Reading

I seem to have made a jump in reading ability. Not sure how it happened, but suddenly, I am able to see things that I wasn't able to see before. While doing life and death problems, I now actually read more of the sequence before jumping in with the 'likely move'. This has increased my problem level in the Many Faces of Go considerably. Of course, it has slowed down the tempo in which I can do my daily problems, but I think that is a good thing in this case.

The scary thing is that I find myself playing sequences out in my head when there isn't even a go board near. I go to bed thinking about go, and I wake up to myself going over a bunch of joseki in my head, getting really annoyed with myself when I can't picture a certain move perfectly or am forgetting a certain continuation. I play sequences while driving my van. I consider the merits of good and bad shape while loading the dishwasher. Yes, I think I can consider myself officially obsessed now :-p

Of course, I still have tons of room for improvement, and of course I still do way too many moves where I realize one micro second later that this was a big mistake. But it still is nice to feel some progress happening.

By the way, thanks to Tristen's advice, I stopped holding go stones in my hand while playing. Yes, it does make a difference, it helps me to prevent some of those 'I wasn't thinking' moves. Not all of them, but obliterating even a few of them does help my game.