Three years without a regular job, two years of Online play

[dogmeat]

A recap on playing as a pro, with my very biased opinions.

The last "regular" job I had working for a company was in Sept. of 2002 - so three years, and since then I have had some investment income, and also secondary income, but the bulk of my income has come from live and online play.

During the past two years, 90% of my "poker" income has been via the internet, and after starting at .50/$1 I have played as high as $30/$60 but regularly play $5/$10 and some $10/$20. My income spiked at $74 an hour, but overall for this period is $33 an hour (It's tough raising your hourly when you have hundreds of hours at a micro-limit).

I'm being honest here, for those interested (expecially those that are new to online play), there is some nice money to be made, but I am starting to reach a point where it isn't much fun. If I was making $250K, it might be different, but I am looking at a job offer in Greece because its over 100K plus housing, and that's more than I will make this year.

I played as a pro in the 1980's (I'm 46) and quit college to do so, but have been back in college since April of '04, and will get a degree in about a year. I wish I had just finished when I was younger. High school and college should be a major highlight in your life, and losing that to poker is a mistake. The more I see poker "taking off," the more I think it will be around way past your graduation. My opinion is enjoy your schooling, play poker on the side, and get your degree.

I had my first six-figure down swing, then took a week in San Diego with the family, and am back home - I've had a great time playing poker in my life, but I need a break/vacation about every two months now, and I'm not sure that's a good thing.

I'm hoping to see a great deal from the "O'Doyle" group that can get me to 3-4 major tournaments next year, and that will probably be enough to keep me playing, but without that, I may give it a rest.

If I had to sum up my life, and poker, I would use one word:
EGO

Before you play poker, you should leave your ego at the door. I've done way too many foolish things due to my ego, instead of not worrying what other people might think of me or my situation. Don't let that happen to you. Do what's right for you - after giving all avenues an honest look. We get in certain games because of our ego, we chase down a player who "drew-out" on us because of ego, we often don't see the truth because our ego does not want to see it. Hell, I post here because of ego - and it's probably time to rethink that too.

Good luck everybody.

Dogmeat [img]/images/graemlins/spade.gif[/img]