The only bad luck in life is bad health. Everything else is an inconvience.
Benny Binion
I tilt.
Since my very first time sitting at the felt, this has been my biggest leak, my biggest weakness. All my life I have been a fierce competitor. I hate to lose. I have mellowed as I get into my later 30′s but if I am playing a game, I am playing to win and I hate to lose. Growing up I had always been harder on myself than I have been a “bad loser” in sports situations, but at the poker table especially if there is liquor is involved, which with cards live is most of the time, I can be a “bad beat teller” and/or complainer. It is well known that Phil Hellmuth at the poker table drives me nuts, and at my worst, he’s got nothing on me, and that drives me insane to think about.
I am known to have “bad luck”. I perpetuate this perception probably by bitching about having bad luck I suppose. I have always been affected by “bad beats”, perceived or otherwise, but its getting worse. My last few live sessions I have tilted off buyins with bad play following unlucky hands, and/or bad results. I had no business sitting at that cash table last night. I was in no mind-frame to make proper poker decisions. Had i been drinking, I could have lose a number. Because I was sober I had sense enough to stop, thankfully.
2010 will now be about one thing only in regards to my poker game. Establishing a bulletproof mindset. I used to joke about “unfavorable outcomes on the river rolling off my back”, essentially me making fun of my outbursts or my Hellmuth like reactions to bad beats. If I am ever to get anywhere in poker I have to fix this right now. And with that in mind I picked up Alan N. Schoonmaker’s book “Your Worst Poker Enemy” this afternoon and have been reading it off and on this evening. I will post some more about this book later.
