Advice/Support needed

[coffeecrazy1]

Poker is like a relationship. There will be days when you are so mad at it that you can't bear the thought of playing another hand. You swear that you are done with poker for good. The bad runs get worse than you could ever imagine. The days of being card dead give way of getting great pockets and terrible flops, which is the worst kind of day. A good friend of mine who is a pro told me that he has gone entire months without a winning session before.

But, there is the flip side, when you are winning. Then, whatever card you need, you get. It doesn't take many hands of this side of things to remind yourself why you started playing poker. Then, you're in love again.

All of this is to say that you have to be able to a)handle the swings, and b)handle yourself. Blaming the cards for your short-term problems is okay...because some nights, you just lose. Saying that the cards are running against you constantly means there is a leak. You have probably changed what was good about your game in an effort to counter the slide. DON'T DO THIS. You have to relax, calm yourself down, and play the poker you know to play.

And yes, this post was very flowery.

[steamboatin]

Welcome to Poker. If my math is right, you have only been taking your game seriously 3 months. It appears you have encountered your first downswing. Please take notice that I said first and not worst.

Downswings are inevitable and it takes a good player to keep playing good poker even when it doesn't work. Don't be results oriented (sounds weird coming from me because I struggle with being results oriented).

Tighten up, concentrate on your game not your results and everything will be fine in the long run.

PS. The long run is much more than 3 months.

[K C]

The only thing you need to realize here is that bad beats are the best friend you'll ever have at the poker table. Every time you get one, thank God for them. Sure, there are going to be spells where they seem to occur more often than they should, but there's also cases where they don't as often either. Guess which one people tend to remember?

There's no doubt that you've let this affect your confidence, but the only thing to do is get back on the bike and realize that if it weren't for these beats, and people played correctly, you wouldn't be able to make any money at this game. Once you realize that, you'll be back on track again.

KC
kingcobrapoker.com

[Pepsquad]

Fiyah,

Please listen to the people on here that are telling you to move down in limits and work on your game. It always makes me cringe when I read posts that have amounts of MONEY sprinkled throughout them. It shows that this is where your focus lies - money money money. How to get more of it and how to get more of it faster. You seem like an intelligent person. So my advice, as I've posted several times before is SCREW the money. Move WAY down in limits. I mean to the point the you could lose 500 BB's and you wouldn't sweat it all (meaning you could also win 500 BB's and it wouldn't mean squat). Try taking the "money" out of your poker game for awile and focus on your play. I know this isn't what you want to hear. Good luck on your way back up the ladder man.

Pep.

[bigmac366]

good post pep. i did this to work on my game and it worked wonders. losing 25bb's on .5/1 doesnt hurt anywhere near as badly as losing 25bb's at 10/20. even if your bankrolled for 10/20 steping down is a cheap and less nerve racking way to plug the leaks in your game.

[fiyah]

Thanks for the helpful and insightful replies everyone. I have indeed moved down in limits, as of tonight I'm grinding out the 15+1 SnGs on PokerStars. I didn't have a negative night so that is a plus, nothing fantastic but its not a loss. As for the mindset thing its like you know what you need to do and it sounds right and everything. The trick is making yourself believe it you know? Its easy to say but its hard to truly believe when things aren't going as you feel they should. I think just chalking up a few positive nights will slowly restore some of my confidence, just gotta remember to take things nice and slow.