One of the reasons people get stuck at the same level for a long time is that their way of playing get calcified. You like the certain josekis, certain moves and keep playing them over and over again. And you should jiggle yourself out of the calcification. An advice that’s often given to stuck people is essentially try playing something you don’t usually play.
However playing something you don’t normally play can be very difficult. You think a move is good but you need to force yourself to play something else, what sense does that make. And how do you even know what kind of different do you need.
The proposed method: do whatever your opponent is doing. Simply put, mirror go. It makes sense to limit mirror go to only the opening, I think. For example, play mirror go for 40 moves after which you actively seek to break it. Of course, if opponent applies anti-mirror maneuver or plays slack move you could break it earlier. And if it looks good to continue you could do so later. Like this you get an even position to play with probably unusual for your style shapes and ideas. They can be relatively normal. Or not. Perfect for jiggling. There’re a few other advantages as well.
During mirroring you’re constantly forced to make a comparative analysis. Is this opponent’s move good enough to be repeated. It looks slack but is it actually. In normal games you’re just concerned with how to answer. But here you always have an option to repeat or to play something else. Which makes you consciously compare the two.
But even after mirroring what often happens is you have similar things happen at the opposite sides of the board. You invade their corner. They invade the same corner just symmetrical. And you can compare, which invasion went better and why.
Minor point - playing mirror makes you more aware of the ladders since you need to be careful with them.
Another small detail - positions you get to play are even. Sometimes when trying something unusual you end up playing worse positions (like black hole) for the sake of learning. Not here, all position are quite even, no matter whether you play white or black.
Consequently because you start playing for real from an even position but kinda later in the game, the games are closer and tighter. It’s good for learning because when the game isn’t close one side might not play best. And normally it’s hard to make, for example, endgame count because one side is losing 20 points. So close games are better.
You also might internalize good moves when repeating moves from a stronger player.
I tried playing a bit like this, and it looks like a fine strategy for learning. I wouldn’t necessarily play like this in normal games but for learning it’s fine. And I’m hovering around 1d, once even beat 3d with black. If I can do it, anyone can do it. Just play mirror go and be 1d, yay.
Something to be aware of.
