Good article about poker
I don't come across many good articles about poker... This article is a very good one to read though, if any of you are interested in playing the game: Poker Can Be an Addiction or a Character Builder
Poker is fun... it's exciting... it can be financially lucrative... One of the things that poker is not, though, is glamorous. It's a tough way of living. Psychologically, it can be very demanding. For example, you don't ever know if you're going to win money or lose money for the day, or the week, or the month... (and that's the relatively easy part)... Believe me--- if you lose money after working your ass off for a month, it becomes very difficult to get out of bed in the afternoon.
Most difficult though, is that there is a fine line between being a winning player and a losing player. It's easy for a winning player to cross that line, and many times it's extremely difficult to analyze your play and figure out what you're doing wrong.
The feedback mechanisms that we all use to learn are not valid for poker. For example, if you touch something hot, it hurts and you know not to touch it again (unless you're into that sort of thing). In poker though, you need to be very careful to separate the short-term feedback from your long-term results. What I mean is--- you can do very stupid things, make bone-headed plays, and make a lot of money... short-term. That short-term success reinforces in your mind that you are playing good. Over the long-run though, you will lose money by making those bad plays, and our brains are just not designed to automatically process that kind of long-term feedback.
When you first start to learn, and play the lower limits, it's not difficult to evaluate which plays are bad and which plays are good. It's just math. At the higher levels though, math is not as important. It becomes more of an art, and that makes self-evaluation much much more difficult.
Most professional poker players live miserable lives. It's not the glamorous scene that TV portrays. I admit that my life is pretty good--- but it requires a lot of self-control and discipline, something that most people who are attracted to "gambling" as a profession don't have very much of.
The last part of the article deserves to be quoted:
Poker is fun... it's exciting... it can be financially lucrative... One of the things that poker is not, though, is glamorous. It's a tough way of living. Psychologically, it can be very demanding. For example, you don't ever know if you're going to win money or lose money for the day, or the week, or the month... (and that's the relatively easy part)... Believe me--- if you lose money after working your ass off for a month, it becomes very difficult to get out of bed in the afternoon.
Most difficult though, is that there is a fine line between being a winning player and a losing player. It's easy for a winning player to cross that line, and many times it's extremely difficult to analyze your play and figure out what you're doing wrong.
The feedback mechanisms that we all use to learn are not valid for poker. For example, if you touch something hot, it hurts and you know not to touch it again (unless you're into that sort of thing). In poker though, you need to be very careful to separate the short-term feedback from your long-term results. What I mean is--- you can do very stupid things, make bone-headed plays, and make a lot of money... short-term. That short-term success reinforces in your mind that you are playing good. Over the long-run though, you will lose money by making those bad plays, and our brains are just not designed to automatically process that kind of long-term feedback.
When you first start to learn, and play the lower limits, it's not difficult to evaluate which plays are bad and which plays are good. It's just math. At the higher levels though, math is not as important. It becomes more of an art, and that makes self-evaluation much much more difficult.
Most professional poker players live miserable lives. It's not the glamorous scene that TV portrays. I admit that my life is pretty good--- but it requires a lot of self-control and discipline, something that most people who are attracted to "gambling" as a profession don't have very much of.
The last part of the article deserves to be quoted:
I'd like to give the following stern piece of advice to all the new poker players out there. If saying "no" to yourself 3 times out of 4 isn't your cup of tea, then poker is not going to be your friend. You'd be better off having a beer or two. But if you've got the patience to sift through all the garbage while waiting for a good hand, and then can exercise the self-discipline to throw that good hand away when your clear vision says you've been beat, poker can be a satisfying and financially rewarding character builder.
All good poker players have this quality. Most weren't born with it; they developed it. They learned how to tell themselves the truth, even when the truth was disappointing and they can use that virtue to their advantage in all aspects of their lives.
I read my first poker book almost 30 years ago, Poker, a Guaranteed Income by Frank Wallace. It contained a one page epilogue that I believe described true poker most eloquently. I'll summarize that inspiring epilogue here:
Poker is a character catalyst that forces players to reality. Those who evade thinking cannot escape the penalties. The winning poker player views all situations realistically. He pits the use of his mind against the unwillingness of his opponents to think. The loser makes himself a loser. The winner makes himself a winner. Poker is sheer justice.
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