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Originally Posted by Brian Boyko
Jared, forgive me on this, but I haven't read the first book yet. Still, I hope you don't mind if I ask a question:
I have a serious block when it comes to playing in casinos. I regularly play in home games against very tough players - players who crush 1/2 and 2/5 NLHE and PLO, and play in bracelet events (though they've never won one, they have cashed...)
It's a $0.25/0.50 mixed game that includes rounds of $5/10 limit games and there are often straddles, double straddles, and occasionally triple straddles when we're all sitting on stacks of $300-400. And 5-card PLO/8 is in the mix as well...
But when I try to play even 1/2 NLHE in the casino, I get Scared Money Syndrome. Something about buying in for $200 and the possibility of losing it all to a poor play or a suckout bugs me, even though losing $200 in two buy-ins doesn't bug me at all. And before you ask, yeah, I'm properly rolled - even though I don't make my living from poker, I keep my poker funds separate and have 20 buy-ins for $1/2.
Some contributing factors are that the nearest casino is 6 hours away by bus/car, so if I end up going to the casino, and lose a buy-in or two, I feel like I not only pissed away money, but also pissed away a heck of a lot of time.
Am I just doomed to be stuck playing 50PLO and 100NL? Or maybe I should just switch to LHE/LO8 instead?
That’s a tough question. I think you have to ask yourself whether you want to drive 6 hours home from the casino playing as well as you can, making the decisions you know are right – win or lose – or if you want to focus mostly on whether or not you won or lost.
I don’t expect that answer to immediately change the pressure/fear you have when you play, so you have prepare yourself ahead of time. Remind yourself that what you can’t control isn’t where you’re going to focus. You’re going to focus on decision making. The cards will play out how they play out.
When you’re playing, keep reminding yourself of this – or other thoughts you have that are close to it. Reducing fear doesn’t happen all at once, you have to inject these thoughts into instances where the fear shows up and push/force yourself to think/feel that way. Over time the fear will drop steadily. Some days may be worse than others, but if you keep at it, you should see some solid progress in 3-6 weeks. It may not be gone entirely, but much more in control so you can make the right decisions even easier.
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