(;GM[1]FF[4]AP[Drago:4.20]SZ[19]CA[UTF-8]AB[pa][pb][pc][pd][pe][pf][qf][rf][sf]AW[qa][qb][qc][qd][re]C[Black to kill.])
I remember last year sometime in October, when we were training for Thai U-Go under Xie Tang, after my game with him he told me something I will never forget.
(In Chinese) "Hey Zhang Xiang, you haven't really been playing recently, right? You seem easier to deal with than before!"
At that time, it was kind of a shock, and I didn't really know how to react, so I just said...
"Well yeah, maybe now I think much more than last time..."
Now that I think about it...
He was actually true.
It's true that I didn't play a lot of games.
And it's still that way until now.
I like to review professionals' kifus, so I tend to do that a lot.
I will also play casually with low dan players using my casual accounts.
But the number of serious training games I play, really seemed to decline over the years.
My ID, Sadaharu, on KGS, played less than one game per month last year.
Then I thought to myself, why is that so?
And then I realised, it's because I'm scared.
I'm scared of playing serious games.
I'm scared of not playing well.
I'm scared of losing.
After playing Go for so many years, I still get nervous every time I sit in front of a Go Board.
That's especially the case in front of strong players.
Maybe that's why, subconsciously, I avoided playing serious games even when I was free.
And that's how my level started going down.
I realised that playing a game yourself is really important.
Of course reviewing kifus is also important, as it allows you to understand how pros think and what they play.
However, what is more important is the way YOU think, and not the way others think.
Only by playing yourself, would you be able to find out the way YOU think.
And only through that way, you can improve.
That's my recent thought.
Tomorrow is the first National Team Tournament.
Against so many strong players, how will I, who "haven't really been playing", fare?
I shall see.
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