Attitude Adjustment

Life is what happens to you
while you're busy making other plans.            John Lennon

www.kiwiology.co.nz
   A few months ago I decided to take a month's break from poker. This was in the middle of a prolonged downswing. My results changed from very good to very bad from April this year, and looked set to continue downhill indefinitely. Something similar happened about the same time last year and my winning margin had turned into a losing margin by the end of the year. In an effort to prevent this from happening again, I called a time out. I had become increasingly frustrated with my sudden change of fortune and figured that taking a break would do me good.
   Although I spent the time reading up on poker strategy and thinking about how to improve my game, I didn't actually play any poker during that period. It was actually surprising to me how easy it was to go a month without poker games. Although I missed playing, I managed to find plenty of things to fill my time; things I used to do before my poker obsession started. By the time that I returned to the game I was feeling refreshed and ready to play.
   But my plan to break my losing streak didn't work. I continued to lose in my online poker games in a fairly consistent manner. In fact, in July I had a run of 15 online SitnGo games without cashing even once. The Seven Card Stud games were just as bad, with a steady run of bad results, albeit at very low buy-in levels. But this time around, the string of losses didn't bother me. Each time I lost I just brushed it off and carried on. No worries. At first I figured that this new-found attitude would wear off in time, but it didn't. It appears to be a permanent attitude adjustment. Although my live poker tournament results were a bit better, the new attitude was also evident when things didn't work out. In my second live game, when I was in the top seven players and went all-in with pocket aces, only to be knocked out by someone who called me with Q2 offsuit, I just shook his hand and walked off with a smile. No worries.

   I've been trying to put my finger on what it is that's had such a drastic effect on my way of approaching the game. The more I think about it, the more I come to the realisation that it's about expectations. I think that one of the things that got me so annoyed about my poor form earlier was the contrast with the previous period of very good results. Since the beginning of the year my bankroll had been increasing slowly but steadily and I'd come to the conclusion that I'd finally figured out how to play SitnGos successfully. Going on a losing run even though I hadn't changed my strategy was a bit of a shock to the system. But coming back into the game, although I hoped to start winning again, I wasn't expecting to.
   On reflection, this all goes back to the time when I first started taking the game seriously. When I first started reading about poker it was something of a revelation that there were actually people who could make a living out of playing poker. I think it was always in the back of my mind that if I got good enough, I could be one of those people. As a result, I became very results driven. Even a casual look at my previous posts shows a pre-occupation with my results and the size of my bankroll. So whenever I posted a few losses it was a big problem and the more I tried to analyse my way out of the hole the worse my play got. It wasn't about the game anymore, but about the results.
   Having a break from poker has given me a new sense of perspective. I'm now much more relaxed about the games. I'm no longer obsessing about whether my bankroll is increasing and drawing graphs of my progress. That doesn't mean that I don't care about winning, just that I care less about losing. Most importantly, I'm enjoying playing like I used to and am focused on the game itself rather than the results. Of course I still try to improve my game and play as well as I possibly can. Playing poker is such a terrific challenge and there is always something new to learn. So that's what I concentrate on: learning to play the game as well as I possibly can and letting the results take care of themselves.