Grind your gears...win lot lose back or win the same

[RED_RAIN]

I have a pretty big day today at poker, then later in the night gave back a large chunk. If I were to lose and be down the whole day this large chunk I would not be that happy as it's a good amount. At the end of the day I'm still up a good amount overall but I still feel bad that I lost back so much.

Is there something wrong with me? Shouldn't I be happy I'm up a good amount yet I'm stuck thinking about what I lost.

[SoftcoreRevolt]

There really isn't anything wrong with you, it is a natural reaction. The human mind doesn't look at losses following wins as "Well, this was just as likely to happen if I played today or 3 weeks from now" and instead says "LOOK AT THIS MONEY I WOULD HAVE IF I HADN'T PLAYED!"

This is one of the huge boons of rakeback, since you still at least have SOMETHING to show for the hugely dissapointing sessions.

The only thing you can do is say to yourself "If I never played to avoid losses, I'd never have any wins" and go to bed, then wake up and play some poker.

[whiskeytown]

happens to me all the time.

You make the money in a tourney, but you feel you should have done better - or like you say - you have a good session but lose enough so that when you leave you feel you should have left earlier.

I think it's the devil whispering in our ears - pay no attention to him.

One of the lessons TT tried to teach me is that if you play what is considered to be perfect poker, and you lose, then you shouldn't care that you lost - because you played the game perfectly and the luck factor will sometimes still make you a loser overall - it's hard to accept that, and no one plays perfectly, but certainly on individual hands, one can make that assessment. If you played it perfectly, and you lose money - I can walk away from that....

I can also accept when I'm boned - if I push with KK and run into AA - I feel much better then when I'm called by A7 and he rivers an A - you start second guessing yourself - did you raise enough preflop, etc, etc...

I dunno, man....find inner peace with it - if you made the right plays, you're cool - variance will take it sometimes.

RB