Quote Originally Posted by swiggidy
Quote Originally Posted by fat-b
see you next monday
QFMFT
Good call

I’ve had a good couple of days away from the tables and am pleased to say they have been some of the most transformative I’ve had since I can remember. In trying to come to terms with why I repeatedly keep failing to follow the most basic of poker fundamentals such as bankroll management and discipline at the table I have been forced to think about areas of my life in quite a profound way. As a result I have managed to pin-point the problem so far with my poker and also make some real strides in my own personal life.

I’ve come to realize that my inability to look at the longer term picture was partly due to a financial insecurity away from the tables which was being impregnated onto almost every decision I made at the table. I’ve also realized that my dissatisfaction with my current life situation in general meant that I was urgently looking for a quick-fix, this quick-fix mentality was carried forward into my poker. These two pretty major issues have really impacted my game for the worst in these past few months.

These realizations have had a number of consequences. Firstly I’ve started the ball rolling with addressing some financial issues in my life I should have tackled a long time ago, and this has already had a big positive impact on my life. Secondly I have re-evaluated my life and where it is going. I have re-considered the principles (or lack of…) that I’ve been using in making daily decisions in my life, in evaluating where I am at in life, and in evaluating where I want to be in life.

One of the things I’ve realized is that becoming a successful poker player is as much about the transformation that occurs on the way to becoming a successful poker player as it is about actually reaching the finishing line and becoming a successful player.

So… what changes have I made to my poker? Well firstly I have really thought long and hard about ‘the longer term’ approach to poker success. I have changed my frame of reference for success. To be successful is to be successful over days, weeks, months and years. What happens in any one hand, one game, one session or one day should have pretty much zero impact on your success or the way you view your game.

I have been trying to put band-aids on my weaknesses these past few months by repeating and vowing to follow BR management plans for instance, by keep telling myself over and over that I need to stay detached and look at the bigger picture, etc… But I have ignored the issues in my life that I mentioned above and the problem with my overal poker outlook - that these failed attempts signalled.

After quite a bit of thought, In light of all this I have decided to play with 200 buy ins for every stake >$2 that I play at. Aside from the bigger life issues I’ve already made great strides in, I realized that the main reason I spiraled into bankroll degeneracy was because the losses in any one game / session / day meant too much to me. This got me thinking as to what would be an acceptable ‘daily loss’ for me personally, how much of my bankroll could I lose in any given day and really just shrug it off and not be phased? I decided on about 5%, if I’m playing with 100 units of bankroll and lose 10 in one day, the next day I’ve lost 10% of my BR and to me I think that would feel pretty significant. But if I still had 95 units of bankroll left I don’t think I’d feel nearly as bad, that 5% would make a fair difference. In light of this I’ve decided as part of my Bankroll Management Policy, I never want to risk more than 5% of my bankroll in any given day.

I then started thinking about what this means in terms of buy ins. In a ‘worst case scenario', how many buy ins could I lose in one day? I wouldn’t want to stop after losing just one buy in, that can happen at the best of times… not even two, I thought by the time I was approaching 3 or 4 – especially as I start to move up the stakes, this would be a bit more significant. By the time I lost 5 buy ins in one day I think a break for the rest of the day would be wise. Because of this and because I decided I didn’t want to risk more than 5% of my BR in any given day, I decided that 5 buyins couldn’t account for more than 5% of my total BR – that’s how I came at the figure of 100 buy ins for any given stake, because if you are playing with 100 buy ins for any given stake, 5 buy ins will never account for than 5% of your bankroll.

The only exception to the 100 buy in rule I’ve decided will be the first buy in - $2. As I don't have $200 to deposit at the moment I would be unable to play for about a week, but more than this as the sums are so small, so the effect of losing a slightly larger percentage of the bankroll should not be very significant. The reason I struggled so much with this stake in the past is because I was not looking at the long term picture, well actually I was, the problem was I hadn’t assimilated and absorbed the ‘longer term picture’ at my deepest innermost level of thinking. I also had the nagging personal issues that I mentioned in the background which is why my discipline and ability to play sensible +ev poker just completely crumbled after the smallest of losses.

I now realise that EV is about the average profitiability of a descision over many thousands of hands and of almost no consequence, from a results perspective, in any one hand. This is something that I now feel I intuitively understand and coupled with the personal background noise I think I've made a good start at eliminating I'm sure I'm now going to be able to crush these small stakes.

So not only have I made big changes to my poker after some careful thinking about where it’s all been going wrong, but I’ve made some pretty big life-changes – which are going to have as much positive impact on my life as a whole as they are my poker!

Everyone here that has contributed to this development by spending your valuable time answering questions, and pointing out idiotic mistakes over the past few months thank you - and thanks for having the patience to continue offering your advice despite the constant failed attempts I had at implementing it.

I read before that poker is such a good game for the way it strips down everyone to their basic motivations and true self – for the way it reveals peoples characters. I’ve come to realize over the past few days just how true that is.

So thanks again – I think I may actually have a half decent chance of turning things around. OK, diatribe over, just wanted to share my progress so far with you all.

My plans for the coming couple of months are to climb up the micro stakes as and when buy ins allow. Once I pass 2nl the increase in BR has to be pure profit, no depositing in a futile attempt to cut the learning process. I'm going to deposit $30 soon and play 2nl. I'm going to add tables in as per Chardrians earlier advice (add 1 table @ $40, another @ $50 etc... dropping one out if the bankroll should dip by $10).

Goals for the coming two months: -

2nl (until BR reaches $500)
5nl (until BR reaches $1000)
10nl (until BR reaches $2500)