After reading through my last few posts which are all a bit doom and gloom, I decided to reflect on my experience of playing poker for a living to date (all 17 days of it lol). I must admit it's not exactly how I thought it would be and it's been a steep learning curve.
Some stuff I've learned:
Motivation
It's not too easy to motivate yourself when when you can play any time you want. I'm going to try to get into a regular routine to get some structure to my lazy arse life. It's not all that easy to motivate yourself when you're winning either.
Losing
Lets face it, losing is a bastard. Nobody likes to lose. It's even more of a bastard when it's your livelihood that you're spunking away at the tables. There are some things that have made losing a bit easier for me to deal with. The first is having a big enough bankroll to absorb the loss. I'm playing with 1000 big bets and can reload if things go completely tits up (like i get haxxored, get drunk and spunk it all at $200/$400 or decide to do $1k flips). Also having some money in the bank to pay the bills at the end of the month takes a bit of pressure off. I don't know if I would go as far as to recommend having as much as 6 months worth of expenses but having a bit of money is good. The most important thing when it comes to having a shit session is remembering that I can make enough money in a month through FPP bonuses to pay the bills. Fuck the downswings :).
Playing Your A Game
This is really important when you play against reasonably decent players all the time. I can safely say that I don't take my A game to the tables often enough. I started off really well in respect of this. I prepared myself mentally before i started playing and would stop if I noticed myself making mistakes, take a look at the hands in pokertracker, find the leaks and get back to business. This is something i need to get back to doing.
Find a Way to Vent
This blog has really helped me in this regard. My wife really doesn't want to hear about it when I'm having a shit day and dropping $$ at the tables. Lets face it, she doesn't need to know and it'll only make her nervous. I whine like a little bitch in here instead and instantly feel better. She doesn't need to know about the upswings either as she'll go and spunk loads of money on shoes and handbags. I also really enjoy writing lots of abusive shit in a players notes because I get a laugh when I check them out the next day or whatever when all memories of the suckout have faded.
Don't Doubt Yourself: Review, Review and Review
Losing sessions getting you down? Review your play. Spot the mistakes. Learn something and move on. I've found that doing a session review following a losing session is a must. A couple of times it has transpired that I was playing pretty well even if it felt like I made loads of mistakes at the time.
Make Clear and Achievable Goals
It's good to set goals for the day, week and month but be specific. I read my goals for the year and they're waaay too vague. Set yourself clear and concise goals.
Don't Worry About Quitting
Let's face it, sometimes the games are shit. Sometimes you're playing badly. Sometimes you're at the arse end of varience. Sometimes you're on insane monkey tilt. Go and do something else instead of spunking away your bankroll you fucking tit.
Enjoy It
At the end of the day this has to be the best job in the world and I fucking love it.
4 comments:
good sound advice, i think we would all be a bit richer and feel better if we could stick to it.
Out of interest how many tables/limits do you play??
I am stuck trying to decide whether to stick to 1 table or play 2, defo not playing any more though, been there and it sucked.
I play 5/10 limit full ring, 4-6 tables at a time. I try to start out with 4 tables then move to 6 if I feel I'm playing well. Tonight I started up 6 tables, lost my way a few times, called down with marginal hands and lost a shitload.
Your win rate will be affected if you play more than 1 table but you should be able to offset that given the fact that you are playing more hands. e.g you win 5ptbb/100 playing 1 table but your win rate drops to 4ptbb/100 when playing 2. You're not winning so much per table but you're up more per hundred hands.
At the end of the day play as many tables as you are comfortable with and add more tables as you get used to it. I play more tables as rakeback has a big part to play in my mopnthly take home pay.
Good luck!
great post m8, keep up the good work, gl
cheers amatay.
btw i meant more per hour not 100 hands. i was pissed when i wrote that. must've made sense at the time :)
Post a Comment