What's your strategy for dealing psychologically with bad beats?

[BarronVangorToth]

While everyone's inclination is to complain about a bad beat, I ultimately prefer not to (granted: I still complain, I just wish I didn't).

This past week at Foxwoods I lost on the river to a one-outter, it got me aggravated, but I kept my cool, said good hand, and walked away from the table and just wandered about for a half-hour, checking out some hot women at the blackjack table that at no time were going to even notice me, watching my buddy Bruce play some No Limit, watching a hot craps table, blah blah blah... After a half hour, I was back in my right frame of mind and I just went back to Plan A, won back what I'd lost, and then some, over the next few hours.

It's not worth getting upset over -- just take a break if required (ideally, you should just be able to move on right away, I usually require a little break from the game) and move on.


Barron Vangor Toth
www.BarronVangorToth.com

[Al Schoonmaker]

Well done.
More people should do exactly what you did.
Regards,
Al

[Hold em 888]

If it truly was a bad beat:
1) Affirm yourself the fact that you did in fact play the hand correctly.
2) Affirm yourself the fact that your opponent got lucky
3) Affirm yourself the fact that playing the hand correctly is the way to win money, while needing to get lucky is the way to lose money
4) Ask yourself seriously : can you deal with the fact that your opponent outdrew you and has money that is rightfully yours. If so, you can continue playing. But if you feel a deep desire to get your money back from this particular guy, or feel like maybe you ought to start calling 3 bets cold pre-flop with 7/5s like he just did and beat him the same way he beat you, or worse, you begin to type comments into the chat field ("you lucky fool!", etc...) you are not on your 'A' game. At this point you want to sit-out, log-out and go for a little stroll while going through steps 1-3 again. When you know your ready to go to the table and play the game like it's supposed to be played, that when the time is right.
Remember, he may have gotten lucky, but these are the people we pray to see when we sit down.

[Bremen]

Most of the time is difficult to alter behavior without an external stimulus. There is no downside to rude behavior online. Worst case is you have to find another table, which online is not even a minor inconvience. So if you have trouble altering your behavior on your own I suggest playing live. Playing live finding another table is not an easy proposition with wait lists and what not. So it is in your best interest not to cause the recreational players any lose of enjoyment. If they're having a good time, they'll drop hand after hand to you, all for the thrill of that time they win one on the river. When they do win on the river, butter them up, make them feel good about themselves, it only increases your EV :0)

[Josh W]

nm

[timmer]

Read Phillips Zen and the art of poker and dwell upon the meanings held with in it .

you must realize that the universal law of cycles dooms you to a re occuring cycle where bad beats are going to be almost common place . Luckily that cycle also holds a place where fantastic rushes are almost common place.

[sfer]

[ QUOTE ]
I smile, tap the table, say "nice hand", and try to mean it, because it is a nice hand--it's the winning hand. I do the same in a B&M or at home. At first, it's hard to do this and not pound the table with your fist instead. With practice, the smile and the tap will come as the natural response unless it's a particularly heinous beat.

[/ QUOTE ]

This works for me.

[Illininate]

Download a song called "It Doesn't Matter" by The Chemical Brothers. It's (more or less) a steady beat throughout the song, with the vocals repeating "It doesn't matter" over and over again.

Put this song on a constant loop while you play.

You take a bad beat, start to get mad, until you get that friendly reminder from The Chemical Brothers - it doesn't matter.

Don't know if this will work for everyone, but it worked for me when I was starting and had a problem handling bad beats. Of course, if you can't stand electronic music, it might just make you more angry. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[keithschnak]

I say to myself, "That's fine, I'll beat him the next __ times he makes that call."