The Tao of Poker: finding the center

Hookay,

My knuckles are bruised from punching the table, as is my forehead from headbutting it. I owe my house mate 2 glasses which i've smashed in a rage and i'm surprised the damage bill isn't a lot higher.

Phil Helmuth once told of his friend who had a bad beat during one online session. Little did he know before he sat down at that session, that by the end of it his laptop would be lying at the bottom of his swimming pool having been tossed out the window in a fit of rage.

Welcome to the glorious world of tilt.

Today I came close to giving up poker. I'm down about 5 buy ins in 1000 hands. It was basically sit down, half in, lose, all in, lose, raise, miss, all in, lose. Took me two weeks of grinding to get those buy ins including mini downswings in between. All gone during a sunday, the fishiest day of the week.

The best one was, during the midst of my dispair (last hand i played) getting 88 and calling a re-raise pre flop. Please lord *looks upwards* please give me an 8.... and the lord GAVE me an 8 on the flop and I said: haaaallelujah. But the lord also gave me an ace. And lo... i bet 2x the pot and was re-raised all in and i DID call... and the villain had AA and the lord crept away saying: oops, sorry.... sorry about that... i'll close the door on my way out.

On to my point.

This is where i stand right now, from some teachings i recieved (in other words, i aint internalised these concepts yet, so this isn't ME teaching YOU, it's me confessing)....

HAVING EMOTIONS DURING YOUR POKER SESSION IS -EV.

During my sessions i watch my poker tracker graph go uuuup and dooown like a fucking roller coaster, yey, i won a hand! boo i lost a hand.

We aaaall know that making +EV decisions makes us winners after tens of thousands of hands, so i don't need to reiterate that, but what happens when you lose a ton of buy ins in one day or weekend?

Simple, we take the nearest thing that won't cost anything to fix and we SMASH it like a responsible-for-your-loss little fuck head that it is.

Until we internalise this key concept:

HAVING EMOTIONS DURING YOUR POKER SESSION IS -EV.

Maybe some of you, some beginners are not hot tempered, this won't matter to you. But those of us who are, the FIRST thing that the poker gods should send us, is a guide to remind us that the winning, is in that miniscule decision you are constantly making. Get all in with AA pre flop headsup and minimise the window, you've won.

Obviously you might want to watch what he's gone all in with for note taking, but you get the principle.

Let each hand be an exercise in figuring out what +EV decisions are. Be a losing player if it be so UNTIL you get it right.

There is only one hand.

The hand that you're playing. Now.

There are no results.

Because results from +EV decisions are automatic.

HAVING EMOTIONS DURING YOUR POKER SESSION IS -EV.

Because being angry affects your game. But so does being pleased. And yet there's nothing to be angry about OR pleased about.

No winning, no losing, just making the right decisions as often as possible and realising that you have, over time, earned a good hourly rate. Perhaps good enough to quit your job and never have to set your alarm in the morning, or catch a bus every day.

This post is dedicated to those who get properly fucked up by their downswings like I do, with thanks to those FTR members who went out of their way to help me.

Nice post.. very zen...

I just had to giggle that this was right next to your other, now locked, thread: "Absolute F**king b*******" Talk about Ying and Yang, nowaddimen?

What the fuck are you talking about?

I think this thread has absalutely nothing to offer the serious poker player but I have to admit i have been giggling about it since i read it.

Even though i agree with spoon i have no idea what you are talking about it.

Originally Posted by bigstock2001

I think this thread has absalutely nothing to offer the serious poker player but I have to admit i have been giggling about it since i read it.

Even though i agree with spoon i have no idea what you are talking about it.

My line above was sarcasm in spite of the hour-long or so convo OP and I had last night about this.

This is actually something that only the serious poker player will be able to naturally apply well.

I just thought after reading that even a great player is still going to play with somekind of emotion. I agree in a perfect world. that no emotion is great but is really manageable. I think that is why we implement controls that we can control. Like your thread on willpower. Those are things we can control. That is why i agreed with what you said. I just don't see how no emotion when you win or losse is realistic.

Don

For one I highly suggest you stop looking at Pokertracker/HEM while playing. The only thing you might want to look at is your stats for the session, such as vpip/pfr/etc, or hands. You definately do not want to focus on how much your up or how much your down. It CANNOT help.

Also your 100% correct in the fact that you have to disregard the value of money, and try to eliminate emotions from your play entirely. That $100 you bought into the table for is no longer $100 to you. It isn't a new cellphone, or a night out on the town. It's only one thing now. It's a buyin. That is all. And it's totally 100% standard to lose a buyins every now and then.

Also, you need to quit getting frustrated by how badly another individual played a hand. Remember, when a player plays badly that means they made mistakes. When villains make mistakes, we profit. Also, you need to focus on your game more than theirs. I don't mean this in the sense on only pay attention to your cards. But in the sense, that you have to evaluate how your playing, and whether you are playing well or not. As apparent from the 3 hands you posted in the other thread, and the one you described here, you are not.

ha, spoon's first comment. Inside joke.

Wooah, stacks, i played that trips hand wrong? I don't get it? I raised, was 3bet pretty big, he outstacked me so I knew if i hit i'd take his stack, nice implied odds, hit my 8 and because we'd gone into the flop pretty aggressively, I knew I had to extract max value, so I bet big. He goes all in.... am I not supposed to call that with a set? That said, 4 spades came down and he had the ace of spades, so i'd have lost it anyway. So maybe betting the turn and river would have seen me back down. Confusing, more thoughts on this.

I agree that no emotions is very hard, maybe not possible, but at least I would say it's going to look more like mild disapointment when you get sucked out, like ah well and a sense of ease when you're winning as opposed to YES, FUCK YOU, FUCK YOUOOO!!!!! *checks PT stats*

I would say, if, like me, you feel utterly rigid with excitement when you win a stack off, you ought to take a deep breath and shrug it off, save all your pleasure for when you realise you made a +EV decision and damn the rest.

Ok, question guys, I was telling this shit to my friend last night and she added: yes but what about the guy who was 55/7 and winning? er... yeah what about him. His name is 'NYfrom LA' if anyone wants to look into it. Why would he be a winning player?? His decisions are not +EV. I mean i always see him with a large stack, he takes my money aaall the time and he multi-tables NLH, Omaha and MTT at the same time!

Originally Posted by wonderland

ha, spoon's first comment. Inside joke.

Wooah, stacks, i played that trips hand wrong? I don't get it? I raised, was 3bet pretty big, he outstacked me so I knew if i hit i'd take his stack, nice implied odds, hit my 8 and because we'd gone into the flop pretty aggressively, I knew I had to extract max value, so I bet big. He goes all in.... am I not supposed to call that with a set? That said, 4 spades came down and he had the ace of spades, so i'd have lost it anyway. So maybe betting the turn and river would have seen me back down. Confusing, more thoughts on this.

I agree that no emotions is very hard, maybe not possible, but at least I would say it's going to look more like mild disapointment when you get sucked out, like ah well and a sense of ease when you're winning as opposed to YES, FUCK YOU, FUCK YOUOOO!!!!! *checks PT stats*

I would say, if, like me, you feel utterly rigid with excitement when you win a stack off, you ought to take a deep breath and shrug it off, save all your pleasure for when you realise you made a +EV decision and damn the rest.

Ok, question guys, I was telling this shit to my friend last night and she added: yes but what about the guy who was 55/7 and winning? er... yeah what about him. His name is 'NYfrom LA' if anyone wants to look into it. Why would he be a winning player?? His decisions are not +EV. I mean i always see him with a large stack, he takes my money aaall the time and he multi-tables NLH, Omaha and MTT at the same time!

None of that means he's a winning player.

Takes time. I'm better now than I used to be, but I still have a ways to go. Personally I find the closer I am to a move up/move down BRM point the more it affects me. Losing a few buyins when I'm say 10 buyins past my move down point and 10 buyins off my move up point doesnt really bother me, I'll get it back. Losing 3 buyins when I'm 4 buyins off my movedown point hits me though. Strangely enough so does losing a couple buyins when I'm only 1-2 off moving up. I guess I've already locked in the move in my head and the delay frustrates me.

Case in point, I withdrew $1k last night, which dropped me right around the point I moved up to 100nl. I then lost almost 2 buyins the next session. Usually thats just the swings of poker and I'd expect to make it back soon enough, now however it puts me at the point where another losing session probably means I need to move down so it hit me.

That said I've never been "smash things" pissed at poker. I just get up or down emotionally sometimes. I'm much better at learning to quit when I feel the tilt coming, or even better there are times I can head it off and get back to playing good poker now.

i have gotten impatient once waiting in line at a bar. that's it.

i go do physical (exhaustion) exercises when i'm at or near breaking point.

now, i need to start doing physical exercises more often and not just in these situations, but that's another story.

I've found doing "physical exercises" regularly has been one of the things to really help with my mental/emotional control.

Maybe I'm too pooped to get angry?

I can relate to this post, big time. I just finished losing 14 straight buy-ins. I don't think I'm playing my cards any different but I'm beginning to wonder. I just got knocked out of game with trips where the other player should have never called me because of pot odds but did and hit his straight on the turn. He has a 18% chance of winning. Calls and wins. I know the pros have losing months but it's starting to get to me.

Okay OP, now that you understand the effect emotions have on your play, you're going to realize that you can never shut them out completely. The first step is to not let your emotions throw you off, and I think you're making progress towards that. The second step is to let your emotions fuel you towards even more progress and a higher state of focus. You'll have to work on that once you get the first step down pat.

some more thoughts, fasten your seatbelts.

Like any spiritual discipline, the aim is not to force anything or 'should' anything.

As i sit here in my first game since this discussion, i find myself thinking: i shouldn't be feeling x, i shouldn't be thinking y. Instead i try to remember that it's better to merely be conscious of what you are doing and recognise whether it's productive or not. Always coming back to the center if at all possible. The hand, the decision, this moment.

nice.

live in the present: the past is already done, the future will remain undone, only the present matters (you have no control over the past, no control over the future, you only can affect the right here, right now)


in the words of the Buddha:

Originally Posted by Gautama Buddha

The secret of health for both mind and body
is not to mourn for the past,
worry about the future or anticipate troubles,
but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly.

this is a obviously fundamental buddhist principle, some really deep stuff you stumbled upon here

I gotta admit Wonderland I am impressed. Not so much at the post but the way your attitude has turned around since you first came on this site. I really thought we had a Slev1n part II.

Good luck to you on your quest...

Originally Posted by Jack Sawyer

some really deep stuff you stumbled upon here

Stumbled upon, lol.

Great post wonderland, really well written - it was a great read. For anyone interested in exploring the power of the present moment in more detail - I can't reccomend this book enough: http://eckharttolle.com/the_power_of_now I first stumbled across it about 5 years ago it really changed my perception of the world at the time and my place in it , I'd go as far as saying it's one of the most influential books I've ever read. GL living in the present moment =)

Edit: wow there's the power of the subconscious for you too, only re-reading the post I realise I've used that phrase 'stumbled upon/across' - I'm sure it's no coincidence!

cheers guys!

Who's Slevin? and what was his story?

Yeah, last night was funny. I was rusty and I used to do this all the time when I first started, but I accidentally bet .80c instead of .08c preflop. I was like: shit, don't call, don't call. He called, goes all in on the flop and I had to call with pocket 6s. So, after being down 5 buy ins, my first hand sent me down another buy in.

So I had to deal with that, I didn't go nearly as mad as used to. I recomposed. Then reloaded, for less this time, I play 2nl and you CAN buy in for $5 and because I was doing well I had started buying in for $3. So I reloaded for $2 and only played one table. Focusing on the other players intently.

So I slowly doubled up which absorbed my previous mistake. Again, trying to just breath through my wins, not get attached to them. I DID look at poker tracker and I knew I shouldn't but I just did it consciously, being aware of why I was doing it, why I shouldn't do it.

I ended up with nearly $9 on that table, so $5 profit total. Again, I felt at ease rather than punching the air.

For those interested in learning about the idea of attachment and doing negative things but doing them consciously rather than forcing yourself not to do them, look up a guy called Ram Dass (ex harvard professor who was fired for conducting experiments with LSD alongside Timothy Leary in the 60s).

And I have read The Power of Now too. Good read yes.