Moving up, mental block.

[Losing all]

A little background, I'm a once failed live pro. I made money, but not near enough. I didn't know it at the time, but my bankroll and experience level were both lacking. Ever since then(most of 01') getting back has been my only goal(study, think about the game, study, think about the game).


So now I've found the best thing since sliced bread for my kind (Internet poker of course) Sure, I knew it was there all along, but there wasn't much talk about it in the games I played back then, and the talk there was was all negative. (teams, site scams, cheating of any and all kind) A couple pros I really respected the opinions of were deadset against it, so I burried my head in the sand.

After finding this site I decided to give ole Party poker a try. Needless to say, any decent player can do very well at the lowest limits. I've played mostly 10+1 sng's with some mutli table .5/1., 1/2, pl25, nl25 mixed in. My roi/bb per rates are nothing compared to some of what I see posted, but I make a pretty easy $150-$200 a week with almost no risk (two losing weeks since mid-Sep -$10, -$40) I hit a bit of a cash crunch toward the end of the year that wiped out all my gains for real life need, but I had a great first month to start off the year.

ok, so here's my point/problem. I've finaly built my roll into a decent starting point for "real" games. the next logical step would be 30+3 and/or 2-4. Wed I decide it's time for 2-4 and I'm not backing off after a big win, or loss. Well I had a small win and ended up playing 3 tables of .5/1. last night?? Laying in bed thinking about what a punk I am this morning I decided I was ready for fulltime 30+3 as of today. I play 1 this morning, First place. Guess the first thought that popped into my head? "maybe I should just play 10+1's the rest of the weekend". I just don't get it. I don't think I'm a sissy boy, I have the accepted roll's for both games, I'm 99.9% sure I can beat either game(and higher) in the longrun.

I'm not sure what I'm looking for here, maybe Dr. Al has some thoughts on this?

Could it be a fear of failure? I doubt it, I've been one my entire life and I seem to wear it well.

Fear of success? God I hope not


Any opinions or similar experiences welcome.

[bigpooch]

Yes, at times I am pretty much in the same boat. I did play
a little 5-10 (6max) and I can't really justify playing any
smaller than 3-6 (except on days just to scoop up some Jucy
Lones! /images/graemlins/laugh.gif ). Now I think in the back of my mind if I play
three tables of 5-10 (6max) twenty days a month for the next
three or four months, I will suffer some bad days (a day in
which I lose $100 or more! This is something I haven't
experienced in a very very long time since I usually play
3-6 and smaller and my draw poker results usually pull up
my daily results substantially). If I have an exceptionally
bad day, I will end up down a dime; even though my record
loss was more than 1K in a session of B&M (20-40 though, so
1K isn't much), it's difficult to accept ANY loss of even
a mere $500 or more on a day.

But to make an omelette, you gotta break some eggs!

[Al Schoonmaker]

Of all the articles I've written, the one that has had the most positive impact was, "Don't quit your day job." A few wannabe pros said they realized it was a bad choice after reading my article. If you send me your email address at BOTH these addresses, I'll send you a copy. alannschoonmaker@hotmail.com and alannschoonmaker@cs.com. Please email to both because I have terribly unreliable email.
Poker is a great second job. It is a terrible career. The article is, however, dated. TV and the influx of new players have improved earnings, and glamour. However, I still think it is MUCH better to avoid it as a career.Hardly any pros have any money, and virtually none of them has anything resemblig security.
Regards,
Al

[illunious]

Great post. I'm feeling the same way moving from $.50/1 to $1/2. 1/2 is going to decide if I move to 2/4 or back to .50/1, so I am feeling extra pressure to win. So far my BB/100 at 1/2 is even better than I was doing at .50/1, but I haven't gone a day without playing mostly $.50/1.

Maybe I'm lying to myself, planning to move to 2/4 once I have 300 BBs, but not all of that will be from $1/2.

Maybe it's fear of the unknown. I'm risking more money and playing against better opponents. The old limit was comfortable to me, at the higher limit I don't sit down with the same track record.

[Inthacup]

maybe I should just play 10+1's the rest of the weekend


I know this feeling well. I think it's a comfort thing, or lack there of. Moving up and playing at a higher limit comes with a sense of uneasiness. You look back down at your old limit and think "It would be so easy to beat those games" and you want to go back to your comfort zone.


I think a good goal for yourself would be to play x amount of 30+3s. Make a personal goal to play your next 50 or 100 tourneys there. If you don't have pokertracker, get it. Track your results. See if you can beat the games. It's sometimes frightening to think "ok, I've moved up to this level....forever". Think of it as a test. Only time, experience and results will calm your fear of playing at a higher limit. Setting goals and keeping detailed records(Pokertracker) have helped me move up much easier.



Cup

[Dov]

Set aside a week or so to concentrate on just one game, one table at a time.

Say you decide to play 2/4. Just play one table until you are comfortable. If you absolutely must play more than one table, play the others at a lower limit like .5/1.

You will know when you are crushing the game. That's when you'll feel comfortable. Just ease into it a little bit at a time. Take a break if you start freaking out. Come back to it fresh.

Above all, make sure you don't move up again until you are ready. You probably moved up too fast last time to make more money faster. Don't fall into that trap this time.

Tight Aggressive Play gets the money. Make sure that's how you're playing and wait for your results to beat it out. (Not short term) If you really are a winning player, then you can try moving up. If you get crushed, you just come down again, regain your confidence, and try again.

Good Luck

[Roy Munson]

I, too, moved up the ladder quite slow and deliberately starting three years ago at 1/2 online. It has taken me three years of diligent study and close to 360,000 hands of play to get to where I feel comfortable playing $10/20 online(hopefully higher in the future).

The biggest incentive to moving up in limits surfaced while examining rake percentage of pots in my pokertracker database for the various limits that I played:

5-10 rake 3.17% of pot
8-16 rake 2.53% of pot
10-20 rake 2.00% of pot

If you allow your bankroll to grow to levels sufficient to comfortably play higher limits, it is in your best interest to do so.

[Losing all]

Thanks for the replies, some good advice in there. I've been thinking about this a lot since my post(all the while playing LL) I think I'm going to try cup's suggestion of just playing 100 30+3's to see how it goes, and go from there.

[theBruiser500]

What I'm doing now is working really well for me, I'm trying to move up in stakes from $1/$2 NLHE to $2/$4 but it's a real big jump for me. So I've adapted a system of playing two or three $1/$2 tables and one $2/$4 table at the same time. I think this system has a lot of benefits and it makes me feel very comfortable.

danny

[SevenStuda]

You sound like a big-time chump. Instead of consentrating so much on poker, why don't you work on not being such a big chump.

[Losing all]

Go F*ck your mother