Years
ago, Dr Diyanath Samarasinghe, one of the most alert thinkers on the
way the world works (or doesn’t), advised me to look for patterns.
Diyanath, as he prefers to be addressed by one and all, even those
ignorant about any of the areas that he has acquired expertise in, went
on to explain by way of examples.
‘Things are not as random as they appear to be,’ I remember him cautioning me. I think the example he used was of a ‘random’ person shot during a demonstration. That person, he told me, was a leader. Perhaps not THE leader, but maybe a mover-and-shaker kind of person. A thinker. An analyst, perhaps. Eliminating such people makes political sense for those issuing orders. Got the point.
He went on to talk about match-fixing. He gave examples.
Diyanath also mentioned, in passing, that he was once the National Chess Champion of Bermuda. Apparently, he had won the National Novices title back in the early 1970s in Sri Lanka. The Bermudian effort had earned him a box of chocolates.
My interest in chess began around the same period. Back then, I hadn’t heard of the term ‘pattern-recognition.’ I don’t think ‘SWOT’ had entered the general lexicon of planning at the time. But that’s what we did back then, as had the greatest chess players, dating back over 2,000 years (yes, the game, in a slightly different form, was played that long ago, and, according to some accounts even Prince Siddhartha knew of it if not playing it).
Today, coaches teach patterns. They are relentless and sometimes overdo it; neglecting fundamental principles of the game in the drive to produce champions. Young kids (and their parents of course) go along, mostly out of ignorance. But patterns they learn, chess players do. They learn ‘chess patterns’ but over time recognising patterns becomes intuitive.
Since ‘pattern’ becomes an integral part of ways of thinking, chess players, perhaps more than non-chess players, can spot threats and opportunities faster. In business, finance, personal relationships, organisations of any kind, political configurations, social interactions or anything else in fact. They ‘spot’ systems, they recognise flows and directions, and they plan accordingly.
Pattern-recognition in chess includes tactical motifs, structures, combinations, positional finesse, and end-game visualisation. What in life does not include things that make such things invaluable? What in life has no use for ‘preventative sensing’ or recognising what a particular protagonist wants to do before he or she does it? What in life has no use for such recognition that is simultaneously responded with ‘moves’ that are both preventive in character and also advances one’s position? That’s chess. That’s life.
In life, though we didn’t know or use the word back in Diyanath’s glory days, on the chess board and outside it, there were moments that could be called ‘toxic.’ There is toxicity now too. There always was. Back then, like now, bad structures could cost. Bad structures could be recognised and remedial action taken. Threats were recognised and responded to. Errors were translated into bad positions, but ‘best moves’ or ‘better moves’ could be thought out to mitigate chess-board ‘toxicity.’
It’s the same with life. We deal with situations the best we can. However, if we can recognise a toxic outcome in any process, we can think of strategies to avoid being poisoned in the process.
It takes me to the teachings of the Buddha, in particular sati or mindfulness. It helps cultivate wisdom and insight with regard to one’s own mind and the world.
One can meditate on the five aggregates or the Pañcakkhandha: Rūpa (form/matter), vedanā (feeling/sensation), saññā (perception/recognition), saṅkhāra (mental formations / volitional activities), and viññāṇa (consciousness/awareness). A different level to the concerns of a novice or a national chess champion, but then again chess hones such attributes. Good for chess. Good for life. Good for the journey through Saṃsāra.
Patterns and pattern recognition have a lot to do with all this. The Anguttara Nikaya or the Numerical Discourses of the Buddha contains innumerable examples of certain patterns recognised and consequently and systematically elaborated upon by the Enlightened One.
It’s about the cultivation of the mind, is it not? It’s about acquiring analytical tools, devices that can detect, dissect, design ‘moves.’ In chess. In life.
Diyanath wası’t talking about all these things, but today, in a position that has forced me to think ‘chess’ much more than I did, I’ve begun to appreciate and extrapolate. Today, it’s ‘pattern recognition.’ Chess is much more than that. Life too. For now, Diyanath’s advice from more than a decade ago prompted reflection. Recognition of patterns is what took me to chess this morning or rather ‘pattern’ in chess took me back to that interesting conversation with that remarkable man.
Now, looking back, thinking of roads taken, avoided and missed, I realise once again the importance of chess in my formative years. It’s not just a game. It’s a guru of deep wisdom disguised as a set of pieces upon sixty four squares.
‘Things are not as random as they appear to be,’ I remember him cautioning me. I think the example he used was of a ‘random’ person shot during a demonstration. That person, he told me, was a leader. Perhaps not THE leader, but maybe a mover-and-shaker kind of person. A thinker. An analyst, perhaps. Eliminating such people makes political sense for those issuing orders. Got the point.
He went on to talk about match-fixing. He gave examples.
Diyanath also mentioned, in passing, that he was once the National Chess Champion of Bermuda. Apparently, he had won the National Novices title back in the early 1970s in Sri Lanka. The Bermudian effort had earned him a box of chocolates.
My interest in chess began around the same period. Back then, I hadn’t heard of the term ‘pattern-recognition.’ I don’t think ‘SWOT’ had entered the general lexicon of planning at the time. But that’s what we did back then, as had the greatest chess players, dating back over 2,000 years (yes, the game, in a slightly different form, was played that long ago, and, according to some accounts even Prince Siddhartha knew of it if not playing it).
Today, coaches teach patterns. They are relentless and sometimes overdo it; neglecting fundamental principles of the game in the drive to produce champions. Young kids (and their parents of course) go along, mostly out of ignorance. But patterns they learn, chess players do. They learn ‘chess patterns’ but over time recognising patterns becomes intuitive.
Since ‘pattern’ becomes an integral part of ways of thinking, chess players, perhaps more than non-chess players, can spot threats and opportunities faster. In business, finance, personal relationships, organisations of any kind, political configurations, social interactions or anything else in fact. They ‘spot’ systems, they recognise flows and directions, and they plan accordingly.
Pattern-recognition in chess includes tactical motifs, structures, combinations, positional finesse, and end-game visualisation. What in life does not include things that make such things invaluable? What in life has no use for ‘preventative sensing’ or recognising what a particular protagonist wants to do before he or she does it? What in life has no use for such recognition that is simultaneously responded with ‘moves’ that are both preventive in character and also advances one’s position? That’s chess. That’s life.
In life, though we didn’t know or use the word back in Diyanath’s glory days, on the chess board and outside it, there were moments that could be called ‘toxic.’ There is toxicity now too. There always was. Back then, like now, bad structures could cost. Bad structures could be recognised and remedial action taken. Threats were recognised and responded to. Errors were translated into bad positions, but ‘best moves’ or ‘better moves’ could be thought out to mitigate chess-board ‘toxicity.’
It’s the same with life. We deal with situations the best we can. However, if we can recognise a toxic outcome in any process, we can think of strategies to avoid being poisoned in the process.
It takes me to the teachings of the Buddha, in particular sati or mindfulness. It helps cultivate wisdom and insight with regard to one’s own mind and the world.
One can meditate on the five aggregates or the Pañcakkhandha: Rūpa (form/matter), vedanā (feeling/sensation), saññā (perception/recognition), saṅkhāra (mental formations / volitional activities), and viññāṇa (consciousness/awareness). A different level to the concerns of a novice or a national chess champion, but then again chess hones such attributes. Good for chess. Good for life. Good for the journey through Saṃsāra.
Patterns and pattern recognition have a lot to do with all this. The Anguttara Nikaya or the Numerical Discourses of the Buddha contains innumerable examples of certain patterns recognised and consequently and systematically elaborated upon by the Enlightened One.
It’s about the cultivation of the mind, is it not? It’s about acquiring analytical tools, devices that can detect, dissect, design ‘moves.’ In chess. In life.
Diyanath wası’t talking about all these things, but today, in a position that has forced me to think ‘chess’ much more than I did, I’ve begun to appreciate and extrapolate. Today, it’s ‘pattern recognition.’ Chess is much more than that. Life too. For now, Diyanath’s advice from more than a decade ago prompted reflection. Recognition of patterns is what took me to chess this morning or rather ‘pattern’ in chess took me back to that interesting conversation with that remarkable man.
Now, looking back, thinking of roads taken, avoided and missed, I realise once again the importance of chess in my formative years. It’s not just a game. It’s a guru of deep wisdom disguised as a set of pieces upon sixty four squares.
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