[...] He will finally have the opportunity to qualify for his second IM norm, moving him one step closer to the three norms he needs to secure the title, but he will also have the opportunity to fail, to lose rating points, to slip further away from his goal, perhaps even unreachably far, so far that the goal is no longer attainable. And in that case, rather than forging ahead to become a grandmaster, he would just drop out of the chess world in his early twenties as so many failed hopefuls do, with his sad little FM title more like an embarrassment than an accolade. But that won’t happen, he thinks, not with the way he’s playing lately. And even if it does happen: so be it. There is more to life than great chess. Okay, great chess is still a part of life, and it can be a very big part, very intense, satisfying, and pleasant to dwell on in the mind’s eye: but nonetheless, life contains many things. Life itself, he thinks, every moment of life, is as precious and beautiful as any game of chess ever played, if only you know how to live.