The Player's Laboratory
A.S. Suetin wrote a book titled "Three Steps to Chess Mastery", Pergamon Press, 1982. Here are some excerpts (in some cases, not verbatim) from the section titled "The Player's Laboratory". This book contains some of the best self-training advice you'll find outside a Dvoretsky / Yusupov book. Working on One's Own Games For a player wishing to improve, the cold analysis of mistakes is not enough. The problem is simultaneously to establish the psychological cause of these mistakes. Not sparing your pride, you should frankly re-establish the course of your thinking, endeavoring to give answers to approximately the following questions: What specific variations did you calculate, when considering your moves, especially at the turning points of the game? It is very important to note what you missed in your calculations, and what your opponent showed you in your joint analysis after the game. What considerations were you guided by in choosing your pla...