Think, think, think, ...

For a while I have been trying to improve my play by making a short check list to work through before making a move. I won't write about the "thinking process" here, because much has been written about this before (see for instance the articles by Dan Heisman and the chessplanner of a fellow blogger).Unfortunately, I had to realize that making a plan (for every move decisions, not strategy) is easier than sticking to it. Usually I realize that I drifted off my plan after making some terrible blunder. How can I get myself to plan every move carefully?

I started an experiment playing chess against the computer because this gives me whatever time I need to go through each step on my check list assuming that speed will be less of an issue once the process is "hardwired" in the brain. Next to the window with the game I keep my check list in a text editor and go through it for every move I make.

I feel that this improves my play against the computer significantly. However, it also takes me a long time to make a move. Thus it remains to be seen if the perceived improvement is only due to spending more time for each move or due to more organized thinking.