Are you tough?

I'm not very tough. I don't mean to say I go on tilt in any way. I am one of the most composed players you'll ever see, even after horrendous beats. I'm just not good at competing. I have a difficult time relaxing at the pokertable, I am very tense. Esepecially when I first sit down I am a nervous wreck. My self-esteem is tied so tightly to my poker that I feel very anxious that I need to win. I am a weakish-tight professional learning to become more solid and make moves and get aggressive short. I feel that everyone at the table is rooting so hard for me to lose as I am a significant winner in the yellow chips games (these guys are so bad that weakish play can win pretty good bank), and this puts extra pressure on me as I so badly want to disappoint them. After all, I love when the tough pros who give me lots of trouble lose, why not the other way around? I know I shouldn't think this way- its a waste of time but I am admittely hypersensitive in these social situations. Also, when one player is verbally challenging me or talking smack I have trouble. I don't want to challenge anyone. I don't want to encourage people to play better against me than they would have. Anyway, after playing a while and getting a little accustomed, I settle down and can play a bit better.


I've been trying to deal with this by getting into sports psychology. Developing the mental attitude and properly preparing before sport can be correlated to proper preparation for poker. I think these tools can be very useful if used properly. James Loehr's New Toughness Training for Sports is exceptional and talks about getting tough in these situations. Ive also read Terry Orlick's In Pursuit of Excellence which discusses the wheel of excellence: commitment, confidence, focus, positive imagery, mental readiness, distraction control and ongoing learning. Useful but very wordy. I'm trying to learn to relax and focus and be disinterested emotionally in playing a pot.involvement.


I have read Zen and Poker by Phillips. Very good book but more suited to lower limit games where one must simply become comfortable with folding. I've reached this step. Now I need to become comfortable with competing. Anyone know any useful books on any of this? Think this is a helpful approach? Similar attitudes out there? I'd love to read what you have to say.


Joeflex

I don't know if this will help you, but what I did when I started playing was this... Before I left the house I would take out my playing bankroll and throw it in the trash. I would leave it in there a minute or so and then take my money back out of the trash can. Sounds kind of silly, but it changed my mindset.


I understood that losing my money across the poker table or throwing it in the trash were essentially the same thing. After a few weeks of doing this it took a lot of pressure of me concerning my play. I could sit down and not worry about chips because I knew that I pulled that money out of the trash can and I really didn't need it for anything else. Seeing I didn't need that money for anything else I didn't need the money that winning would give me either. So I learned to change my focus.


As for the verbal end, simply saying, "Thank you for your input." is usually a show stopper. Or learn to talk in the third person, that way you are not directly involved in the result.


Hope this helps some.

good advice.


variation of the sergeant telling you, hey man, youre *already* dead, we aint coming back - lets go.


brad

Play poker to win more bets than you lose Mr. Joeflex.


Of course everybody is rooting hard for you to lose. What do you expect? Even a live one isn't a total moron.


Sounds to me like too many non-poker related thoughts are somehow getting into your head during show-time.


Win bets. The self-esteem business you talk about is a by-product.


Best of luck to you. Billy (LTL)

one time i a guy (maybe on steriods) looks at me and goes, you want to take it outside!? (i wasnt doing anything, but may have been irritating in general) i looked at him and just said , if you want to? , (i didnt take it personally, and so i answered it the same as if he had said, do you want me to jump up and down like a monkey?) i just read this and let me add that i wasnt being condescending or anything, as i realized that he could quite easily pummel me.


its funny, i play all the time, and at (for me at least) some pretty high limits, but especially after a break (havent played for days) when i come back im always pretty nervous until i sit down and start playing.


brad

Do you need to acclimatise to the stake?

i dont think so, sometimes i even get nervous before 6/12.


if you think about it, risk taking is just not part of regular life, and i think a mental adjustment is necessary. (perhaps those guys who go nuts when they lose or they think they got a bad beat or whatever are still in normal walking around town mode.)


brad

Joe, what you want to do is to unflex a bit - to loosen up and be more relaxed and to just chill a bit. In order to do this, you have to begin to make changes in your attitude towards risk noW....as you do this, begin by reading A. Alvarez's The Biggest Game in Town to find out what beliefs and attitudes the super risk-takers share. Then use the distinctions discussed in the link below to program these beliefs and attitudes into your own psyche so that they become noW part of your behavior.

As a former athlete one of the things poker has provided me with is a way to satisfy the thirst for competition.


When I first started playing poker seriously I went through a short phase where I approached it like I used to race. Sitting down at the table I HATED everyone else there. I wanted to crush them, to take all their money. Specifically I wanted to destroy weak players. I still have and old notebook where I had written something like, "PUNISH THOSE WEAK PUSSY LIMPERS!"


Outwardly there was no indication of my attitude (at least I didn't try to project one), but mentally I was in super competitive mode.


I no longer approach a table quite that way. I am still just as competitive and aggressive, but I don't have to psyche myself up to be so and, thankfully, I no longer have to hate everyone at the table to play as hard as I can.


However, going through that mode helped me tremendously. It taught me to be aggressive and not to fear anyone. I shared my thoughts with a friend of mine at the time and he was also able to use such a mental approach to good success but did not need to keep it up in order to stay competitive.


As a funny aside, my friend had worte something similar to my 'punish weak players' remark in his own notebook to remind himself to stay aggressive. He was playing a 4-8 game and crushing it. At one point the guy next to him looked over as my buddy was looking at his notes and saw the remark. He gulped, picked up his chips and quietly left the table.


In the end the mental competitive state for poker is a bit different than that for sports but if you can get into it, it surely helps.


Good luck,


Paul Talbot

Drink more....works for me!

In The Biggest Game in Town, both Jack Strauss and Doyle Brunson, both former basketball players, have claimed that poker was a way to engage their competitive urges long after they were past their primes in their sport. Their beliefs that deal with having a total disregard for money while at the table is worth modelling especially in no-limit.

I talk to anybody about almost anything anywhere and I have pretty thick skin, so what goes on at the table rarely bothers me.


Some Players have told me that at times it takes them literally hours to recover from a bad beat or a confrontation at the table. Usually they are pretty quiet players and I never suspected it until they told me.


I think socially they lead pretty quiet lives and poker is their way of socializing. Perhaps if they put themselve in other social situations where they have to converse and exhange opinions or ideas it would help them at the table.


Any thoughts on this?

When I played HighSchool Football, before each game, I would get butterflies in my stomach, i would be really nervous, the very first play, I would be soo nervous.....after that I would settle down.....


I'll be honest with you too.....when i go to the casino and sit down.....at a 10-20 table, or at anything higher, i get a little nervous, but after the first play...I'm not nervous anymore....


(now this is what goes on in my head) Chips are chips, players are players, I'm here to make the right decisions.... I'm not intimitated by anyone....because I'll kick their ass on the poker table and physically.....and I'm not going to make it personal with anyone, I WANT THEM TO MAKE IT PERSONAL WITH ME!!! There is plenty of people to take money from 8 other guys, why do I have to pinpoint 1.


I'll see some guys sometimes, take in pot after pot, off of stupid plays, I sit there and smile....and just wait patiently for my turn....


I'm what you would call like a Sleeping Giant Dragon....you do not want to wake me up...because I will crush you and burn you!!!


THAT IS THE ATTITUDE YOU HAVE TO HAVE!!!


CUT OUT THE CRY BABY SH$^!!!!


Hope this helps!!!


By the way, I'm a talker......not in the casinos but in my home game, I will talk more junk to the Players to my right......than ANYONE.....ESPECIALLY TO MY RIGHT!!! because I know they will make it personal with me....and I know that I will not make it personal with them!!! I make them really really IRATE!!!!


Ohh.....and I offer to pour players to my left beverages and get them napkins...... LOL...

This way the whole table doesn't think i'm a MUTT!!


GET MENTALLY TOUGH!! It's a very big part of POKER!!

"I love when the tough pros ...lose."


That's bad mojo. You should want them to win because it confirms that winning is possible and that a clear path to winning exists. Nothing terrifies and humbles me more than when a good player plays well and gets crushed day after day because I know I'm next.


Tommy

'Nothing terrifies and humbles me more than when a good player plays well and gets crushed day after day because I know I'm next. '


I agreed with your post. So I repeated it to a friend of mine who I know for sure wins money and is considered the best player in the local casino.


He said that if someone wins day after day to the extent that it matters statistically, it is very unlikely that his is a winning player, so to hell with his results. If the losing isn't statistically significant, then, to hell with his results.


What about that? I think my buddy pulls my leg alot.


TY.

if someone wins day after day


MAKE THAT "loses"

"He said that if someone loses day after day to the extent that it matters statistically, it is very unlikely that his is a winning player, so to hell with his results. If the losing isn't statistically significant, then, to hell with his results."


I don't understand what he meant either.


Of all the thousands of players I've known or heard of, the number of players that I know for sure are long-range winners (of statistical significance) is, oh, maybe a dozen.


For all the others, I can watch their game, and based on what I think is a winning style, make a guess that if that player were to play the way he is playing right now, all the time, then maybe he's a lifetime winner. And if he is playing what I feel is a winning style, and loses hour after hour, day after day, I feel no joy, such as Joeflex does (recall my initial point to Joeflex), but rather, fear.


For what it matters, I've had dozens of strings of ten or more consecutive losing sessions, and I'm still a huge winner lifetime, so for what it matters, I feel this stat damages your friend's conclusion, as best as I can discern it, which isn't very well.


Tommy

is to write out my top ten reasons why I want the other players to win. Not that I intend to play badly, but if they win, I want to be happy for them.


I did ten reasons for the casino winning recently, and I supply them even though it isn't related to poker. I don't play poker much any more because my casino stopped spreading it. Funily enough these 10 reasons actually help me to keep me away from the casino rather than go there more.

My top ten reasons why I want the casino to win my money...


1. They need the money for wages for security staff, waiters, dealers, floorpersons, valet parking, managers. They need money to buy machines, tables, cameras, film, equipment; do renovations.

2. The staff are such nice people, how could you want them to lose their jobs.

3. If they don't win they will go bust. If they go bust, players will have nowhere to go legally to play blackjack, roulette, baccarat. The underground gambling business will flourish.

4. They need big jackpots to entice more bettors to the casino. If you win one, well you just wouldn't want to show your face; there will be nothing for the gamblers to shoot for anymore, leaving the casino with no patrons. You will start the snowball effect. You'll be the butt of everyones curses.

5. The casino needs to fund those cheap meals somehow. You don't want your mum and dad to miss out on their $3 roast meals do you?

6. The shareholders have to make a profit; you don't want the shares you bought to go down, why should you want someone else’s shares to go down. You may actually have some casino shares yourself, perhaps via your superannuation fund.

7. The young ones won't get their bands and entertainment for free. They might end up walking the streets causing trouble instead.

8. You don't want the casino to resort to stealing to take your money, eg. let a keno progressive jackpot vanish heaven forbid. That would leave a bitter taste in you mouth, and you would have to complain to politicians, gaming supervisory authorities etc., probably getting mixed up in some high level corruption.

9. They actually have a mathematical advantage, and if you show that the mathematics is wrong the rest of the world will surely collapse too (including the bridge you drove over to get to the casino).

10. The more you think you can beat the mathematical advantage of the casino and actually win, the more likely you are to become a problem gambler.

I haven't read them yet, but you might try reading "Inside the Poker Mind" and "The Psychology of Poker", both of which I hear are pretty good books.


As far as player remarks go, I usually find that bad players comment the most loudly. A simple, "I guess I just got lucky" usually silences them and helps to reenforce that they don't know what they are doing and that if the cards fall right, I'll probably end up with most of their chips soon enough. After all, when you are in the big blind and nobody raises, is it really your fault if you flop that open ended straight and flush draw?


Good luck.

Try "Inside the Poker Mind" by John Feeney. It is excellent.

Joe, This post is being written nine days after your original post.

1. Thanks for opening up an important subject that is rarely discussed, our own fears and weaknesses. Poker players tend to be macho and anti-introspection.

2. The number of replies clearly indicate that other people are interested in this psychological subject.

3. The new "Psychology of Poker" forum will focus on this sort of topic.


4. You've committed a very common error: You think other people are glad you lose. Since you described yourself as very composed and weakish tight, I doubt that many people care whether you win or lose. People focus on their own results, and we really don't care much about how other people do. We may want our friends to win and one or two obnoxious or aggressive people to lose, but generally we just don't care about other people's results.

5. Self-help books sell zillions of copies, and nearly all of them have no impact at all. Many of them are written by naturally competitive people, and they urge readers to change their personalities in ridiculous ways. They are full of nonsensical exhortations such as: "When the going gets tough, the tough get going." "Winning isn't the most important thing; it's the only thing." "You can do anything if you really want it." Every psychologist knows that these exhortations have little or no impact. You are who you are because of genetics and a lifetime of experiences. No book or guru or training program is going to make large changes in your basic personality.

6. The best way to "toughen up" is NOT to try to change your attitudes directly. It is to understand yourself and poker strategy. If you know WHY you think, feel, and act the way you do, and WHY it is better to act differently, you may be able to change yourself, but it will be a slow process.

Hope this helps

Alan Schoonmaker

gr8 post..well written and reasoned out...post more often pleeeeeeeeeeze..gl