips. Once you can win an international title of importance, you will gain worldwide reputation. Many chess players have endorsed products of several sports brands and others. They receive grants and sponsorships when they decide to run their own chess institutes. You can also become a popular face with the entertainment media and make public appearances, giving interviews and encouraging people to take up chess as a career.

The key to success in this game is perseverance and performance to outperform others. And the rest is all in your favor.

Emerging from Europein the second half of the 15^th century from a much older game of Indian origin, the real thrill in chess is just not to checkmate the opponent’s king, but to give your opponent player a brainstorming session, of trying to save his king. The game is played on a chessboard, which is a square checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. In the beginning each player (one controlling the white pieces, one, the black pieces.) controls six pieces, one king, one queen, two rooks, two knights, two bishops and eight pawns. The aim of this game is to checkmate the opponent’s king whereby the opponent’s king is completely cornered and there is no way it can be defended.

Chess, usually assumed to be a geek’s sport in schools is now played by every bright boy and girl in class. Worldwide it has been warmly embraced by millions being played through the net, in clubs and in Tournaments. What makes chess or the ‘king’s game’ look real jazzy and cool and not a nerd thing anymore is the captivating element of a challenge. A brain game in which dashing your competitor, off the board with a bow, all thanks to your sheer wit and presence of mind renders you to be a dude with a difference.

Apart from enhancing your patience, memory and abstract reasoning it also boosts your self-confidence and self-esteem. It makes you think sharper and brighter and thus a smarter person. This in turn makes you more popular and attractive amongst your friends and family. Not only does it give you a recreational hobby it also has educational benefits. Chess on a whole… being practiced for thousands and thousands of years has grown to   charm millions with it’s mind sharpening quality and also is considered now as a uber cool game and it’s players fit to enslave any mind that comes it’s way.

Have you always had this notion that chess is a game for the brainiacs? Do you find it almost impossible to remember chess rules? are your moves in chess a butt of everybody’s jokes in social gatherings where some of you gather to play a good game?

You are not alone. For many years, people have considered chess to be the monopoly of the more elite sections of the society, of people with greater access to education, money and possessing greater rational abilities. Even in the Middle Ages of Europe, the game was mostly popularized and played by the ruling classes. Though it is true that playing chess requires some amount of logical abilities and aptitude for rational thinking, nevertheless this is a misconception that the common people cannot play chess. After all, as far as popular historical legends suggest, the game was devised so that the common people would give up their penchant for gambling and play a game that requires them to think logically. So you need not worry about not being able to play chess for the want of thinking abilities.

You can use the internet as a tool to improve your game. There are numerous websites, explaining chess openings and other expert moves, some of which have been used by famous grandmasters in international tournaments. There are online tutorials to go through, softwares to download and players from other parts of the world to play and interact with. You can also read books authored by these celebrity players and practice the tips and moves mentioned in your games.

There are chess clubs, training centers, academies run by professional players to train people who’re game for seriously participations in tournaments. Schools and colleges have chess clubs. Even many new tournaments are being held nationwide to promote the game and spark interest amongst people.

So shake off your fear of the game and start learning and playing. The game contains the key to a world of eternal enjoyment and excitement. All you need is to find the key and the joy is all yours!

If you get bored easily, if you keep on losing you patience over trifling matters, if you feel irritated, distracted or even tired sometimes, nothing can beat a good, exciting game of chess to beat the boredom and make for some really enjoyable way to spend the free time. It’s a wonder how much potential a small eight-by-eight black and white checkered grid and 64 small pieces can hold. People have been known to play chess while waiting for trains and flights and then miss them; this is how addictive the game is and just how much one can get engrossed if it a tough and exciting one. Ivan Nikolic and  Goran Arsovic have played in Belgradein 1989 for 20 hours and 15 minutes with 269 moves,. The longest decided game was between Yedael Stepak and Yaakov Mashian for a whopping 24 hours and 30 minutes, consisting of 193 moves with Yedael emerging as the winner. So you can understand the amount of patience and dedication one has while playing it.

To a novice outsider, it might look boring if players sit idle for hours, slowly moving pieces and taking a long time to decide their next moves and foresee the opponent’s moves. But once you have started playing, you will realize just how exciting and thrilling the game can be with two people silently making schemes and strategies about how to knock off the king. There are continuous calculations going on in the head, while they go one making plans as to how to counter a certain attack of the other person if he/she chooses to do so. The mind game creates an intense rush of gritty excitement, especially when you see your well-thought strategies paying off!

The game besides being an excellent hobby will automatically improve your patience, your concentration, problem solving attitude and decision-making abilities. You will feel more refreshed and charged after a good game and your confidence will get a major boost too.

So fight your bouts of impatience and distractions with an exciting and fun game of chess and see how your world changes for the better!

If you try to list the benefits of playing chess, you might tire out; they are so large in number. From developing the rational faculties, keen observation powers and ability to think logically and make smart decisions, to helping children grow up into all-round personalities; chess is one game that assures you of some good impact in your life once you start playing it. Chess aficionados jokingly claim that chess has only one ill-effect; once you start playing, you are so addicted to it that you sometimes tend to forget all about the outside world and have all your concentration focused on the board as if your life depends on it!

Chess’s beneficial effects can also be observed as far as people’s health is concerned. In an age of fast lives and hectic schedules, we often tend to lose patience quickly over trivial matters; we get distracted easily, lack concentration and focus and suffer from failing memories also caused by diseases like Alzheimer’s. Our rational senses gradually start degenerating with age and under work pressure. A game of chess is all it takes to take away your fatigue and replace it with a rush of thrill and pleasant anticipations. Your memory improves as it demands that you memorize how the pieces move; chess has been known to have helped people fight disabilities and strokes. It is an excellent form of recreational therapy as it helps in keeping the mind fresh and takes away your worries, anxieties and depression for a while letting you enjoy the game. It helps enhancing pattern recognition abilities and helps to fight emotional and physical problems. As the mind remains fresh, you start feeling great too; you feel like your mental clarity and cognitive sense have improved and you feel rejuvenated. This results in better productivity at work and more enjoyable personal lives. You develop greater patience and understanding of various situations, learn to accept challenges willingly and solve your problems more effectively.

It is a wonder how a simple board game can bring such changes in someone’s life. Whoever’s brainchild the game was must be thanked fro inventing such a great game that continues to attract people even today!