Lesson for the day: Don't play when you're tired. If you've had a long day and didn't get to play any poker all day, don't play just to play. Sleep and start fresh the next day.

Boy it sure does make ur life miserable when you run horribly for an entire day.

So far so good. My theory that being a thinking, agressive, creative player is the only way to go is proving to be somewhat truthful. Over the past several days I have been trying to develop a different game from my normal. Being much more aggressive in good situations takes some getting used to, but when done right, can add a few more BB's/100 to your winrate. the only thing with this more tricky style is it's easier to get carried away, so there's the issue i've been dealing with and trying to overcome. I'm gonna pat myself on the back because so far i've been doing a good job of avoiding tilt, and it's been paying off. I find myself in a lot more all-in situations, one because I'm playing more hands, and two because players are starting to react to me differently. Before I was playing superly nitty, and I guess people sort of figured it out.

I'm excited to get even better at this new style and am excited to see the results. I'm really hoping this is the breakthrough I needed. We'll see how it goes. My goal is to continue playing good poker, and don't tilt. Go go go.

I've decided that the only way I will ever truly excel in poker is if I learn how to play a good balanced game, not too tight, not too loose, not too aggro, not too passive, tricky but not spewy. And I will never get there by just playing a completely nit-tastic game. I think I've clenched onto something in the past 2 days that has told me this is the best and only way to become truly good at poker. The problem with me when I try to "mix things up" is that I eventually get carried away and get very spewy and start making a lot of donkish calls. If this part of that game can somehow be avoided, I'll be in very good shape in my poker career. I've been playing no-limit very regularly now for over 2 years and I feel like I should be further along than I am. I'm considered an intelligent person by most people. I am no genius, but I figured I could be with the top 10% of poker players...at least, and do well with it. Not to say that I haven't done decently, which I have. But I should be regularly playing all $5-10NL and up by now I feel, where I'm still playing everything between $0.5-1 and $5-10, and only when the $5-10 games are good. So I really wanna work on my game right now. We'll see what happens this week.

I FUCKED UP. I didn't stick to the masterful "plan" that I was certain would take me to the land of endless money. I tried to get tricky...which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but when I go tricky, I also get a bit reckless at times. Optimally I would like to discipline myself to never get out of hand when I'm in "tricky" mode, at which point I believe I'll be able to earn my highest expected winrate.

The plan was to play nitty, solid poker for an entire week and see how it goes. It was going..okay, not great, but not bad, at least it was in the positives. But it just seemed like something was missing...no thought, no creativity. So I started to watch some cardrunners videos and got some ideas...and all of a sudden I was playing a lot more hands in position trying to exploit my oponents and much as possible and hopefully create an image that would actually let me get paid every once in awhile. But of course eventually I got a little out of hand and I choked. I crossed the threshold of anger, which is so so much easier to do playing this style, and lost a good sum yesterday.

The question is what do i do now? Do I go back to playing nit-tastic, or do I continue to keep 'em guessing, maybe toning it down a little bit, being determined not to cross that threshold of anger. I don't know. The problem is I have a full day's "real" work to do today and no time to play poker. But...it is what it is. I hate that job, i really really hate it.

OK new plan = play like a f*ckin' nit all day everyday. Be perfectly happy with getting no cards and playing absolutely no big pots. Cuz it's a hell of a lot better than what you did this last week, which was get no cards and try to force big pots when you got impatient. Time to nit it up. Reports to follow.

Yesterday went pretty much just as planned. I couldn't afford another bad day, so I did everything I could to pull out a win. I made sure I focused on the bad players rather than going on an ego trip trying to outplay everyone. The truth is I'm not that good and will only break even at best against the good regulars...so why even bother trying to outplay them? Anyway, I cut my $2K deficit i accumulated this week in half yesterday. I am not going to say I will close the entire gap today, which of course I would love to do and more, but I just want to promise myself I will play well and hopefully the results will reflect that. Remember, focus on exploiting the bad players, and it doesn't hurt to wait for that right moment. Play solid poker is all I ask of myself. Give yourself a time goal and try to "hold out" from doing anything foolish for that long and just see what happens -- a little experiment if you will. Good luck at the tables.

So yesterday didn't work out quite as well as I'd hoped...but it could have been worse also. I ended up exactly where I started the day for a break even day after almost 8 grueling hours of play...probably one of my longest days ever. I had to solid sessions at the beginning as cut my 2K deficit for the week in half. Then the next session I lost it all, and the final session was break even. I've concluded I need to start playing more solidly again. I've gotten caught up into trying to be a little tricky as well as trying to outplay everyone. I should be only focusing on the bad players and trying to avoid the good players as much as possible. I should be making smart decisions. So today the gameplan is to make smart decisions and play solid poker. I'm going to make sure I give myself a time limit for the session so I know how long I have to play "solidly" for. It seems to help to have a time goal. Kind of like i have to hold out playing this way for only this much longer. Anyway, again try to stack first before being stacked...it helps a lot. Let's try this one more time.

I feel like my poker game is in a rutt. I believe it has something to do with me not keeping up with this blog and just playing with no clear goal in mind. It's been so crazily up and down it makes me queezy. The good news is I've caught up and more from my humungous loss from a few months back. The bad news is I've reached a road block for a couple weeks now and can't seem to take it anywhere. I'm down 2 grand this week...not good. So...I need a gameplan. Today, I will be very careful in my table selection, only selecting the best tables for $2-4NL+. I will play very carefully. The key is to stack someone before someone stacks you. if you can stack someone first, that usually allows me to set the good momentum for myself and play well throughout the rest of the day.

I've been trying to do some studying...watching more videos and such. I haven't been doing much of that at all and it has not helped me improve my game. I want to make sure I leave time to study the game and focus when I'm doing so. I want to become better, and I believe I can. I'm only 22, so I have plenty of time. Don't rush urself.

This past week was pretty tough to say the least.. Very up and down and I couldn't seem to get anything going for me. I thought I was playing at least decent, but of course when you don't seem to be making the bank your question if you're really playing well or not...it gets a bit gray. Anyway, I did my best to keep my head on straight and was successful in not losing an extreme amount of money during the week. I was almost break even until last night, where I finally got some hands to go my way and was able to book a $2K win and thus a $2K win for the week, which is more than fine for me. If I could win $2K every week I'd be a happy camper. Of course I'm aiming for much higher than that because I do believe the sky is the limit in this game and there's no need to stop aspiring until I'm making at least $500K a year. Higher than that might make my nose bleed a little.

I feel I need to do a better job mentally this week. I need to make sure I'm 100% focused and not getting out of line when I step up to the tables. But at the same time I do need to mix it up and be at least a little bit unpredictable. Lets just start with today, Sunday, and I'll take it from there.