23 March,2015 08:29 AM IST | | PTI
He has seen more highs than lows in an illustrious career and Indian chess wizard Viswanathan Anand says one factor that has contributed immensely to this has been his habit of forgetting the achievements to keep the motivation intact
Viswanathan Anand
He has seen more highs than lows in an illustrious career and Indian chess wizard Viswanathan Anand says one factor that has contributed immensely to this has been his habit of "forgetting" the achievements to keep the motivation intact.
Viswanathan Anand
The five-time world champion says he likes to set new goals frequently. "The first rule for excellence is there is no room for complacence. You have always be humble and assume that there is something to learn. You have to keep setting yourself with new goals. I became World Champion for the first time in 2000, and it was in my third attempt," Anand said.
"The failures managed to motivate me to keep trying and I got better each time. The second time I did better than the first and the third time, I had enough of being second. When you sniff the world title, I knew in my blood that it is not over till you finish the job.
Finishing the job
"I knew that I had to wait and there could be no euphoria, no relaxation, till I finish the job, so this time I managed to see everything through the end and I became a world champion," he stated at the IMC Ramakrishna Bajaj National Quality Awards.
Recollecting the phase when he became India's first Grandmaster, Anand said: "When I was young, there were steady goals at every stage. First was to become an International Master, then become a Grandmaster, and then try for the World C'ship," he said.
