For A Better Tomorrow

Where do I start? Lets see… hmm. I do want to say this though, God sure does have his way of doing things. I remember just earlier this week I was going through some emotional problems non-poker which lead me to write my previous post. I didn’t think I’d get the high positive feeling for awhile until this happens.

The first one happened on Tuesday, I managed to pull off taking first place. I had a commanding chip lead at the final table. I won many draws and suffer some tough losses and by 3 players left, I had one million in chips against two players who only had around 120k in chips. It was obvious that they were now fighting for 2nd waiting for me to knock the other person out. At that point, I did nothing else but just clicked on the “MAX” bet and moved all in every hand.

The 2nd tournament happened in January and I did mention finishing 2nd in a tournament in my previous posts, but I didn’t feel like posting it since it was a small tournament and I only took 2nd place. However, I feel this would go nicely hand in hand with my 1st place victory in that it’ll be more of a confidence booster.

Looking at these two victories makes me feel more confident in tournaments. You win some you lose some, but I’ve made it top two in the same tournament in a span of 2 months. Sounds very good doesn’t it? Heh, I like it but I don’t think I’ll be fully satisfied until I hit the Sunday FT weekly. 500 dollar buyin or 200 dollar buyin, it doesn’t matter, I hope to achieve hitting one of those tournaments this year. I have chased for the past year and a half and still have not yet score one of those puppies. I’m going to keep trying and not give up losing hope. I know exactly how tournaments are, they are very brutal. Sometimes, you just have to accept it in order to make it to the final table.

Am I happy with my results? Of course. Am I satisfied? Of course not. I don’t think I’ll ever be satisfied. I think it’s important to have that urge in order to succeed. You have to want it badly enough to capture it. Currently I feel that I will be satisfied with an FT Sunday weekly tournament, but I know myself well enough to want to chase higher. Perhaps a WPT win or something to that extreme. But it won’t be years until I am able to buyin to something like that, and by that time, I may just forfeit the poker world in hopes to chase my filmmaking career.

I sometimes impress myself on how I am able to play poker emotionally with all these crazy things going on in my life. My back is against the wall, and I’m certain that these events happening in my life right now are perhaps one of the toughest. I know it’s hard to say that since I am young and that there will be other problems in life that I will have to learn to endure. The few things that are keeping me positive is poker and the fact that I keep telling myself that this is just a test for being stronger. This is just a test…This is just a test…This is just a test…This is just a test…

Well, what a test this is…because I am going through a lot of deterioration right now. I really “hope” (and sometimes hope is the only thing one can rely on to feel better or stay positive) that I can look back from the future and smile at my early 20’s. I hope that I can look back and say that “I’m glad I went through that because it made me stronger” type cliche….or that I learned so much because of these events. I really hope because honestly, I think that’s all I have right now. Maybe I’m just immature and don’t realize that what I’m going through is a small problem. I don’t know really. I guess there’s a price to pay somewhere when you’re able to succeed in poker. Perhaps maybe these events will make me become a better poker player in the future. I’m not handcuffed from playing yet, but I am handcuffed from growing.

Mood: *Excited*

Living the professional life of playing poker has high emotional ups and downs daily. I’ve totally forgotten what it feels like to spend one day without being excited or depressed. This lifestyle can make a player experience both emotions within an hour. While professionals such as myself try to be strong and maintain the same emotions no matter what happens at the tables, there is obviously a breaking point for everyone. I believe I am pretty strong at not going on tilt. It has to take weeks of brutal beats to set me off, but even then, I can learn from these tough long stretches and become stronger for the next roller coaster ride.

I have four full weeks in March after today. I’ve taken on a pretty cool project recently and I’m kinda excited about it. I think it’s such a healing process to be able to do some other kind of work just for a week to get the mind off poker. The project I’m on is very rewarding, so when I am done, I’m going to take many pictures for posting.

Crypt (friend of mine) recently made me realize that I am playing an enormous amount of poker. I didn’t realize it until he explained it to me. I track my hourly via Pokertracker, so my “clocking in” does not necessarily count until I am dealt a hand. So doing this for 40-50 hours a week, I am probably spending 50-60 hours on poker a week. Many players say that they play 40 hours a week, but if they don’t use the PT to track their hours, their work time would include opening tables, looking for tables, or even just when they immediately sit down in their chair. Many even surf the website while they’re waiting for a table and yet this includes their “hourly” play. There’s obviously nothing with that kind of thinking because essentially they are “spending their time” on poker. Waiting for tables can count. It’s like being at an office job and going on your 15 minute break. Even though you are on your break, you still include it in your “40 hour week”. Imagine if a programmer is not able to “clock in” until they start typing in their first program code. And then when he or she steps away from the desk for coffee or what not, they are immediately “off the clock”. Again, these small things make a difference if they counted for.

So again, I don’t “clock in” until I am dealt a hand, at least that’s how I always looked at it. Sitting there and waiting for an opponent does not count towards your hourly. So when I clock up 150-160 hours of poker a month via pokertracker, I am spending an extraordinary amount of time on poker. Also, I’d like to point out that many live cash games player do not start their hour count when they are dealt the first hand. I’m sure they start counting it when they arrive at the casino and put their name on the waiting list. But again, that’s the way it should be done because they are essentially spending that time on poker.

I find myself in a good position to take this week off. I’ve probably played like 4 hours of poker this week in between my new little project. I feel really good and I am looking forward to next week. March has 4 full weeks, and I plan on taking a lot of advantage of it. I hope to put in a good 40-50 a week according to my PT

It’s strange, the more I break from the tables, the more I am eager to play. I honestly feel very unproductive when I don’t put in the hours per week. I feel like I’m only prolonging my tough runs - which sucks to the “mind”.