This post isn’t fun. If you’re looking for humor try this one. It’s still my favorite. This post is for me; I wanted to get this down on paper while I was thinking it. I want to reread it during my next bad run.
I’ve had 60 days that I am forced to view as a setback. It reinforces the fact I realized 3 years ago that is more true than any other thing I know about poker:
When you’re running bad, you can’t imagine winning. When you’re running good, you can’t imagine losing.
It’s simple but dead-on correct. You’ll get immediate agreement from every poker player you say it to.
So what happens when you’re in the middle of this period? You drift from non-optimal play. You get fooled by the randomness of the event but it will try it’s best to get you to change what you know to be true.
You have to refuse to raise to $50 with Jacks so you don’t have to play them. Don’t go all in on the flop to stop the flush draw from calling. But that’s probably the easy part. The hard part is not accelerating the loss and donking off the rest of your money. Either way I think it’s safe to say that if the money is important, that this is the time where you can positively affect your results the most by sticking to what you know to be true and not giving early Christmas gifts to your neighbor. I guess what you have to do is keep the faith. But it’s discouraging.
I know guys that play poker that don’t have fun AND loose money. This group thinks they’re unlucky and it’s going to turn around. You feel like convincing them they don’t HAVE to play poker. But you don’t. I also know pros that don’t have fun. It actually looks pretty miserable. It appears to me that going pro and having fun playing poker are pretty close to being mutually exclusive. There’s a blend in there somewhere. (But they probably find 8:30 meetings pretty miserable; who can argue with that logic?)
It really comes down to what you really want out of playing poker. Is it fun? Is it money? Is it escape? Is it friends? It is entertainment? How does it fit into your life? You should know and you should make sure it fits. Or does the fact that I’m asking these questions just mean I play too much poker??
You have to decide for yourself, but I'll leave you with this:
One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree.
Which road do I take? she asked.
Where do you want to go? was his response.
I don't know, Alice answered.
Then, said the cat, it doesn't matter.
Lewis Carroll - "Alice in Wonderland"
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New to the site? Start with the posts in the margin, those are the oldies but goodies! Part poker strategy, part attempt at humor to get the Internet to like me. But don't worry, it's all degenerate, all the time.
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3 comments:
What is too much poker? It's just like everything you just said, "as long as it fits."
I for example have positioned my life around it. I work in the industry, all of my friends are poker buddies. And all i do in my free time is play, study, or watch the game. But it fits.
So, are you playing too much? Is it disrupting your otherwise "normal" life? If so, then yes. I don't know of any real "life" you have outside of poker. Do you even want to do anything else? That's what you need to ask yourself.
This post certainly was not fun.
I view all of your questions as relevant and worthwhile though, Hero.
I often ask myself if sitting at a poker table, praying that I can take advantage of someone is perhaps the worst waste of life possible? I mean, literally, you are contributing nothing to the world, and in the long run, for what?
So, of course it is relevant to say, "Where does it fit in?" That's why I've taken a lot of your advice lately and am trying to enjoy the game more... joke more... have more fun. Because if it's not for that, then for what do I play... money, I suppose... "the root of all evil."
I sometimes wonder if these legends of poker that we see sitting around the table, always smiling on our TVs, are really as satisfied with their lives as they pretend to be... what have they done, really... what have they ever contributed to society? Have they wasted their lives? Have they fallen so deep into the rabbit's hole that they no longer recognize the real world around them?
I read a story once in an old poker book, "Wisdom from the Table" maybe... something along those lines. Anyway, the story basically just illustrated how oblivious most professional poker players are to the world, and is perhaps relavent here.
When Ronald Regan was shot, after his first assassination attempt, a guy walked into the big game (at the Horseshoe at the time) and saw the usual pros there... most of which had not left their seats for nearly 2 days. He said to them, "Can you guys believe Regan was shot?" Then Doyle Brunson (I believe) said, "Ronald Regan, the president?" and the guy replied, "Yeah, it's all over the news." Doyle replied, "Huh." and that was that.
Sorry if my comments are a little random... just sharing my initial reactions to you oh so glum post.
It is hard sometimes to ignore these things though... at least for me. Perhaps it's the real reason I've never truly committed to making my way in life through this game.
You, on the other hand, seem to enjoy yourself a lot, Hero. Perhaps you just need a break?
If I am way off in my understanding of the feelings you are having, I appologize.
P.s. Sorry my above comment was so self-centered.... I just watched last weeks episode of "High Stakes Poker" -- I DVD record them all -- and was kind of thinking about a lot of these things before I read your post... so, as a result, instead of something particularly thoughtful or useful, you more or less got a 100% all about Mike response. My bad. Take it easy.
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