We've all heard of Tilt, in fact, we've all experienced at least once. If you say you haven't tilted while playing a game, either you are lying, or you've been playing the game for ten minutes.
In my case, I had a losing streak so hard that the tilt lasted for a couple of days, the game I was playing - and pretty much the only game I've played since 2020 - is Chess.
I used to be PlayStation kind of guy, mostly RPG and fantasy-science fiction adventure kind of gamer since I was like 6 years old. Then a few years ago I moved on to PC gaming, using Steam to play old school games and relive some nostalgia, but nothing new.
Then I realized I was wasting my time and decided to stop playing any kind of game, until around 10 months ago I remembered that Chess existed. One thing led to another and right now I have 4 things going on for me: Coding, Chess, Exercise and Girlfriend, not necessarily in that order, and all of them are pretty serious.
A couple of days ago I had a few beers and before going to sleep and while my girlfriend was watching some Netflix series, I played around 5 games, I lost them all and my ELO rate dropped to the low 1000's - it was at around 1060ish. I didn't care much about it and fell asleep thinking I would recover from that drunky streak pretty easily - I've spent around two months in the 1000-1050 area without dropping but also without climbing.
The next day I didn't even think about it, after all Sundays are my mind clearing day and I don't do anything that requires thinking, take it as a Shabbat for lazy Mexicans kind of day.
Monday came and before going to bed I open the Chess.com app and remember my fiasco from two days before. I then get determined to win back those points I lost by playing carelessly, I mean after all those points were difficult to earn and I want to be ready - ELO wise - for my 3speak weekly video about Chess, and I need to have a 1060+ ELO for that.
I lost the first game, then the second, then the third, and I even blamed my girlfriend for distracting me - never, ever do that again, not to self - and then I went into Tilt mode.
By trying to recover the 50 points I lost, and by attempting to win fast so that I could win more games in less time so that I could at least go to sleep with the same rate that I started playing with that same day, I ended up losing 80 points more.
I lost 20 out of 24 games. My ELO rate was 1060 and by Monday night, it was 923.
A rate I haven't had in at least 4 months, and it was all because I was a hot head that doesn't know when to stop, succumbs to tilt and has no self control, at all.
I even went the distance and moved my gaming to the laptop, because apparently it was my phone's fault that I was losing to 900 rated players. Naturally, I kept losing and I got so angry, something I consider weak, that I fell in desperation and once I lost against a 901 rated player by blundering a full rook out of nowhere, I threw my mouse to the wall. I broke the mouse and damaged the wall, the dogs got scared and my girlfriend well, it wasn't nice.
But I mean, I went from a 1059 rate to 923, you know? It's only natural to react like that, right?
Hm.
Today, Tuesday, was a different day.
I woke up early, went to the gym, prepared coffee, did the dishes and cleaned a little bit, got my Hive post up and did some coding, trying to have a normal day.
Then, by the time I felt like I was ready to hit the chess board, I sat down on my desk and began playing.
Not trying to win or trying to be fast, and not thinking about the massive amount of points I had to win in order to be exactly where I was three days ago. No. I started playing just to have fun and to get my Mojo back.
I've won 15 games out of 23.
I'm nowhere near 1059 ELO points, but I am steadily getting closer.
Right now, I am at 1007, not bad, it's like the last month didn't happen, lol.
I'm not playing any more games today, I will go to sleep like a champion, and tomorrow it will be another day, another story, but same strategy.
Yeah, that was a huge introduction - oh yeah, that was just the intro to my post, I wasn't planning on writing so much but just as 
Hm.
I don't think so, I actually feel like writing about the Gamer psychology, I actually did some reading about the topic a few days ago and I find it incredibly interesting.
I used to be a poker player, not a professional player but I made some money by playing online and attending table events with big prize pools, but I didn't feel like continuing down that path - even though there's a lot of money involved, perhaps later on in life, but not right now. But still, Tilt was perhaps the public enemy #1 of all players.
And this not only happens in Poker, or Chess. It actually happens in every single game and to every single player that has enough self respect to care about winning.
Tilt is made of frustration, anger, exhaustion, inebriation, or even a combination of any of those and many more feelings. Tilting makes you make decisions that you would otherwise never make in your right mind, and tilt will definitely blur your brain and make you end up in situations that you would never enter in if your five senses were working perfectly. In fact, Tilt sometimes will push you into self-destruct mode and you will actively make choices that will end up hurting you, and you make those decisions consciously.
Once you realize you are Tilt-Playing, you should stop, take a break or maybe even call it a day, otherwise you will end up like me, losing 90% of your progress of the last 3 months in just one night.
Anyway, if you play Chess and have a 1000-1200 ELO rate in Chess.com leave a comment, wouldn't be so bad to play against same-level Hivers.
