Anxiety catches up to me.

[Pokey]

I've got to ask you folks about this lil' problem of mine, because I simply don't know what to do about it. This problem resurfaces all the time while I'm playing, and it eventually gets me to leave. Here it is:

I'm afraid of the tables.

Seriously. Whenever I'm playing poker, I start getting nervous. Hand after hand, my anxiety gradually builds. If I'm in a hand, the tension mounts; if I'm not in the hand, I'm worrying about how soon the blinds will come to get me. I'm always double-counting my stacks, noticing that I've made a pretty penny, and worried that it could all go away if I get a bad beat of two (or three, or seventeen). When I'm down, I'm worried my stacks are getting too short and I'm going to get busted off the table. Always, the short-run scoreboard is in the front of my mind: "if I drop $7, I'll be down for the session," or "$103 profit -- I really don't want to lose more than three bucks" or some such nonsense.

After a couple hours, the tension overwhelms me and I simply have to stop playing to calm down a bit.

This can't be a smart way to play poker. Has anybody else had this problem? How can you deal with it? Is this just something that is supposed to "go away over time"? I need to shift my perspective away, but I'm having a really hard time doing so, and any advice would be welcome.

P.S.: it's not a bankroll issue, either, since I'm usually playing with 400+ BBs. And with my current mentality, even if my bankroll were 10,018 big bets I'd still be saying "I can't lose more than 18 bets or I'll be under 10k BBs in my bankroll."

[toss]

All I can say is that you gotta be confident when you're playing poker. If you're playing scared poker, you're not playing good poker.

[RobbyD]

If your playing in real life put all your chips into one big pile in front of you. Now you cant count them. Seriously... This works.. If your online then I dont know what to tell you.

[RacersEdge]

I was going to say something similar to the pile of chips. Just don't count your chips - it will prevent you from associating a dollar value to them as much. Think of them as just pieces of clay.

It's like playing golf. When you get close to your best score ever, you start playing safe and thinking differently. So there, don't even add the score up exactly. Just focus on one shot at a time (just like the cliche). Keep your focus at the micro -level (golf= this shot, poker = this hand). Add stuff up when your packing up.

[liquidboss]

"You never count your money... when you're sittin' at the table, there'll be time enough for countin'... when the dealing's done."

Note: does not apply to tournaments.

[Harv72b]

I often have the same problem, although moreso when I've been winning at a good rate for the night. I at least manage to force myself to stay on a good table(s) until they start tightening up, but I'm much more apt to call it a night at 250 hands if I'm up 35 BBs or so. I have the opposite problem when I'm down--I get too confident in my abilities & the laws of variance, and tend to chase my losses.

Since I obviously haven't solved these problems yet myself, I can't give you any great advice. But if you're leaving good tables because you're afraid of losing your profits, that's something you seriously need to reflect on--bad beats come around regardless of how well you've been doing on the night, but bad players will keep giving you money as long as they're at the table.

On the other hand, if you're just playing for fun & extra spending cash, then it isn't such a terrible thing to quit when you're ahead or take a break when you're losing. Over the long run you're losing more money than you save by quitting when you're running cold/playing poorly, but not everyone is in this to milk every possible dollar off the felt.

[BoxLiquid]

Right after I read this, this post came to mind.
This program should help you... Only if you're playing online though.

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...=1#Post2372623



And, btw you have to do something about this because it seems to be a form of tilt (anything that causes you to not play your best game). If your case worsens ... you'll be playing a scared game forever which isn't good..

[SomethingClever]

Check out the Tilt Blocker 2000 thread in General.

It's a neat lil' program that will hide how big (or small) your stack is so you don't go on tilt.

Make sure you buy in for 50 BB, and good luck!