Maximizing EV - Career Management: Discipline, Routine & Habits

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Maximizing EV - Career Management: Discipline, Routine & Habits

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sauloCosta10

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Maximizing EV - Career Management: Discipline, Routine & Habits

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sauloCosta10

POSTED Dec 27, 2020

Saulo Ribeiro aka sauloCosta10 discusses the important concepts of discipline, routine and habits in the second installment of his attempt to shed light on the often overseen skill of career management.

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Drelza 4 years ago

Thanks for the content Saulo :D

I'm one of your old students (Michael, the Australian) and have been really enjoying your content. From your coaching I've been able to take the year off and now am beating nl1k on ignition/apps, taking shots at nl2k at the moment. The only thing I wish is that you'd made this video at the start of the year so I could've learned these lessons earlier on!

Cheers,
Michael

sauloCosta10 4 years ago

Hey Michael, glad to see you here!

I'm happy to know you are doing so well man. From our sessions I could see you had more appetite for risk than the average guy :D so I'm not surprised you have been finding success at the tables. Keep crushing!

The only thing I wish is that you'd made this video at the start of the year so I could've learned these lessons earlier on!

It's never too late, right? ;) more videos like this coming soon \o/

Jeff_ 4 years ago

Hello Saulo, Happy new Year!!!

Actually I wanted to ask about future of poker and liqudity in few years but will skip it. Doubt anyone know how it will go, every year some people are saying - this is last year after little sense to play....

So I got question about studies. My study routine is decent (I feel) however I want to ask expert opinion. While playing I mark hands and at the end of the day I try to go over them. Reviewing all of them taking quite long time (1-3 hours depending on amount), however I'm not sure how beneficial it is. Since I likely forget ~90% information few days after. Some situations I write in my notepad, thats more helpful of course.
What is your opinion on that?

And how many hours do you think micro stakes player should study each day and low-mid stake palyer?

sauloCosta10 4 years ago

Hello Jeff_, how are you today man? Thank you! Happy 2021 for you too <3

So I got question about studies. My study routine is decent (I feel) however I want to ask expert opinion. While playing I mark hands and at the end of the day I try to go over them. Reviewing all of them taking quite long time (1-3 hours depending on amount), however I'm not sure how beneficial it is. Since I likely forget ~90% information few days after. Some situations I write in my notepad, thats more helpful of course.
What is your opinion on that?

That's a great question and I discussed it with my 500nl students last week. I think there is a much higher chance such method is not beneficial at all than there is a chance you are improving a lot from it. The only way I can see it being useful is if you are spending a lot of time on one unique sim, trying to dig deep on why the strategy is the way it is. But thats not how most people spend their time browsing sims in the solver. For a long time I was also part of the people who just solve hands to check if they misplayed or not. Or best case scenario spend 5-10 min with the simulation checking how solver plays other lines. I think thats pretty close to useless and I'm now advising my students to study using mainly 2 different methodologies:

1 - practicing with immediate feedback (SGT) in order to solidify knowledge into unconscious competence;
2 - study the fundamentals of the game through the sims. Ask questions about why the strategy looks the way it looks and build models to try and answer them.

While playing I mark hands and at the end of the day I try to go over them

From my experience and what my students tell me, studying post grind is not very effective because we are usually very tired and our mental capacity of absorbing information or thinking deeply about something so complex gets diminished. So I only study in the morning and a lot of my students do the same. I think you probably already thought about this since you are experienced but thought it was worth mentioning for other people reading.

And how many hours do you think micro stakes player should study each day and low-mid stake palyer?

Very important topic as well, which I will eventually cover in one of the videos for this series. The thing I regret the most about my career was to study 1hour per day reviewing hands when I was at microstakes. If I could go back in time with the knowledge I have today I would have a study:grind ratio of at least 1:1. This will result in 3 to 4 hours of study per day. And with that I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have spent 2 years at 100nl or lower. For a low-mid stake player, which I'm assuming is specifically 200nl grinder, I think it would depend a lot on long term vision and IRL circumstances. In most countries, being a winner at 200nl already means making a very good amount of money, so if your long term vision doesn't include playing high stakes then I don't think 1:1 is the way to go. You can probably sustain your edge for future years with a lower volume of studying (I wouldnt go too low though, minimum 1h per day). But, if you do want to eventually move up to 1knl+ and have enough money saved up such that grinding less wouldn't cause you any stress in the short term, then I would go for 1:1 for sure (3-4h per day).

Jeff_ 4 years ago

Hello Jeff_, how are you today man? Thank you! Happy 2021 for you too
<3

Hey doing good, finishing year and will take sometake off \o\

I think there is a much higher chance such method is not beneficial at
all than there is a chance you are improving a lot from it.

This is very often crosses my mind, nevertheless I have hard time getting away from checking hands at the end of the day(mentally). Just because always after sessions I will have hands which I would want to have immediante feedback. Either need to study very carefully some spots (which I actually doing this year- here I nodelock, change strategy to range bet for example and see how EV changes, try to find something which I would miss in game(calls/folds/x/R).....) or go rather faster to not waste a ton of time.
However I kinda noticing coumpound effect. Since I go over the hands everyday and for long time even if I forget 90% of information I still improving

2 - study the fundamentals of the game through the sims. Ask questions
about why the strategy looks the way it looks and build models to try
and answer them.

Only problem with that it takes ton of time. Possible 1 deep look ~30m - 1 hour. And when you have 10 hands I suppose need to make priorities.

And lastly my life vision doesn't allow me to play in the evening. So I gotta study at noon/evening which is obviously likely slightly negative but not the end of the world.

Thank you for reply and cheers \o/

RunItTw1ce 4 years ago

1 - practicing with immediate feedback (SGT) in order to solidify
knowledge into unconscious competence; 2 - study the fundamentals of
the game through the sims. Ask questions about why the strategy looks
the way it looks and build models to try and answer them.

What does SGT mean?

From my experience and what my students tell me, studying post grind
is not very effective because we are usually very tired and our mental
capacity of absorbing information or thinking deeply about something
so complex gets diminished.

I tend to agree that our brains absorb the most information in the morning at our peaks. I usually have a break between study and first session. If 1 = study and 2 = session then wouldn't your session have worse results when its study + session or session + study ? (1+2) = 3 and (2+1) = 3. Same amount of energy is used, but I guess session can be some what robotic due to energy level after a study session. Another important aspect of this and something I failed at a few times is studying before a session then trying to apply a new concept without really know the game tree behind it. I would learn something new for flop play, but get lost on turn and rivers on what cards are good for barreling.

Gedis92 4 years ago

Hey, could you give the exact name of the book you were talking about at the end of the video? Thanks for the video

sauloCosta10 4 years ago

Hey Gedis92, the book is How to win friends and Influence people, from Dale Carnegie. Must read for life EV imo.

RunItTw1ce 4 years ago

Goals for 2021

Couple of notes
1) I would not refer to downswing or upswing being your career is just one long session! Talking about a downswing just enables a negative mental mindset or negative emotions where people are constantly thinking about it and not clear minded.

Those who do not plan are planning their own failure.

2) The structure and routine you build should be written down. Don't just think about it and say this is what I'm going to do tomorrow or this week, this is what I want to accomplish this year. Make sure these things are written down on daily, weekly, and yearly schedule to make them more real. Able to hold yourself accountable once they are written down. A-Game Poker Master Class . Vision board also helps as some times goals are like webs and harder to organize in an excel format.

Determine a monetary loss for yourself in case of not achieving your
goals.

3) This is something I disagree with, but something I used to do all the time. I spoke with Chris Primer about this as one of RIO mental coaches on this very topic and something he advised against. I would ask the BRPC psychologist about this and why it's bad long term. I still see merits in it short term for building a habit but once that consequence is gone, people might double down on some of their bad habits if loss of money was their only motivation. I used to bet $500 for the month with a friend on stuff like no soda / alcohol or must go to the gym 5 days a week and whoever didn't complete the goal would pay the other person $500. I think it's a temporary fix for underlying mental / health issues of people's long term visions.

Overall thought this was an excellent video and goes hand in hand with a lot of what Eliot talks about as well. Looking forward to the next part.

sauloCosta10 4 years ago

1) I would not refer to downswing or upswing being your career is just one long session! Talking about a downswing just enables a negative mental mindset or negative emotions where people are constantly thinking about it and not clear minded.

I dont think I agree with that. Avoiding to talk about it doesnt necessarily help. Downswings exist, they are periods in which we accumulate losses due to negative variance. Ideally such periods should have no impact in our mental state, to the point where talking about it would be a waste of time, but thats not the experience of 99.9% of poker players. Also talking about it doesn`t necessarily lead to negative thoughts or emotions as you seem to imply. One can learn to accept and act naturally towards downswings.

2) The structure and routine you build should be written down. Don't just think about it and say this is what I'm going to do tomorrow or this week

Yes, of course. Just thinking about it would be kinda silly. As I mentioned in the video, I use excel but maybe there are better tools for this specific purpose.

3) This is something I disagree with, but something I used to do all the time. I think it's a temporary fix for underlying mental / health issues of people's long term visions.

I think expecting that trick to be anything other than that would be very optimistic xD. For most things in life, no one action will be a permanent fix or instant solution to a problem. Its generally an accumulation of several tricks and exercises and the development of good habits. So within that context, using or at least trying as many as you can makes a lot of sense. Also usually people react differently so it might work for you but not for someone else and vice versa. The key is to always be open to try and see if it works. I personally tried it once and it worked but Ive always found better ways to motivate myself so I never used it again.

Overall thought this was an excellent video and goes hand in hand with a lot of what Eliot talks about as well. Looking forward to the next part.

I`m happy you liked the video! More coming soon \o

Daniel Clemente 4 years ago

Hi Saulo,

Great vid! You touch on many important points. Your comment on healthy life habits (sleep, diet, exercise) is a key one that can't go overlooked imo. Particularly for me, getting my sleep schedule under control has really helped me in so many ways this year.

I wanted to ask about the days off. Your first and 3rd rules to me at first glance were inconsistent! Taking a day off for me necessarily means I break the "study every single day" mantra. Though I definitely respect the idea of studying every day to build up the habit.

I am definitely someone who is prone to burnout I believe. I have a tendency to take 3 weeks and only do poker things, only to then burn out and not find the energy/motivation to play for weeks after that.

So do you recommend still keeping up with the study during off days? Something lower energy like reviewing some hands/playing GTO trainer for <= an hour, simply to keep the habit up? Or do you think it's better to take the day off entirely and let the brain reset?

Also, any other activities that help you recharge on days off personally? Particularly this year with having to stay indoors, I often find myself declaring "this is an off day", but out of boredom/not having other activities I end up putting in a short session, or watching RIO videos, which then contributes to the burnout for me.

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