Aim for the stars, I hope you’ll shine brightly 
I also got into go last year when I read about AlphaGo. I’d learned the rules of go as a kid, maybe around age 9 or 10, but never really played (pre-internet, I didn’t have anyone to play with). It was always on my back burner to pick up if I had the chance. A friend had recommended Hikaru No Go to me in college, but I’d never watched it. Finally last year, after AlphaGo vs Lee Sedol, I watched all the way through Hikaru, did some tsumego in fits and starts, watched it again with a friend, and then started actually playing. I’m 34 now.
I don’t generally have the patience for videos, but reading the beginner pages on Sensei’s Library and working tsumego has been good for me. A different friend of mine was interested in learning, and so we’ve been playing each other on 9x9 about once a week. We’re both obviously beginners, so we split wins pretty evenly, but we see the board very differently from each other, so it’s been a good way to learn. I play a lot of go on my tablet and phone, too, using an Android app on its lowest setting. It took me a couple months to get up the courage to play online, and I’ve lost a lot here, but I’ve learned a ton through losing. So play, play, play. 9x9 is good, 13x13 is a challenge, and 19x19 is a place to stretch your brain. Play whatever’s comfortable. Do tsumego, Just play! 
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I don’t know if it is a reasonable goal being that my mom doesn’t even know I play.
Just found this post, I too am a beginner, and am facing the same problems you are having, however, getting to 16kyu in just 2 weeks is really impressive, OGS estimates that 16kyu should come from 3 months of playing go.
- About 3 weeks
- I did fairly fine at the beginning, but then started to really improve after watching Nick Sibicky and Xhu98(though Xhu’s games were hard to understand ).
- I stumbled across one of Nicks videos while browsing Youtube, and thought “this looks complicated, so it must be fun:smiley:” "
- I don’t really know how well a beginner should do at the start, because I am a beginner myself.
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How long have you been playing Go?
Off and on, (but mostly off) for 24 years.
How old were you when you started?
Early thirties.
Why did you pick up Go, how you got in touch with it for the first time, what was your motivation at the beginning?
I’m a software engineer. A new guy, Gordon (a 1d) started at my company, and he mostly seemed to be interested in evangelizing Go (he traveled everywhere with a large magnetic board). A whole group of us at work became mesmerized. Soon there were go boards all over our group. Developers always seemed to be in the middle of a game while working. I think management became slightly alarmed. Lunchtime was nothing but Go.
I’m grateful to Gordon for the mind expanding experience. Sometimes a few years would go by without my playing a game, but the go proverbs were always floating around in my head. I own two very beautiful boards, and I find playing through games to be both an aesthetic experience, and sort of my equivalent of contemplating a Zen garden. I now head for the board and a commented game when I am experiencing stress to lose myself in it.
What should you expect of yourself?
I mostly want to appreciate the beauty of the game. Part of that has to be through playing, but now I am starting to play through classic games as a form of literature, learning to appreciate the moves.
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[quote=“aka_re, post:1, topic:11526”]
How long have you been playing Go?[/quote]
Since May 13th this year (just under 1 month at time of writing)
How were you doing at the beginning?
My first 9x9 I had no idea what I was doing and first 19x19 my head hurt so bad after.
How old were you when you started? (Btw, I’m 18, almost 19)
25
Why did you pick up Go, how you got in touch with it for the first time, what was your motivation at the beginning?
AlphaGo
How do you think a person should do at the beginning? What would you expect from a beginner in the first few weeks since they started?
Total confusion and lots of losses.
How you progressed since the start?
Watched a lot of YouTube videos, did some puzzles, played as many games as I could without it becoming overwhelming. I started at 25kyu with no idea what to do. Currently, I’m 22kyu, though I think I play at an 18kyu-ish level.
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ive been playing for 10 years now, albeit including a long pause of 6-7 years (give or take
) due to lack of motivation when i had noone to play with. my most active time has been the last year here on ogs by far. -
the beginning was all about books for me. i really enjoyed reading and studying about go and most of my time went into that rather than playing. id say it helped me progress, but i had to catch up in terms of experience later (still have to).
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i was ~19.
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i randomly read hikaru no go… total accident, as i had never heard of the game or the manga before
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from beginners who want to improve i expect that they “pretty much” know the ruleset they use, that they stick to basic etiquette and that they arent afraid to ask questions.
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i am 5k here atm and am fairly pleased with how things have gone so far, but i definitely want to be a dan player.
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I started playing GO back in the early 70’s. I had played chess for many, many years before that, and discovered GO by accident. It was far less claustrophobic than chess and the battles more open and fluid. I was hooked. I played a lot until about 1985 or so (life got in the way of that and so many other things). Now that I am retired and have decided to live my life as a parasite on society, I have re-entered the world of GO. There was no real internet when I stopped, and now we have sites like this. Times sure have changed. I have more rust on me than the Titanic, but I’m having a good time and meeting great folks, so it’s all good.
Mogadeet
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I learned the game about 30 years ago, playing regularly since about 10 years. Lot’s of breaks, lots of phases where I just played and didn’t do any problems/reviews or whatever. Some phases in which I took it more seriously. Not sure about my rank, on different servers both having changed the rating system during those years I saw ranks between 11k and 17k. So the current 14k that I have on OGS might not be that far off.
I do think that there is a bias in threads like this. People not that talented or not that willing to study hard rarely post (if they are even playing still) . Everyone has a limit somewhere (maybe not a hard limit, but one after which further improvements are so hard/slow, that subjectively it seems impossible). In my opinion that limit is weaker than 5k for many people. I might be one of them. I think it’s worth saying that out loud, because it can be frustrating if you are told you should be able to reach 5k in two years or whatever and find out you in fact can’t. I’ll be happy if I improve slowly. And if 10k proves to be my limit, so be it. And I’m not accusing the people who told us in what time they reached 5k, love to read about it. But there are slower folks like me too, and I bet I’m not alone.
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GaJ,
My story is surprisingly similar to yours. I am 51 and have a 13 year old son who is now playing - we started in April/May. There is simply no substitute for having an opponent so readily available. I’m a veteran of strategy games (my chess rating is around 1700 or so) and Go is sticking with my son where I wasn’t able to hook him with chess as he just couldn’t enjoy games against me. We played our first live tourney in August and have another this month. I’m hovering around 16k and my son around 22k.
I’ve watched a lot of Dwyrin, Nick Sibicky, Andrew Jackson, Clossius (Shawn Ray), Jonathan Hop, and other content creators on YouTube. There is good information that I’ve taken from all of them.
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A year ago yesterday, I played my first ever game of Go against who is now a close friend that I hope to meet one day (he lives in Canada). I’ve grown in my skill and love for the game a lot since that day, thanks in no small part to my friends’ tutorage, and had the blessing of getting to share that love with others in my life. There is so much hidden mystery in this game that takes only a few minutes to learn but has not yet been mastered in hundreds of generations being the oldest game that is still being played today! <3
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My first game. I was black and lost by 20 points
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I was 26 when I started
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Found Go through YouTube videos about AlphaGo
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My personal experience was 2 games of 9x9 and then straight into 19x19. It gave me headaches at first but it was right for me. If I had played and studied seriously I probably could have made shodan in my first year. As it was some things came up IRL and currently after a year and one day of playing, I play at a 6 kyu level at my local club and an 8 kyu level in national tournaments.
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umm, see answer to 5 lol.
EDIT: I just realised I already posted on this 11 months ago but I thought it was worth revisiting for my first anniversary 
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Congratulations on 6k! Does this mean your rank in your account in OGS is outdated? Or is your local rank that inflated?
PS. Seems you were just throwing correspondence games left and right here so your OGS rank prolly means nothing.
Yeah I was part of a few correspondence tournaments as well as ladder games that I had to resign for mental health / stress issues IRL.
Though my local rank is also a little inflated I’d say the national rank is the most accurate.
well I’ve got about 15+ years in now and I’m still a single digit kyu… I saw my first game played at a coffee shop when I was 14 and decided to teach myself. Bought some books, started playing on KGS, and by the time I was 18 I was about a 9kyu. Now I’m around a 4-5kyu. I’d have to say, the fundamentals are some of the most important things. I remember learning them in the beginning, and then re-learning them again and again but with different perspectives each time based on the knowledge accrued. The more knowledge you gain about the game, the more the basics become important cornerstones to build off of and learn more advanced things. I would recommend finding someone willing to play and review with you. It is very helpful to have a little guidance and just try to learn one thing each time. To start, maybe the correct response to a 3-3 invasion, or maybe how to defend a cut or what a ladder breaker is. anyway, if you ever want to play a game just let me know. Im no Dan, but I don’t mind teaching.
best of luck.
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I really wonder what are experiences from other people when you just started out? Did you feel overwhelmed, frustrated maybe?
As Im slowly learning bit more about the game, I feel like I know less and less … and my playing seems to be getting even worse than it was. Would really love to hear other peoples experiences…
And one question, at which kyu does the game start feeling to make sense?
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Excellent, thanks
Haven’t seen this thread since my before I went to ME 3 years ago. I didn’t come on the forums again until recently.
I started when i was 9, (I’m 11 now) but since then I’ve always been 8~12 kyu on OGS
even though my Go school graded me as 6 kyu. 
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Well since Im having a break, I guess I could answer these:
How long have you been playing Go?
- Tomorrow its gonna be 11 days!
How were you doing at the beginning?
- I won 2-3 games, but usually I get lost in my own plans… I get an idea, I focus on it
and in mean time whole damn board falls apart!
How old were you when you started? (Btw, I’m 18, almost 19)
- 11 days ago would be… 34
Why did you pick up Go, how you got in touch with it for the first time, what was your motivation at the beginning?
- A friend suggest me go like 10 years ago and never looked it up. During these quarantine days, I decided to play a bit chess…after some 20 years or so. Than I remembered “maybe I should try that go thing. So here I am”
How you progressed since the start?
- Well I learned rules, shapes, some basic attacks, some basic life and death forms and so on. Got some literature and videos, so I recon I can get a bit better.
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