You know you're on tilt, and now...

[Al Schoonmaker]

I think you have thought more clearly about this issue than I have. Thank you for correcting me.

Regards,

Al

[Exitonly]

If you can realize you're on tilt, you should be able to realize don't play anything other than QQ+.

Take your watch off as a mental reminder. Play tight till the blinds come. Leave. Done.

As a side-discussion here - does it not make sense that once you realize and admit you are on tilt then that act alone may be enough to take you off tilt?

I define tilt as being "playing poker without making rational decisions based on one's knowledge of the game"

It is, by this definition, an irrational frame of mind - one can equate it to committing a crime "in the heat of passion" or "in the heat of the moment" - in other words, your emotions have overcome your capacity for rational thought.

However, a crucial component of such a condition is that you cannot possibly have the wherewithal to understand that you are in this frame of mind.

Thus, once you sit there and say to yourself "I am on tilt", you have made a realization that requires you to step outside your immediate circumstances and make a rational assessment. Making an assessment of one's mental state requires a level of self-awareness that is not accessible when you are on emotional overload.

The problem is that your brain is not likely to make the switch from emotional overload to rational self-awareness as fast as you would like - and it will not act on the change immediately.

Great response, Hank.

At the point where I realize that I'm on tilt, the realization itself may be strong enough to temporarily jerk me out of the psychological mindset in which my brain has been hiding. However, my emotional state is not stable. At this point, it may be possible for me to continually jerk myself out of my emotional state, but I will be vulnerable to falling back into it at any point. It may be possible for me to have to discipline to only see flops with QQ+; however, it would also be easily possible that I could slip back into tilt and play these hands very unprofitably.

I do think that there are different degrees of tilt. I think that in some cases, only a break is required, while in more severe cases, leaving the game altogether is a better solution. I have experienced tilt of which I could not rid myself for days. I am now able to spot it sooner and sooner. But once I reach this decision to leave the game, I think leaving immediately without waiting for the blinds is the most profitable decision. Deciding to stay is very results-oriented and not decision-oriented. Poor decisions with profitable hands still cost you money.