“The Queen’s Gambit”

The QUEEN’S GAMBIT is the story of Beth Harmon (Anya Taylor-Joy), an orphan with tenuous connections to life and emotion, who finds a single outlet: utter brilliance at chess. She pours everything she has into this one avenue, ultimately becoming world class. Her lack of familial connections damaged her heart, and she struggles to fill that hole with drugs and alcohol, sex and fame.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Ultimately, we see her build relationships that fill that hole, and give her the balance she needs to genuinely feel she belongs in the world. People who love her enough for her to like herself, and use chess not just as a means to an end (fame, fortune, acceptance) but as an end in itself (pleasure, art)

Queen’s Gambit is wonderful not because it is about chess, but about the evolution of a human spirit.

We all want the same things: safety, power and security, love, community, growth, self-expression, and ultimately contribution and evolution. Once you understand this pattern you can usually tell where someone’s wounds are simply by looking at where they are dysfunctional in body, relationships, or money.

That dysfunction can be the result of easily identifiable externals (here, being an orphan raised by an emotionally damaged mother), but the truth is that we ALL take damage growing up, and while it is the job of parents to create the healthiest environment possible, once we are adults it is OUR job to look at our lives, see where we fall short of our dreams and potential, and…