---
title: 'Why I Never Tilt'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=VqW7d-QAk-4'
video_id: 'VqW7d-QAk-4'
date: 2026-06-16
duration_sec: 0
---

# Why I Never Tilt

> Source: [Why I Never Tilt](https://youtube.com/watch?v=VqW7d-QAk-4)

## Summary

The speaker explains how to avoid tilting (getting frustrated) during competitive gaming by adopting a healthier mentality. The core advice is to separate your self-worth from the game's rating system and focus on self-improvement rather than chasing rank symbols.

### Key Points

- **Tilting is natural but harmful** [[0:18]] — Getting angry is normal, but letting it take over is harmful to performance and enjoyment.
- **The root cause of tilting** [[0:46]] — 90% of tilting comes from caring too much about the rating system (SR, MMR, rank) and using it to define or validate yourself.
- **You are not your best or worst moments** [[1:46]] — Your true skill level is what you do most of the time, not your peak performances or worst losses.
- **Rating increase follows improvement** [[2:32]] — Getting mad at the rating system is like getting mad at a stopwatch. The number will go up after you improve, not before.
- **How to self-reflect after a loss** [[4:21]] — Ask yourself: 'Did I do enough to deserve to win?' If no, focus on your own mistakes. If yes, you achieved your goal of playing well, so there's less reason to be upset.
- **Chasing rank symbols is hollow** [[7:12]] — Wanting a higher rank as a status symbol will never make you happy because you'll always want the next rank. The goal should be to be a better player than you were yesterday.
- **Focus on what you can control** [[9:28]] — Playing to improve is entirely in your control. It leads to sustained growth and a healthier relationship with gaming.

### Conclusion

Stop chasing rank symbols and instead focus on being a better player than you were yesterday. This shift in mindset puts the power back in your hands and leads to less frustration and more genuine improvement.

## Transcript

people often ask me how i'm able to stay
calm
or how i avoid tilting when bad things
happen while i'm playing and
particularly when i'm streaming
and they can see me having some really
frustrating losses or annoying teammates
i'm gonna tell you guys now the
mentality that i adopted a while back
that has really really helped me to
almost never tilt
getting angry is a normal human emotion
and we will sometimes feel frustrated
and annoyed
but letting it take over you is so
incredibly harmful
and even from a playing perspective it
will stop you from playing the way you
want to play
so while i can't guarantee you'll never
tilt i do think that if you internalize
what i'm about to tell you and i mean
really believe it to the core
then you will find gaming to be a much
less stressful experience and you'll
actually find it easier to get better
and have a healthy relationship with
video games as a whole
ninety percent of the time when people
tell me about them tilting from losing
an online multiplayer game
it's because of the game's rating system
it's because they're mad at having lost
something they perceive to be valuable
sr mmr rank or whatever it's called in
their game
why would you care about the rating
system well you would care if you're
using it to either define
or validate yourself this is the first
mistake right here
the problem comes from that very
self-definition people always want to
know
how good am i and i get that that's a
perfectly normal desire to have
you want to know how you stack up
against other people playing the game
but putting too much emphasis on the
number itself
is going to lead you down a very dark
path if you value yourself
and your happiness with your performance
or your happiness with the game
based on that number you basically
guarantee that your mental health will
go
up and down alongside that number two
every time that number goes up
you think yeah i'm great i'm a really
awesome player
and every time the number goes down you
think ah this is so stupid
this number is wrong my teammates are
stupid i played way better than what
this number is telling me
or maybe you do even think god am i a
terrible player
am i as bad as this number is telling me
all of this
is a lie and deep down you know this too
you're not the sum of your best moments
and you're not the sum of your worst
moments
you are what you do most of the time and
whatever your great plays or bad days
your real level in the game
is whatever you're averaging out to be
it's whatever you are when you're
normally playing
if you want to improve you're never
going to get anywhere by fixating on the
lows or the highs
you're going to improve when you raise
that average when you raise that base
level of what you do most of the time
rating systems are arbitrary it doesn't
matter what game you're playing doesn't
matter how good or bad you think the
system is it's just there to provide a
rough value
chances are it's probably fairly
accurate but the main issue that people
have
is that they get the order of events
completely the wrong way around
the rating increase will always come
after you improve never before
how do you expect to be baited higher if
you never become a better player
people get mad at the rating system
because they think it's telling them a
lie or they think that they should be
higher
why put it in another context imagine
you really want to be a 200 meter
sprinter
getting mad at the rating system because
you don't think that number is right is
like getting mad at a stopwatch
after you finish last in the race
because you don't think the time was
right sure maybe the stopwatch is old
maybe it was started too early and maybe
the screen is a little faded
but you still lost the race and the
watch is just counting time
so how wrong could it really be who
should you actually be upset with the
stopwatch
or your performance let's say you lose a
game and you get really tilted maybe you
feel the odds are stacked against you
if the matchmaking was unfair or that
your teammates were just really stupid
next time before you get really mad just
ask yourself a couple questions
number one did i actually do enough to
deserve to win that game
now to answer this requires you to have
some level of self-awareness and
objectivity
but in truth if you ever want to improve
at anything whether that's a video game
or in life
you need to be able to self-reflect and
ask yourself for honest answers
not always what is most comforting or
what you most want to hear
so did you do enough to win the game in
the case of overwatch were you playing
better than your teammates
were you playing better than the person
in the other team that is playing the
same role because really that is your
competition
if you're better than that person then
you will make more of an impact than
them
every time the both of you get into a
game and therefore you will make it more
likely your team wins it's the
foundation of the whole ladder system
if the answer is no then what grounds do
you really have to complain
whatever stupid things your teammates
did or whatever unlucky things happened
you flat out didn't play as well as you
could have done so you need to work on
that first and foremost why would you
focus on the things
out of your control when there's
something in your control that you can
fix that would have changed the outcome
of your game
but maybe the answer the question is yes
you think
yeah i did actually do a lot and it's
unfair that i lost the game i deserve to
win
okay fair enough but then you should be
even less upset that you lost
why because you actually achieved the
goal the actual goal when playing the
game
and trying to climb a ladder system is
to be as good as you can be
to be challenged to improve and to play
better than those around you so that you
can reach the next rank
if you've played better than the players
in your lobby then you're well on your
way to climbing and getting to that next
rank
because it simply follows logic if you
continue to be one of the best players
in every lobby you're put into you will
naturally
have more impact and make it more likely
your team wins and you will therefore
win more than anyone else in your rank
you may have lost one particular game
but that's to be expected in a team game
even the best player in the world will
sometimes lose but over the long term
over many games
your superior skill will show and you
will find success more often than not
it's just not physically possible to be
making more impact than any other
individual in the lobby consistently
and still not winning more games than
them at least not in any games i know
if you think you're constantly better
than everyone else and yet you're still
losing
you're probably not as good as you think
you are it's not an easy pill to swallow
but you're likely lying to yourself and
inflating your self-assessment
alternatively you just genuinely don't
have the tools to understand your
mistakes
you don't actually know enough about the
game to spot all your own errors
so you think you're playing flawlessly
in which case i recommend getting a
better player or a friend or a coach of
some sort to have a look at your
gameplay
i guarantee you they will show you a
million things you're doing wrong
and let's say you've got a slightly
different problem let's say you're mad
because you actually played really well
and you played way better than you
normally would and you're upset because
despite that amazing performance
you still lost ok understandable
that sucks you played your heart out but
you couldn't claim the win
but again what's there to really be mad
at you may have lost that one game
but ask yourself why do i not play like
this more often again
if you consistently played like this
chances are you wouldn't be losing so
much anymore
multiplayer games like this are almost
always about odds and percentages
one player can only ever tilt the scales
in their team's favor no matter how good
you are
unless there's a severe mismatch it's
very unlikely that you alone can
guarantee your team wins every time
all you can do is play well and increase
the percentage that your team wins by
consistently making a difference
compared to what a different player in
your position would do
if you're not making that consistent
difference and you're only doing it
occasionally then why is that the case
how can you justify to yourself
deserving to be rated higher or be at a
higher rank
if you only ever play to a higher level
once every few games
what about those other games should we
just pretend they didn't happen no of
course not
again you are not your best moments or
your worst you are what you do most of
the time
so if you can be really good sometimes
and you need to figure out how you can
reach that level most of the time
because that's the only way you can
ensure you're going to be a better
player
and that's what we're all after right
right
well no and that's another problem a lot
of people have
a lot of people who really suffer from
tilting and toxicity do so because
they're not really striving to be a
better player
they just want a higher rank either they
think they already deserve it or they
just want that rank as a symbol of
achievement
this is another really unhealthy
approach to gaming take it from someone
who knows
chasing that rank symbol is completely
hollow and will never make you happy
let's say you really want to achieve
platinum rank you feel like that will
really indicate that you're a good
player
and that you've achieved a lot in the
game i promise you it won't help
when you get platinum you'll be happy of
course for a day maybe
then you're going to realize that you
actually want to be diamond now
and then when you reach diamond you're
going to want master and grand master
then top 500
then you're going to want to be 4.5 k or
4.6 k if all you ever do is chase these
markers
you will never be happy because there is
no magic ceiling
there is no point where this greed for
the next thing will ever stop
it's just human nature as the saying
goes you will always want what you can't
have
that's why you have to change your goal
to a much simpler one
and one that every single one of us
regardless of ability and time and
talent can achieve
being a better player be a better player
than you were yesterday
if your only goal is to be a better
player than you were yesterday i promise
you you will feel much healthier
because when you play just to be a
better player you will see that you're
the one in control
and you have been all along if you chase
the rank symbols
you will always feel like you have no
power you will always feel like your
teammates or the rank system or the game
balancing
is keeping you from this thing that you
desperately need you will feel powerless
you'll feel like there's nothing you can
do to get what you want or what you feel
you deserve
but playing to be a better player is
entirely in your control
you have the autonomy sure my teammate
did something stupid but what did i do
did i make a mistake did i make several
mistakes how could i have impacted the
game more
why did i die there why did i misuse
this ability here when you look inward
you will always find something to
improve on and when you do you'll feel
much more proud when you fix those
mistakes and see that progress
definitely more so than if you just
chase numbers if you chase numbers
someone could just hack the system
overnight and give you 1 000 more rating
points on your screen
would that really make you more happy if
the answer is yes
you may as well just buy an account or
cheat because you're not really
interested in the game anymore you're
just looking for a status symbol
ironically
it's only when you look to improving
yourself that you will see sustained and
lasting growth
and that's the only healthy and reliable
way of actually gaining rating and
climbing higher in multiplayer games
like these
i've said it before the players who come
to me for advice and i'll say it again
stop chasing a number or symbol and
chase being a better player
because when you do i promise you will
realize how silly it is to be mad at
things beyond your control
and you'll have a much healthier
relationship with gaming as a whole and
hopefully
even life that's all i got for today
guys hope you found this video helpful
and i hope it can genuinely provide
guidance for those of you who do
struggle with tilting i understand how
natural that impulse is
but once you realize your goals are
within your reach that being to just
improve your mistakes
you won't feel that powerlessness that
leads to anger you should i hope
just feel the satisfaction when you see
improvement and the occasional
frustration at yourself when you fail
which is normal and part of the process
of self-improvement as always
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