Poker Journal Entry #1: When I still thought I could find the "RULES"

 

    

Poker Journal Entry #1: 

When I still thought I could find the "RULES"

This is my first entry in my learning journal that documents my poker learning journey.  I started out by hitting up the classic poker strategy site 2+2.  I went to the micro NL section and started in the pinned posts.  There was one that caught my eye about how to beat the micros.  I didn’t think it would matter too much that it was about 7 years old (duh!)  I read through it and made a bulleted list of my major learnings. 

   The major learnings for this day were that if I wanted to beat the micros all I had to do was start overfolding rivers.  They listed a bunch of hands and spots that proved their theory and they had a graph that made it look like it was a very successful strategy at these levels.  The list (above) included the following “rules” for beating the lowest stake games:

-          Fold to massive river bets and overbets

-          Fold to triple barrels on bad runouts

-          Fold to triple barrels when I am low in my range

o   I had no idea what was really meant by ranges back then.  I had a clue from the context I had heard them mentioned in, but I didn’t really know what they were or how to define someone’s range AT ALL

-          Fold to triple barrels on paired boards with only top pair

-          Fold to bets on 4 card straight boards

-          Fold to bets on 4 card flush boards

-          Fold to ALL turn check raises

     Okay, I am not hating on all of this, but I think looking back it was way too simplified.  The other problem with this is that it gives the impression of being a solution to any poker problem.  That is obviously not the case, but I didn’t know that back then.  I really thought I had read one (long) post on a message board and had cracked the poker code.  I was ready to go and crush.

     I spent one day memorizing all of my bullets in my list and then I was ready to get out in the streets and make it happen.  I probably played 3 hands before I started back with all my bad habits: bluffing without any equity (I didn’t really know what equity was,) and assuming everyone else was over bluffing as much as I was.  I know what you are thinking, “How could you follow the rules on your bullet list while you are also assuming everyone is bluffing?”  Great question, the answer is simple, I COULDN’T.  I started letting my ego get involved and before I knew it I was saying “fuck those rules! I know they are bluffing me.  I call…   DANGIT I lose again!”

     I didn’t realize it while I was in the games, but poker was scratching a lot of itches I hadn’t been scratching since I had straightened my life out and gotten sober.  It let me feel like a victim, it let me get angry about things, it let me get carried away with something that has an addictive effect on the human brain.  I couldn’t see it, but at the poker table, I was the person I used to be.  I was the person I had worked so hard to make better.  I might as well have been grabbing a bottle of booze and going to town for the first time in years because I was letting my ego and my dopamine cravings rule me.

     I would make a big call, know I shouldn’t, get tilted, play crazy, lose more, and repeat those steps until I was fed up with playing.  Later on, I would review a bit of the poker I had played and excuse it as tilt, that way the only improvement I needed to make for the next day to be a success was to “Not Tilt”  So easy, right?   This time was different than the past, thank goodness.

     I couldn’t lie to myself like I used to.  I had dismantled myself and put myself back together while I was going through the process of rebuilding from my rock bottom.  During that process, I learned the ways I liked to trick myself into self-destruction.  Once I had been away from the tables for about an hour it became very clear that I was repeating those old behaviors, but I was just using bad decisions on the poker table instead of bad decisions throughout my whole life. 

     I used my evening study session reviewing my session and calling myself out for every time I got caught in victim thinking, or let my dopamine take me away from my strategy.  It sucked pretty bad to have to admit that I had taken such a huge step back in mindset, but I have learned to be honest about my fuck ups and to use them for growth.  I finished off my evening session with some meditation.  I tried to think about keeping my calm, controlled mindset to the poker table.  I knew it wouldn’t happen overnight, because nothing ever does, but I knew if I kept it as a primary focus I would make it there eventually.

Thanks for reading and make sure to check back next time when I unveil the next entry in my learning journal and a bit about the experience I went through trying to have it all click and turn into in-game success.

If you would like to see a bit about my history in the game of Poker please click here