The pros and cons of being a professional chess player.

 The pros and cons of being a professional chess player.

I first filmed this as a video for my YouTube channel. To he honest I never really wanted to do YouTube, because I didn't like the idea of sharing my life with others. But financial issues forced this change of direction.

That is the reality of being a chess professional now, the money is very bad. So in this post I wanted to talk a bit about the pros and cons of being a professional chess player.

The pros:

1. You get to set your own time. You have total freedom, more or less. You can pick and choose whether or not to play tournaments. You can sit at home and create books or courses. You can coach people online.

2. You get to travel to places both in your own country (In my case England) and abroad, that you might not have got to see if you were stuck behind a desk for 40 weeks of the year, as you would be in a typical job.

3. If you play at a high enough level, you get to compete against some of the best players in the world.

4. You get to compete (exciting in itself) and potentially win tournaments, prize money and so on, all boosting your self-worth and ego.

5. Chess is a creative activity. It's enjoyable, in many respects. Chess is a real mental challenge where you are actively problem-solving. That is fun in itself.

6. You can forge friendships that last for a long time. And chess is a social activity in many respects. After the games it is typical to adjourn to the pub for some drinks and food. 

The cons:

1. You get to set your own time. That can be great, but can also mean that you have too much time on your hands and no idea how to truly fill it.

2. Because there isn't anyone watching over you like in a normal job, it can be tough to achieve the kind of mental discipline required to make serious improvement.

3. Chess can be a lonely activity. You don't see people during the week, and often you only interact with people during tournaments. What I've found particularly when playing abroad, is that players are shut off and you don't interact with them. Plus, the typical player in open tournaments now is upwards of 30 years younger than me. I think that's why so many of my colleagues are enjoying senior tournaments, because it is easier to interact with those in your same age group.

4. There is no financial security. That it because the money is bad. There are some who have made decent money from streaming and being a commentator. Some who have made good money from coaching. But there are many like myself, who continue to struggle. 

5. Sticking to the same subject, the money is getting worse all the time. 30 years ago, a typical open in tournament might have had a 1,000 euros first prize. Now it might be double that, but tournaments are probably stronger than they were in depth, and everything else like travel, hotels etc, is much more expensive than it was.

6. Chess can be extremely painful when you lose.

7. Chess is the only activity I can think of where your colleagues not only do not support you, they are trying to destroy you. You are a threat to them. If you are in teaching, a doctor, a lawyer or so on, your colleagues are in most cases your friends and you have a support network. No such network exists in chess. You are entirely on your own.

8. Chess websites like Chessable are becoming saturated. This also relates to book publishing as well. It becomes difficult to sell courses, or books because everything is trying the same thing. Of course this relates to the whole money issue.

9. Players can't afford to play tournaments because it is cheaper to sit at home and give online lessons or write courses and books. A nice income, but it takes away why you got into chess in the first place.

10. Chess is stressful. Preparation in particular is stressful, grinding and boring. Also in tournaments now it is typical to not start the game until about 16.30 P.M. That means I'm sitting around all day worrying about the game. I normally look forward to tournaments, but once they start I can't wait for them to end. 

There are probably more pros and cons that I haven't thought of, but as you can tell from this list there seems to be more cons than pros, which possibly reflects my negative outlook in general.

                                          It is becoming increasingly difficult to make money from chess.