If the kids get a good grasp of what the main lessons are for chess after two or three years of staying with the game, then you've given them brain food and you've given them a skill that can last them a lifetime.

You playing chess well is just a reflection of your inner thought process and your ability to maintain discipline throughout. If we can teach every child that, then we've taught them to be better people, better friends and better citizens.

Today, you talk to kids about books and they almost want to run away because they've got computers, iPads and all that, while we had to actually sit down and crack the books open and go line by line to try to learn all that stuff.

My brother played the game with his friends, so I thought I was a pretty smart kid and I played this friend of mine and he just crushed me and this was Brooklyn Tech High School in Brooklyn where I still live, in Brooklyn, New York and this guy beat me so bad it wasn't even funny. I couldn't understand why he beat me.

Just because you lose doesn't mean you're a loser, and champions don't quit.

Well, I'm still looking for Maurice Ashley. My essential qualities. I think that more than anything, I try to do the right thing, I think about doing the right thing.

Look at Garry Kasparov. After he loses, invariably he wins the next game. He just kills the next guy. That's something that we have to learn to be able to do