[Femto]

I have a little ritual that I go through. When I drop past a certain point, say 10 buyins (I play SNGs), I drop 3 levels and play an hour there to blow off some steam, then play an hour at the next level, etc, and I don't move back up to my preferred stakes until I've shown a profit for a day or two at the lower stakes. I think if I had implemented this earler it would have severely cut down on the tilt aspect of my downswings, because this helps to maintain your confidence level. It feels good to be able to laugh when your QcQh gets outdrawn by QdQs, because the money doesnt matter. So ride out the downswing at a lower stakes, then move back up when they flip back the doom switch.

But for 6max...I used to play a lot of 5/10 and a little 10/20, and the downswings were always so stressful. I was rolled well enough, but I just found that if I sunk past 100BBs or so I'd just keep on sinking until I took a few days off--NO poker, NO 2+2--do other stuff for awhile, like exercise, sleep, hit on some ladies, etc. And come back mentally refreshed. IMO that's all you can do. "Working through it" is something some people can do, but not I. I prefer to take a step back and regather myself.