10 Notes to Myself About Poker

1) Poker Ain't Going Nowhere: Stop being a stupid monkey and mindlessly chasing losses. It doesn't matter if you're still playing well and not tilting or otherwise playing sub-optimally. You aren't having fun. There's no point in sitting there, clicking buttons, not having fun.

Remember all those times you play a ton of hands, end up down for the day, and sit there, grinding over it in your head, thinking "Not only did I lose money, but I didn't get around to doing (insert household chore), didn't spend time with (insert name of loved one or friend or pet rat), didn't read (insert name of book), didn't watch (insert name of movie), didn't exercise, didn't write, didn't do anything productive, whatsoever"? Well, hoss, guess what? No one made you sit there, grinding out hands. Just get your ass up and go do something.


2) Shorter and Sweeter: Stop ignoring the really obvious trend, as far as the majority of your winning sessions being less than 2 hours, and the majority of your losing sessions being more than two hours in length. Play shorter sessions, get up, take a break, do something constructive, then come back for another short session. Repeat. This works for you, and why you let yourself still get sucked into long, fruitless sessions, bashing of your head against the poker tables, I do not know.


3) Know When to Fold 'Em: Just because you're playing short doesn't mean you have to look everyone up, or that they're making moves on you. Play fast and hard and, when played back at, be inclined to respect it. Pay more attention to pot size, as far as whether you decide to look someone up. Pick your spots.


4) Don't Use the Presence of Lemurs as an Excuse to Cold Call: Break the nasty habit you're developing of cold-calling pre-flop when you still have lemurs left to act behind you, who you know will call. If you're going to play your hand, raise. I don't care if it's a hand like KQs, that you'll likely need help from the flop with, and that you don't mind multi-way action with. Raise or fold. I don't care if the lemur will call three-bets cold anyway with 49o, and will hang in there to river two pair to take down your top pair. Raise or fold.


5) Stop Playing Like a Pussy When Losing: Remember when you were winning early in the month, playing very aggressively, busting out turn bluff-raises, check-raising with middle pair on the flop, three-betting/capping it pre-flop with any hand you decided to play, and occasionally donking a river bluff on a scary board? Remember the epic downswing (and I know you do), and how quickly you regressed to tighter play once it started, turtling up, playing very predictably with much less aggression? Think those two things are related?

(Psst, the answer is yes.)


6) Don't Chase Losses by Moving Up in Limits: Yeah, that worked out well last month, sitting 30/60 short for a few sessions, especially the one where you turned the nut straight against AA, who couldn't comprehend that his slowplayed aces were no goot (and then rivered a third ace for more pain) and took down the largest pot of your limit life, nearly $1,800. But we both know that you shouldn't have sat down at 30/60, especially in the midst of a downswing.

To be slightly fair, it's not the worst thing in the world for you, as it sobers you up pretty quickly and gets you back to playing tilt-less poker, but it's eventually going to bite you in the ass, and you don't need or want that, especially when you're in a sub-optimal state.


7) Stop Being Stupid and Tilting Off Remnants of Buy-Ins: Yeah, I know, it's frustrating as hell, to get kicked in the teeth by yet another two-outer, and to see your $500 buy-in eroded to $70, capping off yet another brutal session. And it's even more frustrating when you then get dealt JhJd, raise, get two lemur callers, the flop comes Ac 10c 5h, you bet, get called, and then raised by the second lemur.

But you know what? Your hand is no goot, so there's no point getting tilty and shoving your remaining $40 in there. That's $40. Paltry in comparison to what you've lost, granted, but that's 2BBs, which is basically a solid hour of expected profit/work from a good player playing optimally in a $10/20 game. It may seem like a piddling sum but it isn't. Save it. Either re-buy or, even better, just log off and fight again another day.


8) Step Down in Limits When Truly Running Bad: Stop letting your ego have its way. We both know you can beat the 10/20 short games. And, honestly, should be beating them. But we also both understand variance, especially in short games.

There's no shame in dropping down to lower limits when the losses pile up to the uncomfortable point. Stop making excuses and rationalizations. If the idea of sitting down and losing a buy-in is unduly painful to consider, step down. Regroup, rebuild, step up. If the pain of potential losses enters into your thinking at any point, you've passed the point of no return and aren't playing optimally.


9) Poker is at Best 50% Skill, 50% Luck: Mystify it to death, but you're still always at the mercy of the random nature of dealt cards, to some extent. When you used to play many, many games of cribbage with your dad as a kid, did you entangle larger self-worth and happiness issues with whether you won or lost? Umm, no, not at all. Because, you know, it was cribbage, and sometimes you get cards and sometimes you don't.

The only thing different about poker is that money is involved, so the results get magnified in proportion. That's a natural effect, but not conducive towards happiness or better results in the future. The sooner you get over that hump, attaching inordinate significance to money, the better. And that applies to many things other than poker, as well.


10) You're not as Good at this Game as You Think You Are; You're Better at This Game than You Think You Are: Come to grips with that Zen-like statement, as it likely will never cease to be true.