“the art of how awesome i am” by josh waitzkin
stage 9, tour resumes in the mountains, those boys are suffering more than i do playing chess. vinokourov is riding with stitches in both knees and an elbow. imagine peddling a bicycle up a mountain, and not just a regular mountain, but an alp, with fresh stiches in both knees. those dudes are harder than woodpecker lips.
so i finished “the art of learning” by josh waitzkin. it was mostly how great he is at whatever he wants to do. apparently, as a kid, he was walking in the park, saw chess for the first time, and gave the guy he played a hard time winning as he was learning the rules. he talked about his rise to chess stardom and then his rise to kung fu stardom.
perhaps i expected something different, which put me off. maybe i was expecting a “how to learn” kind of book, and he does give some guidance and tips, but the majority of the book is about him struggling and excelling at his pursuits. as i said in a previous post, i did learn that there are two types of learning, entity and incrementaly. i am an entity learner, therefore i defeat myself often . there were some interesting parts in the book, but mostly it’s a kind of biography of his struggles and successes with a few tips on how you can be a bit better.
at first i wanted to say “fuck you josh waitzkin, thanks for telling me how naturally gifted you are and how i’m not” because it seemed to be one big fluff piece on how awesome he is. but as i read along, i could see he was trying, maybe, to “teach” via the parables of his life stories. yeah, it’s easy for me to bag on the guy, but really, what do i know, i’m just some idiot with a crappy blog, he is travveling around with an agent giving seminars.
as a book, it is written quite well, easy to read, rather exciting in some parts (if you enjoy following a kung fu match, i do) and i am sure if you try you can take away something from it. it’s not a horrible book, not at all, i’m glad i read it and i might go back and re-read a part or two, but there was no great revelations, it’s not a guide to learning or a how-to self improvement book. it’s a “learn what you can by reading what i’ve done and get inspired” kind of book.
maybe the answers are right there in front of me and i’m too dumb to see them, that is entirely possible. i would reccommend the book if you have time. i’d get it from the library though first, and if you really really like it, go ahead an buy it. there might be something in the book that talks to you and puts you on the right track.
Wahrheit said,
July 17, 2007 at 12:07 pm
That’s a good, honest review that I enjoyed–I gave it a superduper book-of-the-year type review which I think you commented on, but yours is fair enough. I plucked the peals about how to use cheaters and difficulties and turn them into energy and power for yourself, but looking back it is a BIT too much much about how great he is…still he has the hardware to back it up…I think the book would have been better with more sex, like he talks about his Czech girlfriend, maybe he shoulda told about how he learned to have a four-hour orgasm from her or something–there’s nothing else about women after he’s 20, did he take a vow or something to channel all the sexual energy into Push Hands???
I still like the book a lot but your review is a nice counterbalance.
Pawn Shaman said,
July 17, 2007 at 3:27 pm
I think hes kind of a knob. A great chess player mind you, but kind of a knob. He narrates some illustrative games on chessmaster, which I enjoy and learn from, but I definately get the sense that he thinks hes something more than a great chess player.
Little known truth. Studying marshal arts that dont let you fight in the ring, dont give you cool scars and dont leave you useless after the age of forty will repel women like the plague. You become some dude playing kung fu movie instead of the bad ass fighter you wanted to be. I do like to hear stories about people getting laid though. I also got laid once.
chessloser said,
July 18, 2007 at 7:34 am
wahrheit - it’s really not a bad book, i just went into it with different expectations, so any problems i had with the book were mine, not his. there definately should have been at least one sex scene, and possibly an illegal kung fu match on an island in thailand where one of his teamates gets killed and he has to fight to avenge the death.
pawn shaman - thanks for telling it like it is. if josh had studied jeet kun do (jkd) and become a bad ass fighting master, then he would have something….are you saying your chess doens’t get the chicks all excited?
Pawn Shaman said,
July 18, 2007 at 8:44 pm
Its not the chess mr loser its when I roll up the sleeves and show off the guns. And when I say things like “hi, do you have a boyfriend?” “wanna make out?” Then again I dont really know what it is. But did you ever think of making chess peices into vibrators? Think about it, its genious.
chessloser said,
July 19, 2007 at 11:47 am
a chess piece vibrator? yes, that is pure freakin genius. if i make my own line of HARDCORE PAWNOGRAPHY vibrators, you get half the profit….
David K, Seattle said,
July 22, 2007 at 11:12 pm
i respectfully wish to submit, the stronger your own ego is, the bothered it will be by people like that. Mind you, some folks bother me, too.
but really, when you meet great or amazing people, you just say to yourself, ‘there is another one’… there are so many, the Google wunderkunds, the chess prodigies, the guys on Wall Street age 25 and they control empires, the women who are chased by every paperatzi photographer, the power slow CEO’s, but, really, you too are your own outstanding person, you are your own source, your own work of beauty and wonder.
seriously. it is all just you.
i was a prodigy in another field. i became such an arrogant bastard. and now, hopefully, im recovered. actually, two fields. the latter, i was even worse. now, im just a guy at a big hardware store
who has an ego for knowing where it all is located, but the king of a tiny pond, and balding at age 49.
warmest, david
David K, Seattle said,
July 22, 2007 at 11:14 pm
i respectfully wish to submit, the stronger your own ego is, the
..LESS …bothered…
it will be by people like that. Mind you, some folks bother me, too.
… the power
SLOT
CEO’s…
chessloser said,
July 23, 2007 at 8:35 am
ah david, i’m an ego maniac with a low self esteem, so there is the problem i have to deal with, the issue i must resolve….