Demondoink

Starting a new routine

On Sunday I found myself almost feeling addicted to my phone. I think that sometimes we use phones as some sort of soothing tool, in an attempt to make us feel better. We think that by continuing to scroll, check social media and send random messages then our mood will improve. I had just watched Rangers lose (yet another) game against Celtic in a cup final and there was one or two other things on my mind too. As a result I just kind of mindlessly stayed glued to my phone for hours after the game and didn't do anything productive. I would set my phone down and then feel instantly inclined to pick it up again.

Overall I would say I am pretty decent at staying off my phone (I leave it at home when I head out on a walk or go to the gym/yoga class). If I'm out with friends/family at a restaurant or whatever then I barely even glance at my phone throughout the meal. However, when you are lying around at home by yourself then it can become easy to doomscroll or just stay glued to your phone for hours at a time, unless you are careful and conscious.

Suddenly I got a flash back to a point earlier in the year when I done the 'no phone for a week' challenge, where I would limit my daily screen time to 30 minutes or less. So I searched for the 'downtime' feature' and decided to go extreme- I cannot use my phone for the next 12 hours. This was around 2am, and I will often watch Youtube before I go to sleep and upon waking up. When I was doing this challenge I would leave my phone in another room as I slept, but soon after ending the challenge I slipped back in to bad habits again and would take it with me to my bedroom as I went to bed.

So I tossed the phone to the side of my desk and left it in my office.

I went to sleep around 3am, woke up for perhaps an hour or so and then fell back asleep until 12pm. For the past few weeks I've also been falling out of the habit of meditation. Usually I would do 12 minutes per day, followed by reading around 10 pages of a random book that I would happen to be reading. Typically I read two books at the same time (well not literally the same time as my eyes work in tandem and are unable to read two different books simultaneously lol).

One is typically some sort of self improvement book, and the other some type of non fiction- sometimes a biography/autobiography or perhaps a book about war, geopolitics etc. Occasionally I will read a fiction book, but not often. I read 1984 earlier this year and enjoyed that- though some would argue it's becoming less and less of a fiction these days. At the moment I am reading 'the law of attraction' (again) and 'unmasked', which is a really good book about crime scenes, cold cases etc.

I have found that how I start my day is vital to how the rest of my day unfolds.

If I start it in a poor manner, perhaps by watching two hours of Youtube and then just lying around on the sofa on my phone or something, then typically the rest of the day will be kind of lazy and unproductive.

However, when I start the day productively, often the rest of the day unfolds in a similar manner. I am more conscious and less unconscious (the latter leads to mindless phone usage).

So today I woke up without a phone in my room. That removed the option to check social media, watch Youtube or send random messages. As a result I done my 12 minute meditation, followed by reading some of the 'law of attraction'. I think that what some of that books says is perhaps a bit hocus pocus, but I also think it's true that our thoughts often manifest in to our reality.

If we think negative things we often receive negative outcomes, and if we think positively we often receive positive outcomes. We attract people in to our lives that are similar to us, and if we don't attract the sort of people that we like, then that says a lot about us! We may struggle in one or two aspects of our lives, and see the same results (or lack thereof) year after year. Thus, clearly, our thoughts play a massive part in determining the outer aspects of our lives- whether that be interactions, relationships, success, health, poker etc.

Upon getting up I decided to skip breakfast and just head straight out of the door to the gym. It was something that I enjoyed while looking after Rocco- I would have to walk him as soon as I woke up cos it was already later than he would usually get walked (as my parents are on a more normal sleeping pattern). We only get light until around 4pm just now, so it's easy to miss it if you wake up around 12pm, do meditation/reading etc, watch Youtube, study, make breakfast etc and then head out the door.

Anyways, I ended up having my most productive day for a while. I left my phone at home and didn't get back until almost 5pm as I walked each way to the gym, done a push workout, went to the sauna, read 20 pages of unmasked and then done a food shop on the walk back home. That meant, apart from a quick 5 minute check after I woke up, I didn't look at my phone for 15 hours. My mood is so much better today due to the combination of exercise, sauna, being productive and staying off my phone as much as possible.

I also ended up playing online for the first time in two weeks (having been away in Prague and then having no interest in playing after arriving home last week). I only played for a little over an hour as the games were completely dead with basically no fish and no 1k+ games running, but I was happy to at least get in some hands and shake off the online poker rust again. It felt nice to be back.

Going forward I want to stick with this routine. Granted it is literally day one, but I really like the 'get the fuck out of the house' first thing approach. No messing around. No breakfast. Get outside. My phone is locked between 2am-2pm going forward too.

I actually love reading too. One of my favourite things to do is hit the sauna after the gym and then lie down on one of the loungers and read for 20-30 minutes.

I also booked flights to go and see my brother in Australia early next year. I am only going for a month for now, as I still have a lot of work to get done with the house, but I will see how I enjoy it and then take it from there. I'm unsure whether or not I'll be living in Scotland next year, so I'll just try out different places and see if there is something that suits me. If not then I'll just keep on looking- or perhaps I will realise that Scotland is the right place for me, who knows! I am going to be pretty open minded.

I hope everyone has a great, productive week :)

Prague+ other things

It has been quite an eventful past week or so- having left Inverness last Tuesday in order to stop by my home town for a day, before flying out to Prague from Edinburgh on Wednesday. I wanted to play live poker at least once this year (which I have now achieved) and also do another hostel trip. Obviously staying in a hostel is far from ideal when you are finishing poker very late at night, and when other people in the room can snore etc and affect your sleep negatively, but I think its also important to sometimes do the opposite of your normal.

So for someone who grinds online and lives alone, then I wanted to grind live and sleep in a eight bedroom dorm haha. In general I also like the kind of people who stay in hostels. They tend to be more open minded than the average person, more social and also eager to meet and interact with new people. Where as in our home towns/cities, we often tend to stick with the same group(s) of people and are less eager to meet new people and make new acquaintances and friends.

As beautiful as Prague is, I still think that it's far better visiting places in the Summer when it is warm and when the days are much longer. Of course there is something special about the cold, dark nights in contrast to the bright, luminous Christmas lights that are littered throughout most European cities at this time of year. Yet I would take 25c weather and light until 10pm any day of the week!

However, beggars can't be choosers, and this seemed like a good stop to go to and revisit a city that I had never been to until last Summer. I arrived late on Wednesday night and had registered (online) for the 7pm Thursday flight of the $1k. This was supposed to be a fast flight, with shorter blind levels, but we ended up playing until after 5am as the bubble seemed to go on forever.

It was actually funny, cos on the (as it turned out) last hand of the evening, I actually just ran off and went to the toilet because I was so desperate. I could have likely waited another 5-10 mins, but unless I got AA then it wouldn't have really made any sense to go all in pre flop anyways, and even with AA you could argue that it's higher EV to fold, lock up the min cash then try to double post bubble.

The way I look at it is like this- if I have AA and I'm called, I have 80% equity, thus meaning I bust 20% of the time. However, if I fold everything, do I bubble more than 20% of the time? The answer is almost always no unless I am one of the shortest few stacks remaining.

Of course this isn't an exact science, cos future game comes in to play etc, but I still think it's a good overall view of how moronic it is to stack off with (almost all) hands when you are on the direct bubble of a tournament.

Anyways, I returned to bag up my chips, grab an Uber back to the hostel before making some pasta at 6am and getting to bed at around 7am. Fortunately Friday was a day off, before we returned on Saturday for Day 2.

I never got a ton going on Day 2, though I did double up once or twice. However, in the penultimate hand I opened AKo ep off 18bb before the big stacked sb 3bets me. I 'jam' leaving one chip behind as we are on a direct money jump, and he puts me all in on a JTx flop. I tanked post flop before the dealer called the clock (I didn't even know this was allowed tbh) and unfortunately I directly bubbled the 400 Euro pay jump. I cashed for 2.7k.

I ended up playing a random 550 Euro event later on in the evening, but bust relatively close to the money. I actually played one kind of hilarious hand bvb where I limped J7s vs some guy (I think he was a fish but I'm not 100% sure). I think we were around 50-60bb deep. I stabbed A92r and he calls (I think my hand is probably a better x as I dunno how many better hands I fold out). Turn is a rainbow 6x and I check, essentially giving up. He stabs small and the red line/exploitative voice inside of me tells me that this bet is weak as shit and I should just go after it. I end up x raising a no equity hand, then on the Tx river I feel obliged to follow through (I'd probably give up on most other rivers tbh) and he snap calls with a random T6s. It was a little annoying cos imo there is almost no chance he calls if he has, for example, Q6/J6, but I guess my over aggressive bluff was suitably punished!

The guy was clearly tilted about an earlier hand I played vs him when I 4bet jammed JJ for around 30bb and spiked a set vs his AA, so it would have been better in hindsight to just have zero bluffs against him and go for value. However, I still think it's very unlikely he would have called had he not binked a random two pair, and he will have a lot more weak 2nd/3rd/4th pairs relative to two pairs or Ax. So it was still, almost certainly, a +EV bluff- unless he decides to spite call down with any pair haha.

This session finished around 1am, and having looked at the next couple days schedule (basically the only tournament worth playing was a 2k high roller) I decided against playing and just vowed to do some sightseeing, reading, socialising etc instead.

What I noticed is that without the constant use of technology, the days tend to go by a lot slower and you have so much more time to do other things. I averaged around four hours of phone screen time throughout the trip (which is about normal for me) but usually I also go on my computer to grind, study etc and I also watch Youtube/sports etc either on my TV or at the pub. So in reality my actual daily screen time could easily be double this. I didn't take my laptop nor watch any TV etc while I was away.

As a result I read 'the four hour work week', which I really enjoyed, and also took a bunch of notes and answered the questions at the end of every chapter. I got several good ideas from that book that I will add in to my life- for example the 'mini retirement' or 'batching' tasks together on certain days. The latter suits my mind very well cos I am someone who prefers to do everything in one sitting (for example responding to messages) otherwise I will just continually put off the task/chore/errand until I eventually feel like doing it.

I averaged around 20k steps per day too, making sure I would get outside at least 2-3x per day and go on walks around the city. It's funny but when you are in a hostel then you feel kind of guilty if you laze around (and you don't really wanna hang around in a eight bedroom dorm). People are coming and going all the time, and you want to make sure you don't waste the day too. Where as when you are sitting at home, then it can be easy to allow hours to pass by without much awareness of time or the fact that you are completely wasting it.

I met some cool people and had some very interesting conversations. I had a random argument with a live pro who kept staring everyone down like he was on the final table of the WSOP. I tried to get to sleep with the worlds worst snorer in the bed beneath me- who managed to turn the entire room in to an enemy. I managed to get my first and last live cash of the year, and I even bought a Pokerstars t-shirt to prove that I am still a fish at heart.

As I currently write this, I am in a bar of a random hotel in Inverness. I arrived home after 3am on Wednesday morning to realise that my heating wasn't working and that I had a leak in the pipework. It's pretty cold at this time of year, so it's not really suitable to be in the house (other than sleeping/cooking) as its sitting at around 10c in the living room without any heating on.

Fortunately the plumber is coming tomorrow and will hopefully resolve the issue. I also thought I had lost my bag or that it was stolen as I got the bus back in to Edinburgh (towards my parked car) but fortunately I flagged down the same bus I'd gotten on over an hour before and managed to get the bag back.

Otherwise some petty criminal would have been walking around Edinburgh in my Pokerstars t-shirt.

Perhaps these are signs from 'the universe' that it is time to move on, that my horizons lie beyond Scotland. Next year will be a year of change. All I know for certain is that I will see small bet sizing's from fish float betting the turn as weak, and attempt to punish them, and that I will be wearing my Pokerstars t-shirt while doing so. The rest is up in the air...

GG.

I'm going to EPT Prague on the 4th-10th of December. I won a 1,100 Euro ticket earlier on in the year in a satellite that I need to use up before April, so thought this would be a decent tournament to go to. I'll be playing the Eureka main, but I'm gonna fly back before the EPT main as I'm not really bothered about playing it tbh.

If anyone else is there and wants to catch up drop me a message. I was planning on writing a post tonight but I don't have any time as I gotta be up in six hours time and still haven't packed etc. I'm not flying for another day but I have to go back to my hometown etc first to do a couple things.

GL to anyone else who is going!

Hey man. Thanks for the reply, I will respond to your properly tomorrow!

Edit:
I just opened the Youtube tab and the chill mix was 1:40 hours in (I started playing it at the beginning of writing this post). That's definitely the longest time I've ever spent writing a post lol.

Also I almost never take my phone with me on a walk, but my family wanted photos of Rocco so I made an exception today. He is extremely photogenic. This was a walk up Ord Hill, on the outskirts of Inverness.

The ant 'trapped' in the circle

I was listening to a podcast the other day and in it, the guest mentioned about the 'ant in the circle' experiment. This involves placing an ant (or however else you get the ant in to this position) on to a piece of paper, before drawing a circle around it. The ant then proceeds to try to 'escape' before experiencing an invisible barrier any time it approaches the line.

Sure, I am sure some of this is to do with the toxic smell of a freshly drawn pen line, but nonetheless, it still acts as a good anecdote for us humans and highlights the fact that many of the boundaries that hold us back in life are merely ones that we created within our own minds.

I am curious, what are the limiting beliefs that you draw in your own mind?

You don't actually have to answer (but also feel free to), yet perhaps just taking a note of whatever springs to mind may help you to start to overcome them.

Personally speaking I have a few, most of which I am already pretty conscious of and I'm trying to work through.

The five most common limiting beliefs when I done a quick web search were as follows;

1. Self-doubt: “I’m not good enough” or “I’m not capable.”
2. Fear of failure: “I’ll never succeed” or “I’ll be judged.”
3. Imposter syndrome: “I’m just pretending to be competent” or “I don’t deserve this.”
4. Negative self-talk: “I’m not worthy” or “I’m not deserving.”
5. Fear of change: “I’ll lose control” or “I’ll be uncomfortable.”

I wouldn't say I've ever really suffered from fear of failure tbh, I don't mind failing and learning in the process. I've never suffered from imposter syndrome, and not really fear of change either- I've lived with different flat mates in different cities, I've travelled a lot, I've tried different poker formats (starting off in mtts then converting to cash), and I've tried tons of different sports over the years- football, golf, tennis, bouldering, running, yoga, snooker/pool/darts, weightlifting, swimming, hiking etc. I really try to force myself to do new things so that I do not experience the same day on repeat for years on end.

However, I guess I suffered a lot in the past from self doubt and negative thoughts. I am much better nowadays through a combination of meditation, reading/learning, introspection and by adopting healthy habits that put me in a better mood- which is also a great way at quietening negative thoughts.

I remember one time (over seven years ago) a girl asked me what my biggest fear as, and I literally said something along the lines of 'being at football and everyone picks a partner but I am left alone'. I noticed this translating to girls too, where as soon as another guy was interested as well, I would self sabotage in some way to protect myself from being rejected and the other guy being selected ahead of me.

This wasn't rational in any way, because I also knew I had a lot going for me.

I was actually playing golf earlier this year with some random older brothers (they were probably in their early sixties) and one of them said he was a child psychologist, and at one point in the round asks me if I'm a middle child (which I am) then proceeds to tell me how they are often the most messed up of the three psychologically speaking because the eldest brother receives a ton of attention because he is the first, and the youngest gets coddled because he is the last.

Then there's the middle one.

I never really thought about this tbh, but after he mentioned that, it kinda made sense. I guess there was some kind of deep rooted ineferiority complex that then transferred in to my teenage, and eventually adult life. The reason that I feared being selected last when asked to partner up at football, was because I felt that way growing up from my family- even if they didn't consciously/intentionally do this.

Anyways this is already pretty open so I shouldn't go too deep, but at the same time writing this out also helps me to identify my own flaws and to connect the dots in a clearer way. Plus it might help other people as well, or enable them to identify their own limiting beliefs!

The cool thing about living alone for the first time is that you spend a lot of time by yourself, so it forces you to get comfortable in your own company. I think that a big reason that people jump from relationship to relationship is because they are scared to be alone.

For example I had a friend who, a couple of years ago, was dumped by his girlfriend at the time. We went for a walk and he was telling me about how life was pointless unless you shared it with a partner. He told me he was depressed and essentially needed a girl to fill that void.

Well, he ended up finding another girlfriend relatively soon after and they have been together ever since, but essentially he has just ditched his friends and spends almost all of his time with her. On a night out he would hold her leg when they were sitting down and walk up to the bar with her every time she went for a drink.

So it's kind of weird because on the one hand you could say that the single person is 'bad' at relationships and that the personally constantly in relationships is 'good' at them, but is that a healthy relationship? Is putting all your self worth and happiness in to another person really a good way to live? Is being depressed any time you become single a positive?

Of course there is a happy medium where you can be in a healthy relationship, which is probably what we should all strive for.

Anyways, I think the point I am trying to make is that we (most likely) all have some sort of limiting beliefs in our minds, that will show up in many different ways- whether that be relationships, our health, our career, our habits etc. We draw imaginary circles around ourselves and then live according to those circles.

My intention is to erase the remainder of the lines that still circle my mind.

I still experience some negative thoughts these days, of course, but I am so much better than 5-10 years ago.

Other circles that I have draw in my mind are-

1. Wanting to live abroad, but not pulling the trigger.
2. Reaching $2k and then just kind of being content at this stake, and not being bothered to play much higher. Despite having a fairly high WR and beating every stake I've put decent volume in to.

Next year I am going to do a lot more travelling again, and if I find a country that I am happy to move to (and it makes sense to do so) then I will move abroad. The plan is to visit my brother in Australia for a couple months at the start of the year, before returning to sell my house etc and then probably go some place else- like Thailand for a bit.

But in all honesty I have no idea what next year will bring because I am unsure if I will even play poker next year. I kind of feel like I need a break from it as I'm a bit burnt out from 10+ years of grinding- actually over 11 years of full time poker to be precise, as I quit University in September of 2013.

In that podcast the guy said something along the lines of- you have to decide what phase of your life you are in, because nobody can focus enough energy on their career/becoming wealthy, maintaining/creating relationships, your health/exercise, learning new skills/habits etc. We have to prioritise some of them while (at least for the time being) put others on the back burner.

So my twenties, for example, were about playing a lot of poker and making a decent amount of money. They were also about adopting a healthy diet and exercise regimen, and improving my mentality through meditation, reading books etc. I started to travel a decent amount too.

However, they were less about dating and forging new friendships- though I still made some effort in the latter regard. They were less about learning new skills (for example investing, or DIY) and more about honing my poker skills.

This week I have not really felt like playing poker. I played like two times, but even then they were relatively short sessions. Instead I kind of just felt like socialising- chatting to girls at the gym, or on a dog walk, chatting to random people in the pub while I watched the rugby (today I ended up sitting with a woman and her mother, and then some other random guy joined us too lol). Reading. Listening to podcasts- about money, toxicology, politics etc. I feel like there is so much to learn in the world and every day it's quite exciting to learn about something that I didn't know much about.

I have been getting up and leaving the house first thing to walk Rocco, and walking him last thing at night. I am getting in 15-20k+ steps per day and also going to the gym/yoga etc most days. Compared to when I am having a grind day (when I'm not dog sitting) and don't leave the house once, and maybe do like 5k steps.

I also feel like I want a girlfriend relatively soon. So I will make more effort in that regard in the coming months too. I went through a red pill phase a couple years ago where I would watch a bunch of that content on Youtube where a woman divorced a guy and took all his money etc, but I think that, ultimately, we just have to take that 'risk' if we want to feel fully fulfilled in life. I've gone off that stuff now tbh and now I would be open to marriage etc.

I often think about the 'yin and yang' concept.

I thought this was a cool description of it-

Yin and yang are not absolute opposites, but rather complementary and
interdependent forces

If we are disagreeble then an agreeable person compliments us. If we are indecisive then someone who is decisive compliments us. If we are masculine then someone who is feminine compliments us.

We seek out our opposite energy polarity and then become one (yin and yang) together. I guess that also explains the 'opposites attract' phrase that is commonly used.

Anyways this is a bit of a random post that doesn't really hold any relevance for a poker blog, but these were just some thoughts on my mind and I felt like discussing these things. I'll probably go back to playing poker again next week, or at the very least get in the odd session when I feel like playing (and when the games are running).

GG.

$2k 3 handed

Bluff, bluff, call?

Update

For the past month or so I have been focusing more on social activities, on my health, and then simply playing poker when I have the time and when I am motivated to do so. In the past I was always someone who would organise things last minute- for example there were times when me and my friend would be booking our holiday accommodation as we were sitting at the airport, waiting to catch our flight. Nowadays I prefer the clarity that creating plans in advance provides.

I think that something that doesn't get talked about often enough in poker is how too much freedom (which we all have as professional poker players) can actually be detrimental. Assuming that we sleep for eight hours per day, then that gives us sixteen hours per day in which to work (play poker), exercise, socialise, read, study etc in. That sounds like a lot of hours, which it is, but it is still easy (at least for me) to allow these hours to slip by, without having played poker, without having done any reading and sometimes even without, now the weather is cold, leaving the house!

We have so much freedom as poker players, that sometimes it can become stifling. Our freedom is in fact our prison cell. Playing poker becomes an option. Studying becomes an option. Exercise becomes an option. Reading becomes an option. Socialising becomes an option. Youtube, social media and television are more than happy to suck up that mental indecision and have us hooked for hours and hours at a time, with almost zero reward for our troubles.

Even things such as podcasts, provided they have good hosts and good guests, can educate us and make us smarter. I have honestly learned so much from the hours that I have spent listening to podcasts. Sure not all of what every podcast host/guest says is true, but then again I don't expect ANYONE in the world to only say things that are 100% factually true. We all have biases, we all have blind spots, we all have knowledge gaps and we all have some level of ego that will (often) be unwilling to accept that we are wrong, even when we know that we are.

When we play poker- we make money (assuming we are +EV players).
When we study- we improve our understanding of the game, which then leads us to indirectly making more money.
When we exercise- we improve our cardiovascular fitness, or we build muscle, or we lose fat. We extend our lives and we boost our mood.
When we read- we learn new information, or we are absorbed in to the plot of a novel. We extend our attention span. We get off technology.
When we socialise- we connect with other people. We practice and refine our verbal skills. We share experiences that we may remember for a lifetime.
When we listen to a podcast- we learn and absorb new information. We can multi task and transform a seemingly mundane task (such as driving long distance) and make it in to a learning experience.

We know that by playing poker, studying, exercising, reading books etc that we are being 'productive' and thus improving the overall quality of our lives, so long as we don't fixate too much on one of these components and instead try to diversify as much as possible- meaning that we don't ONLY play poker. We don't ONLY exercise or socialise. We try to have a good balance of all of these healthy habits and routines.

However, with so much freedom I often find myself mindlessly watching Youtube for hours, or commenting on news articles, or getting in to pointless online debates. It's easy to tell ourselves that we will study later, or we will grind later, or we will exercise later, then watch as the hours slip by as we watch TV, before realising that we no longer have enough time left in the day to achieve all of these productive, daily goals, and now we need to select which one(s) to complete and which ones to leave for another day.

Compare that to someone who has to head in to work for 9pm and who will be working in the office until 5pm. He has deadlines to meet. He has a boss and coworkers watching his every move. He simply cannot sleep in and arrive at work at 11am. He cannot start the day off with a Youtube binge. He cannot take the day off because he doesn't feel like playing.

He has to show up. He has to work. As a result he WILL work. Then, safe in the knowledge that he now has the remainder of the day (after 5pm) free, he will feel a sense of lightness. His work for the day is done- now he can enjoy some relaxing time to himself, or some (slightly less relaxing time) to himself working out at the gym, or he can catch up with friends and go for drinks, or watch a film or two.

Anyways, I am not trying to say that working a 9-5 is a good thing, but I think there are certain positive benefits from having less ambiguity about our upcoming day.

For example, today I had a busy day. I woke up at 10:30am, chilled in my bed for thirty minutes, then took Rocco for a walk for about an hour. Then I came home, made breakfast and watched a decent chunk of Grant Horvat's two hour long major 'cut series' video (I wouldn't classify this as mindless Youtube watching as it's almost like a film in terms of length, and I watch every single one, compared to watching an assortment of random, unrelated ten minute long videos with no intention behind your decision to watch them).

At just after 1pm I decided that I needed to do some work on the house/garden, so I sorted out a bunch of vinyl flooring that I'd tossed in to the shed and procrastinated about for months, and took it to the skip. That allowed me a short fifteen minute break before starting my 3pm study call, which I waited around for around thirty minutes before realising that they probably weren't coming along- and there had been some sort of misunderstanding. So I ended up doing an hours study by myself (on bvb), washed the dishes and then went to a yoga class at 5:30pm. Upon returning from the yoga class, I made dinner, watched the remainder of Grant Horvat's video, then got on the grind, playing for about two hours as the games were pretty dead and I also needed to take Rocco on a short walk to go to the toilet etc. I ended up battling $2k three handed for most of the session, which was fun, but a little frustrating as I was up two buy ins at one point, before losing some pots back and finishing up a buy in.

Then it was time to walk Rocco, get involved in some pointless online debates on the BBC website about the Ukraine/Russia war, before heading back up to my office to write this post (it's currently 2:17am as I speak).

There are days where I waste so many hours in the day- whether that be laying around in bed after waking up, watching Youtube, or scrolling through social media. Having no set poker schedule an sometimes be very detrimental, even though (on the surface) it seems like a blessing. But on days like today, when I have lots of things to do, and much of the day is already planned in advance (walking Rocco first thing, the poker study call, the yoga class etc) then I feel better. I feel like I have purpose. I appreciate the short breaks watching Youtube, because I know that in fifteen minutes I have something else to do. There can be freedom within the constraints of a schedule. There can be no freedom within the endless possibilities of a day void of any plans or schedules.

I think that's why Jocko uses the 'discipline equals freedom' phrase. Without discipline, without schedule, without planning then we lay around wasting large swathes of time and getting no closer to our goals or targets. We may think that having so much free time would enable us to learn a new language, to read multiple books, to make lots of friends or to go on plenty dates, to exercise and become shredded, but the reality is that we often use this lack of routine to instead do pointless things of no ultimate benefit.

A dog forces you to get up at a decent time and walk him first thing. This starts your day off in a positive, productive manner. You have exercised, you have gotten outside, perhaps you have interacted with some people during the walk. Compare that to when I am not dog sitting. I can lay for hours in my bed trying to fall back asleep, or watching random Youtube videos, before getting up.

This freedom and lack of responsibility can quickly become a curse.

Tomorrow I will get up at a decent time, I will walk Rocco first thing, and then I will have a productive day. I want to live each day with intensity and avoid taking time for granted. Perhaps, for a moment, I will wish for an extended stay in bed, as I check the weather app and look at the cold weather outside. But I know that, despite by reduced 'freedom', I will have a more enjoyable day as a result of getting up and outside.

It's currently 2:30am. I have been awake for sixteen hours. Now I can finally relax, make food (hitting my daily caloric target) and watch some (mindful) Youtube, because I have earned it.

GG.

Haha nice one, I am glad that you enjoyed that story! It's funny because with dogs every day seems like a 'new' day to them, where as with humans it can seem like we are merely living the same day on repeat-meaning we lose enthusiasm for each daily activity, chore, task, exercise etc once we become accustomed to them.

He gets incredibly excited whenever I make his food, despite the fact that he eats the same thing almost every day. Whenever you say about going on a walk he reacts as if he has just shipped the Sunday Million. Animals, and especially dogs, live in the present moment very well, where as we tend to (usually) live in the future or in the past.

Rocco is a ten year old golden retriever. I will make sure to attach a photo in my next post, of him! Do you have any pets?

Your English seems good to me! And thank you for the kind words :)

Hey mate, thanks for asking! I am actually doing pretty well recently. I organised plans with friends/family for the past four weekends and now I am looking after my parents dog for the next couple of weeks as they are away on holiday. I have been playing poker sporadically, but when I've been playing I'm playing pretty well.

The reason that I've not been posting any updates recently is cos my last couple posts didn't really seem to attract much interest, and my last post actually took 1.5 hours to write lol. So I just felt like I could make better use of my time by doing other things.

Anyways seeing as you sought to see how I was doing, then I will make sure to post weekly again for the remainder of the year- even if some of the posts aren't too interesting for others. I guess I am kind of 'spiritual' phase where I am mostly trying to focus inwards so that I can be 'happy' as often as possible, while relying less on external factors for happiness. Which is why I focused more on that topic in the last few posts.

I will write out a post tonight with a proper update! And how are you getting on?

Gotta respect the bluff!

Action turn!

The power of now

This year, so far, has been a bit of a strange one. My poker volume hasn't been amazing, but I have actually been pretty consistent in playing and I grinded both SCOOP and WCOOP for the bulk of both months. What has cost me volume is the fact that 500z continues to rarely run, and even getting volume at $500/$1k/$2nl tables can be a bit of a challenge on Stars recently. I played $5k a couple of times in September and then I've never really seen it run again (on Stars) since then. This has meant that I've even had to play some 200z recently just to increase the hands per hour, which isn't ideal given I could be shot taking $5k right now.

Of course I could be playing on other sites, but I still greatly prefer Stars to any other site out there and I also like knowing which player is who- something that I have no idea about on other sites, for the most part.

I've made a small strategy tweak this year because I wasn't overly happy with my win rate for the previous two years, and I also felt like I was giving too much respect to other regs in some regards (but I don't want to get in to specifics).

Anyways, overall I am feeling pretty good on the poker front and I'm much better this year at shifting my poker logic from one stake to another- something that I struggled with in the past. If I was playing a session then I would tend to just play the same (roughly speaking) on all my tables. Whether that be the $2k table or $500nl. It can be difficult to think simultaneously on 4-6 tables about your poker decisions, while also trying to take on spot from the $2knl perspective and the other spot from the $500nl (or perhaps even 200z) perspective.

At the moment I feel like I've trained up my brain pretty well this year to the point that I can think in different ways while playing hands at the same time, at vastly differently skilled stakes.

I guess what a lot of this boils down to is being present or not. When we are grinding a session, the bulk of our decisions are somewhat automated- we know (roughly speaking) our 3bet ranges from every position. We know (roughly speaking) our 4bet ranges, our SRP opening ranges and our bb defence ranges. We know what boards to big bet and what boards to small bet, we know what boards to range bet and which boards to split on. We know who are the nitty regs and who are the bluffy regs. We know x combo makes a good bluff on certain board textures, but how y combo is a much better river give up.

Most of our in game thinking is about maintaining focus, making small tweaks to our strategy based on our opponents, or when we play a weird spot that we have basically never studied before. The vast majority of our game is done on auto pilot, assuming we have reached a fairly competent stake level where we have a good understanding of pre flop ranges and how the post flop game is supposed to function.

However, it can get to the point where too much is automated, and not enough of our game involves actually thinking. When we are playing the same style at a stake 1/10th of our higher buy in, then this is more to do with automation than logic. Logic would dictate some sort of adjustment in our strategy, but automation dictates that we play the same way, regardless of the stake. Of course this is the exact same when we play against different player types. Some guys are capable of bluffing in most spots, and other guys are nitty pieces of crap who have never shown down a river bluff in their lives. Yet we project bluffs on to both of their ranges, and we click call with our second pairs...

I've noticed that the same happens in our daily lives. Much of our daily lives are automated. We have managed to formulate a 'good strategy; when it comes to daily living. Perhaps this involves waking up at a reasonable time, having a healthy breakfast of (in my case) porridge oats, some sort of milk (typically coconut or oat), frozen berries, peanut butter and maple syrup. Sometimes this changes a little and I might switch the frozen berries to a cooking apple (stewing the apple first then adding the porridge oats at the end of the stewing process). Or perhaps I may add cocoa powder to add a different flavour dimension, or protein powder if I've been at the gym the previous day, or plan on going that afternoon. Sometimes I will mash up a banana and cook it with the oats- my chef friend showed me this, instead of cutting it up and topping the oats after they are cooked. Or maybe I will lose my mind and add a couple squares of dark chocolate to melt in to the porridge oats as they cook on the stove.

However, either way, I know pretty much what I am going to eat for breakfast every day. I have refined my porridge cooking from brick hard, clumpy oats cooked in the microwave, to smooth, creamy perfection, cooked on the hob. My porridge strategy (like my poker game) has been refined to the point where it's 90%+ automated.

The issue is that with automation comes predictability. We know what to expect, meaning there is very little fun involved, and very little room for novelty and creativity. When we play poker on autopilot, we lose the joy of finding a funky line, of pulling off a creative bluff or of making a wild hero call. And in our daily lives we can know what to expect before the day has even begun.

We know what we are eating for breakfast, with the exception of protein powder or not. We know what workout we are doing at the gym, we know what way we will walk to and from the gym, we know our methodology of study, we know what we will cook for dinner, we know what time we will start playing poker and we know the way that the day will pan out- perhaps with the exception of how our poker session will go!

Of course some of this automation makes sense, we don't want to wake up every day and have no idea what to eat for breakfast. Spending 1-2 hours walking around shops trying to get creative ideas for a good breakfast recipe. We don't want to show up at the gym and have no idea what we are striving towards- are we trying to put on muscle, build strength, improve our cardio or simply use exercise as some form of meditation, to cleanse our minds of the daily worries of life.

There is a thin line between too much automation and too little. We want to play good poker, while maintaining our capacity to find creative plays and make good deviations. We want to get in a good workout and progress towards our physical goals, whilst also maintaining some sort of novelty in our workouts. We want to walk around the city in an area that we enjoy, whilst also avoiding taking the same path every single time.

Over the past year or so I have been focusing a bit more on spirituality again. I have meditated most days for the past 5-6 years, and while that has helped me greatly when it comes to improving my confidence and overcoming insecurities and fears, I feel like it kind of stagnated and I wasn't really getting any better. It helps each day to a certain extent, more so to cleanse me of some negative thoughts etc, but my mind is still restless and I still think too much of both the past and the future. I wanted to be more present in my daily life, so that each day, even if it was a day of 'routine' where I was going to be playing poker etc, maintained some level of novelty and excitement. I don't want to know exactly what I am eating today, exactly what I am studying, exactly what time I'm playing poker, exactly what workout I'm doing and exactly what TV show I'm watching after the grind has completed.

So I started reading the power of now again. I have read it once or twice before, but probably not for a couple of years. The book talks about having an outer purpose (goals, destinations, achievements) and also an inner purpose- which is essentially to remain present in each moment.

Sometimes I find myself doing things as a means to an end. I will watch a film, but I am already thinking about the ending and what I am going to do when it's finished. I start a poker session and I'm already thinking about what I am going to eat afterwards. I step foot in the sauna, and I am already counting down the minutes until my fifteen minutes is up (which is why I now sit in a position where I cannot see the clock).

It's funny cos I talked about the book 'the wisdom of groundhog day' earlier this year, and how I wanted to apply some of the lessons within that book to my own life. I ended up buying the DVD for like £1, but it was tinted a weird shade of green when I tried to watch it on my PS2, so I never watched it. I had seen some of the film on Youtube years ago, but never the whole thing. Anyways, I am on Prime last night after my session and browsing the suggested films- most of which are James Bond, and up shows Groundhog Day! The film expires in four days, so needless to say I watched it right away.

I think it's actually the best every film, at least that I've seen, when it comes to meditation, being present and enlightenment. Phil goes through all the different stages of living when he realises he is stuck in a time loop- the initial fear/shock, then lust/greed, depression/hopelessness before eventually becoming grateful and fully present and appreciative of each day.

Initially he is Punxsutawney just to get the weather report over with. He is doing his job as a means to an end. His mind has already left the town before his body has. However, at the end he is fully present. He doesn't see people in cafe's, in shops, on the street etc as NPC's, he sees them as human beings who have likes and dislikes, dreams and goals, hobbies and interests. He sees them as people who are important to others- whether that be their spouse, partner or even a friend or family member.

I think most of us are like Phil at the start of the film. Perhaps we aren't as cynical as him, perhaps we treat others with more respect etc, but most of the time our minds are on to the next thing before we have finished the current thing. We look forward to holidays that are months away, we dread getting up in the morning for our run, or we watch a TV show whilst simultaneously scrolling on our phones.

What I've noticed since I started reading the power of now again is that I start to notice things again. Normally when we look in a food cupboard, much of the 'food' doesn't even process as food in our minds. Perhaps they are weird ingredients that we have never looked up a recipe to cook with. Perhaps it is something that takes hours to cook, so we leave it for another day. We use certain spices and sauces regularly whilst consistently overlooking others. Things become props in our lives that we don't even notice, because we are never truly looking.

For example, I have a small basket of books in my living room next to the TV, but I almost never look in the basked and instead I go to the library for a book, or buy one from a charity shop. The other day I actually seen it as a basket (instead of a prop in the background) and I took out a small book and started reading it again.

Anyways the point I'm trying to make is that when we spend most our daily on auto pilot, we don't notice most things. Strangers are merely NPC's who we rarely interact with, books gathering dust tend to gather more dust, weird ingredients lie in the cupboard until they go out of date.

My aim is to be like Phil at the end of the film. Appreciating each day, interacting with people whether a friend or a stranger, noticing the small things that we tend to take for granted on a daily basis, and living each day as if it of vital importance- which they are! I may have an outer purpose (whether that be poker related, fitness related, relationship related) but my inner purpose is the most important one. That means being as present as possible on a daily basis. This presence will lead to a much more fulfilling life- one that enables me to escape auto pilot and who knows, perhaps even take porridge off the breakfast menu for a while!

GG.

super1234 Yes that makes sense. Personally I would like to switch to a more 'early' wake up time in the future, but as long as I play online poker in the UK time zone then I will be waking up between 10am-12pm. It just doesn't make any sense for me to wake up at 8am if I'm not starting playing for another twelve hours.

I was just throwing up a random photo of Jocko's watch for motivation, not really for anything else. I agree that getting eight hours sleep (for me) is vitally important. Some people can sleep less though and feel just as refreshed.

Aquila Hello mate. It doesn't have to be the 'next year approach', but the reality is it will take a while to sell the house etc, so there is literally no chance that I will have moved out of here before the end of this year.

However, I do think there are some merits to the 'next year approach'. The reason that we make goals for the new year is because we want to change in some way. Of course in an ideal sense we could just change today or tomorrow, but starting in a new year kind of gives us a great 'blank page' to begin on. We can easily recall (in the future) when we began our healthy/spiritual/social/career journey if it begins at the start of a new year.

Also, Christmas etc are in December, so it's easy to go off the rails a bit in terms of our health/exercise etc and put on some weight, or drink too much alcohol. Which means that January is kind of the ideal time to begin our health/fitness journey as there are no holidays or reasons to get drunk for at least a few months until Easter or whatever.

Personally I don't drink alcohol or eat more around Christmas time (actually I'm still trying to put on weight anyways) but I am just playing devils advocate and why, for many people, waiting until the new year to start their goals makes sense.

I don't know your sleeping regime, but I guess 4:24 is closer to the
time you go to bed than your waking hours :)

Hahah yeah you are correct! Typically I go to sleep between 3-4am, but I don't really need to stay awake the late so I want to get it closer to 2am, or even 2:30am so I can wake up around 10:30am each day. I have no intention of waking up at 4:30am each day (cos I usually don't start grinding until 8pm or even later) but I like mixing it up every so often and I want to experience different days and not the same day over and over.

For example when my brothers were over for the Summer we played golf on the Saturday, and then decided Saturday night to play at 8am again the next day. They have normal sleep patterns, so waking up at 7am wasn't difficult for them, but I do not! So I probably got 4-5 hours sleep, but it was fun to get up early for a change and throw my body off it's normal routine.

It was pretty cool finishing our round and it was still not even 12pm yet.

What is important to you? In no Order:
- Poker
- A social life
- Sports

Yes that is accurate! I completely agree with you about enjoying the small things in our daily lives, but I think that we can have micro goals (for example appreciating the company of friends/family, talking to strangers in our daily lives, stroking a dog, sitting in the sun etc) and simultaneously have macro goals- training for a marathon (or a triathlon), getting to the nosebleeds, travelling to different continents, learn a new language etc. Imo it doesn't have to be one or the other.

We can be present in our daily lives and appreciate the small things in life, but also try to have 'bigger' goals (not that they are more important, but just that they will take more time/money/effort to achieve).

I do meditation (most) days so that I can be as present as possible in my daily life and not waste time or take it for granted, but I also enjoy setting bigger goals so that I have more purpose behind my daily routines etc- for example studying most days so that I can play $5k+. If I lost track of my macro goal of playing higher stakes, then I wouldn't even bother studying.

That's not to say that moving up in stakes will change me in any way, it's just that I play this game because I am competitive and I enjoy the challenge. And of course also because I am good at it and it's my job.

I've read a lot of books over the past few years that have enable me to focus more on the present moment and on my daily life- the power of now, the wisdom of groundhog day, the law of attraction etc, but I will still read books on procrastination (the now habit) and on how to improve my productivity. I will still read books on world class sports coaches (Phil Jackson eleven rings) and watch old highlights of Tiger Woods winning the Masters in 2019. Then the next day I will start off with a twelve minute meditation and talk to my neighbour.

We don't have to limit ourselves to being more present to enjoy the small things, or more disciplined to enjoy the big things- we can do both!

Which is why I enjoy setting goals/targets each year. It means that each year will be different in some way and they won't all blend in to one. For example in recent years I can say in 2023 I bought my first house, in 2022 I ran my first marathon, in 2021 I lived with my best friend and my brother, in 2020 I had my best ever year at poker, in 2019 I went on a month long trip to Canada and America.

Life isn't a box ticking exercise, daily life matters, but so do new experiences and new challenges! I don't want next year to be similar to this year, I want it to be different. And in the process I want to be present in my daily life so that I never take a day for granted.

How much money is our youth worth?

I was listening to a podcast with Jimmy Carr and at one point he discussed life, and more accurately our youth. He said something along the lines of- in thirty years time we would trade our entire material worth to come back in time to this point in our lives. It is so easy for us to take each day for granted until one day we wake up and we are thirty years older, having spent that duration of time mostly living on auto pilot.

Recently I've been having a lot of conversations with people, whether that be friends, family or even acquaintances, getting their advice on what I should be doing next. The vast majority of them are in agreement that a move abroad (most likely to Australia) out of my comfort zone is the best move. The main issue with that is that I could no longer play on Stars- a site where I've probably put 90% of my volume in on over the years.

However, what exactly is the point in earning money?

Is the point to earn enough money so that we have freedom to do things that we otherwise would not be able to? So perhaps that would enable us to travel for a year, or shift towards more of part time schedule, or perhaps change career entirely. Or is the point of earning money merely to add more zeros to the end of the numbers in our bank accounts? Or is the point of earning money not so much about the money itself, but more about the process? We know that money isn't easy to earn, and we know that humans (especially guys) require a purpose in their careers in order to feel fulfilled.

I'm not exactly sure. But we also need to think about what Jimmy said, that time and life is something that you cannot really put a price on. Our hourly rate when coaching may be x amount of dollars, and our hourly rate at the tables may be y amount of dollars, but how much is living in this current period of time worth? How much is being in our twenties and thirties worth? How much money would a guy in his eighties pay to switch places with us?

Lets say our target in our life is to grind until we hit $10m, well would we take $10m right now to switch places with the eighty year old? I highly doubt it. Which clearly highlights that our age and youth is almost priceless, yet we often take it for granted and just allow the years to drift by as we sit in front of the TV or the computer screen, or as we stare in to our phones for hours at a time.

At the start of this year I wrote down around twenty experiences on a list that I wanted to do in 2024, and I am ashamed to say that I have done only five or six of them so far. Whenever we go in to a new year we swear that this year will be different, but how different does it actually pan out being? Perhaps we start the year off hot by going to the gym 5x per week, by doing dry January and by going on Holiday to escape the cold weather. We read several books and we tell ourselves that THIS is the year that we finally break in to high stakes and beyond.

But then auto pilot kicks in. We start going to the gym 4x per week, then 3x per week, then it becomes a struggle to go at all. The motivation to study and grind slowly decreases, and we start watching Youtube instead of reading our books.

Before we know it, this year appears eerily similar to the last. We want to shot take, but we are in our comfort zone at 500nl and don't wanna risk that 5bb/100 WR. Summer comes and goes, the sunshine and weather that we have been longing for for months is now turning to rain and snow. Next thing we know the Christmas decorations are starting to appear, and we start to think about how next year is going to be different. We break out the notebook and construct a list of goals for 2025.

1) get to high stakes 2) go to the gym 5x per week and get shredded 3)...

WAKE UP!

Tomorrow I will start the day off by ticking off one of the things from my 2024 experiences list- by running before light. I literally don't think I've been on one run all year, so running even 5km will probably be a struggle, but my alarm is set for 7am (according to my watch the sun is rising at 7:49am).

Actually my mood has been a lot better for the past week. I think I may have had some mild form of depression, but then I realised that I've not been getting much sun and I've not taken any vitamin D etc supplements since before the Summer. So I went and bought a multi vitamin (iirc I had this issue a couple of years ago) and I actually feel really good tonight. Also I've been making plans with friends/family for the coming weeks, so my social calendar is a bit more full after the extremely anti social WCOOP grind.

I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders after deciding that I am leaving Inverness, and tbh I'm just gonna sell the house to get it off my hands and then (hopefully) go to Australia for a year. I might even go to Thailand at some point- both to visit (I've never been to Asia) and to get my Pokerstars fix!

Anyways next year WILL be different from this year. No more auto pilot bullshit and taking time for granted.

When the alarm goes off tomorrow morning at 7am, it will be a new day- both physically and metaphorically.

GG.

Jeff_ Exactly! That was one of my main focuses earlier on in the year too- to focus more on having fun each session instead of taking them so seriously. Obviously I have my moments where I get annoyed during a session, but I think that overall I have had more fun at the poker tables this year than I have in a while.

In a weird way I think it would be cool if online died, cos then we would be forced to come up with other ways to make money, whether that be grinding live or switching careers. I am not saying that I want online poker to die, but every professional athlete calls time on their career at some point and then has to find something else to focus on. Sometimes that is coaching, sometimes it is punditry or analysis, and other times its just doing something new and completely unrelated. I think it would be boring to do the same job for 40 years, even though I still enjoy poker and online poker for now.

Do you think about GG or apps? For playing higher than stars. GG has
5k games very often and being very good reg you have a great chance of
doing great. Some people took a lot of money from it and showed very
nice results.

Thanks man I appreciate that :) I play a little on GG at $1k, but probably haven't played in a month or so cos I was playing mtt's and then took a week off since then. I am still trying to figure out if the rake is beatable there, do you play much on GG? I'll probably just shot take $5k on Stars in the meantime, and then play $1k on GG until I get a decent sample size and figure out if I can beat those games pre RB. I might play $5k on GG if I run up more of a roll there, but atm it would be risky to play that stake with my current role on the site- and it's very difficult to deposit more from the UK if I were to go busto.

Tbh I know literally nothing about the apps and have never played on any of those sites. I'm a bit of a fish when it comes to adding new sites, hence why I have mostly just played on Stars throughout my career. Though its definitely clear that adding in these sorts of games would increase your annual profit/income.

Aquila Hey man, how's it going? Thanks for commenting and I appreciate the advice!

The annoying thing is that I like the area and I want this move to work. I think it makes sense to put some of my poker profits in to buying a house so that I can save on rent and also so that the house will increase in value over time. However, it was probably just the wrong place to buy in, in all honesty.

I would definitely advise you to go to Australia for 1 year. The
number of hours of sunshine alone could have a very positive impact on
you. I think it can be a great country for sports enthusiasts.

Yeah I think it would be a good idea to mix things up for me and get me out of my comfort zone, while simultaneously improving my daily quality of life with the improved weather and being around more people of a similar age etc. I doubt Australia is somewhere that I would live long term (I like travelling and it is so far from everywhere) but I think as an experience and to get me out of this rut I'm currently in, it could be a good move for me.

But I wouldn't buy a new house or apartment beforehand. What if you
want to stay in Australia? Or you think you want to go to xy. Your
life situation can change “radically” very quickly (partner or
something else). I would think that it would be easier for you not to
have any extra luggage in mind.

That makes sense too. My thinking was that I don't want to come home after being there for a year and have nowhere to live, and be back at my parents or renting again, but yeah perhaps its not the best idea to buy some place else and then move in case I decide to stay there longer term or perhaps even live in another country afterwards- I think it would be cool to live in Japan for a bit, for example.

What options do you have to play online in Australia?

I think I can play on ACR and I suppose other sites like Coinpoker- which I actually intend on depositing on to at some point. I definitely can't play on Stars, but I know of a fairly well know high stakes cash reg (who posts Youtube videos) that grinds GG from Australia, even though you're not supposed to. Presumably through a VPN. So perhaps that is an option too.

If I were to start playing live I could just play shorter sessions or play a few days per week. I'm not ruling out live tbh cos at least playing live is more social than online as you are around other people. Also I have very little experience live, and playing there could increase my confidence so that I could eventually play in some higher stakes cash games further down the line in the US or Canada or whatever. Cos atm I wouldn't be comfortable playing much higher than 5/10 or 10/20 cos I know that I have a tendency to give off live tells.

Anyways I am going to think things over and make a decision in the coming weeks/months on what to do next.

Oh and on a 'positive' note, I ended up doing my annual tax form tonight that I've been procrastinating on for months. I have a procrastination list on my phone where I write down everything I am putting off and delaying- typically more daunting tasks.

As I wasn't playing poker tonight I told myself I need to do at least one thing off the list, so I tackled one of the biggest ones, as it took me a couple of hours to complete!

Days where we perhaps may not be in the best mindset to play poker are great opportunities to catch up on things we have been putting off for while imo. It doesn't matter if we are on soft tilt if we are filling out a tax form, but clearly matters a lot if we are grinding poker.

Then when I go back to playing poker again I will feel much freer to grind as I won't have these tasks lurking at the back of my mind that need completed.

Time for a change

Recently I've not been overly happy. It turns out that moving to Inverness was definitely not the right move for me, and now I am kind of stuck with a house that is in the process of getting decorated, in a place that I no longer wish to stay in. In all honesty if I could move out tomorrow I would do so.

For the first six month I was pretty happy- I was living in a new place that I had never really explored much before, I was able to focus on my online grind after spending the past year house hunting and I had my own space after basically living with other people for my entire life (bar around a six month period when my flat mate moved out of my flat in Edinburgh).

However for the latter six months (I've been here just over a year now) my mood has slowly been getting worse and worse. Towards the end of my stay in Edinburgh I experienced these same negative emotions, so I paid attention to them and moved out, before going over to Budapest for two months and then house hunting when I got back. Now these negative emotions are back, and are probably worse in all honesty.

I just started listening to a podcast tonight on 'diary of a CEO' with 'the brain rot doctor' and (although I've on only listened to around 25 mins of the podcast so far) in it the doctor talks about how important it is to listen to our emotions when we feel them. Our emotions serve a purpose. He talked about how some forms therapy can be detrimental.

For example lets say that someone goes in to therapy and talks about all of their problems to the therapist in a venting manner. Often this will feel like a weight has been lifted off of their shoulders (at least temporarily) but they will then soon go back to having the same emotions soon afterwards. They have not solved the problem. Instead he says its important to pay attention to your emotions because they are trying to tell you something. If you are feeling crap then it's probably a signal that something needs to change. You (or perhaps someone close to you) just has to figure out what that 'thing' is that needs changed.

In my case I have discovered that their simply aren't enough people of a similar age up here. They tend to move away from the area (if they are ambitious) at around 17/18 after high school and usually to one of the bigger cities where they can attend University (there isn't one here). Then because there are more jobs in these big cities, they don't tend to move back- unless perhaps they are starting a family or something and wish to move somewhere with more affordable housing and in a nicer, more scenic area (like the Highlands).

This is not a good place for a (relatively) young, single guy to live. This is a middle aged+ city imo.

Compare that to Edinburgh and where I lived which was basically in a student/young professional area (we were like 10 mins walk from the Uni) where you were surrounded by people in their 20s/30s etc. There were very few families cos the vast majority of the housing in those areas were flats, which aren't really big enough to raise a family in.

Anyways I'm not saying I want to move back there, I am just pointing out the huge difference in the demographics of people I am living around currently compared to a couple years ago.

One of the reasons I decided against moving to the Isle of Skye was because I noticed (while walking around) that there was a distinct lack of younger people. I ended up speaking to an Irish guy in the gym (he was probably in his twenties) and he confirmed my suspicions and said there weren't many younger people and told me not to move there lol. I guess I just wish I had done more research before I moved up here, but because they had a college I just assumed that there would still be a good amount of younger people up here too.

My intentions with this post aren't to rant or complain, I just want to outline my thoughts and one of the main reasons why I have not been posting on here very recently. Also, hopefully this post will force other people to think twice before moving to a town/city that they haven't done a ton of research on- especially if you are moving by yourself. I think that the vast majority of places can be good if you are living with a close friend or partner, but if you are living by yourself (and also working from home as a poker player) then we have to make sure that we are in an area where it is relatively easy to meet similar like minded people so that we avoid becoming socially isolated.

So I've decided that I'm either going to rent out or sell my flat. Originally I had planned to wait until the end of the year so that I could grind etc, but honestly at the moment I don't even give a fuck about grinding I just want to move to some place that I will be happy living in, so I might try to sell even sooner than that. The only issue is that the house is like half way through decorating so it's not exactly in pristine selling condition lol.

Just to be clear Inverness is a really nice city and the Highlands are amazing, but it's one thing visiting for a holiday and another thing living there (especially by yourself).

My brother lives in Australia and keeps on asking me to fly out there for a holiday. It was never somewhere that I particularly fancied travelling to, but now I am strongly considering just saying 'fuck it' and moving out there for a year. I have two other friends who live out there too. I wouldn't be able to play on Stars though, so I guess maybe I'd switch to other sites or even just grind live or something. Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea just taking a year off poker as well, as I've been doing this full time for eleven years now.

The main issue is what to do with the house though so I have to figure that out first, and I'm also half way through dental treatment so I'm not exactly sure how that would work if I moved out to Australia lol. I'm also thinking about whether it would be better to buy a place somewhere closer to my friends/family here, in a younger demographic area, before moving abroad- so that when I do return I have somewhere decent to live in, instead of having to move back here or house hunt again.

Also, the other night I logged back on to Reddit for the first time in like five years (I stopped posting on there cos they temp banned me because I fought back against a girl who heavily implied that she hated men) and I read a couple of my old posts. One of them was titled 'I'm not chasing any more' and discussed how I am no longer willing to chase after girls who show a low/lack of interest. It actually proved to be one of, if not my most popular post as so many other people (both guys and girls) resonated with my message about how crap it can be chasing after people who don't really give a fuck about you.

Anyways the main point I'm trying to make is not related to girls (I think this post was from 2019), it's that we should apply this approach to ALL of our relationships- whether that be romantic or platonic. What I noticed was that I have been clinging on to friendships where the other person is often making very minimal effort, and where I am essentially the only person trying to arrange plans to meetup and hangout. Overall I don't mind organising plans, as some people just don't enjoy doing that, but the very least you can ask of a friend is a reciprocal effort on both sides where you both make effort to catch up and organise plans together.

After reading that old post its like something clicked and I realised that I was taking my old approach of chasing girls and now applying it towards chasing long term friends who make almost zero effort nowadays, simply because I have not surrounded myself with enough like minded people and I have prioritised the online grind too much. I make poker friends (like minded people) and then basically never see them cos we live in different countries.

So my next move, whether that be in Scotland or abroad, is going to purely focus on being around other young, ambitious, adventurous, like minded people.

Of course I cannot blame everyone else and absolve myself of all responsibility, I was the one who chose to move here for example, but I can hand on heart say that I always make effort with my friends. What I have to realise is that I am no longer a priority for them, and that it's time for me to move on and focus on creating a new social circle. Instead of chasing after people that don't reciprocate the same effort.

I will be back to posting more positive things next week, but I wanted to get this off my chest and explain why (perhaps) I may not be playing much poker this month.

GG.

Yeah there are a lot of factors, but I think that people will always find money to gamble with, even if they can't really afford to. I think that if it becomes very difficult for the average fish to deposit, then they just won't bother with all the hassle and will just spend the money some place else- whether that be on an expensive meal etc or by gambling at the casino instead.

If people have to send in six months of financial paperwork just to deposit, then they won't bother, unless they are a professional who's income depends on them playing.

Live poker will always do well imo, I just think that online has a limited shelf life with all regulations that most governments are putting on gambling. Which is why I think it's our duty to vote for political parties that espouse more freedom and making our own decisions instead of ones that strive to limit and control what the populace can and cannot do.

If we vote in governments that limit free speech, want to constantly increase taxes etc then obviously this will eventually filter down to gambling.

So if we vote in these types of authoritarian governments as poker players then we better not whine when it stops being possible to make a living online cos nobody can deposit more than $500 any longer.

Jeff_ Yeah the game wasn't amazing but it was definitely +EV to play in. Cos the rake is basically 0bb at that stake, and the rec (while not being terrible) was still definitely worth playing against imo. I think he was just playing okay cos he was winning, but I knew that if he started to lose then it would be likely he'd punt off his entire stack.

Anyways I quit the game cos I was on a final table (of the $33 bounty builder lol) and wanted to focus.

I agree it sucks that $5k games rarely run nowadays on Stars, but I always kinda figured that we had a finite period of time to play online poker in, so just have to make the most of it. If the games die and we have to switch to live or do something else, then so be it. It has been fun either way :)

With that being said, hopefully there are more high stakes games running for the remainder of the year at the very least!

How has your grind been going this year?

WCOOP wrap-up

I would like to apologise for not posting here in a while and slacking in terms of my weekly updates. However not only was I busy grinding WCOOP, but I also just had no motivation to post in all honesty. I didn't feel in the best mindset and so thought it would be better to get in to a better headspace before writing up my next post.

I said to myself at the start of the month that I was not really going to focus on tournaments, instead only playing them on the side of my daily cash game grind- and perhaps focusing exclusively on them on Sundays. However as the month wore on, I became engrossed in the mtt grind and basically just focused on them.

At the start of the month I was able to maintain my exercise regimen fairly well, and I was also studying more often than in the previous months. Yet as the month wore on I kind of just sacrificed exercise and study and just focused on preparing well for each session (usually with meditation and reading or perhaps a walk). I am not used to playing such long days and I guess it took a toll on me as the month went on. For example, on a typical cash game day I will study for around one hour and then play for three to four hours. Sometimes I will play longer depending on how the games are, but I am not a big volume player these days. But during WCOOP I was just grinding until I finished all of the tournaments I was in. Usually I'd aim to start at around 5:30pm and would grind until the early hours of the morning.

On Monday, for example, I ended up playing for just under eleven hours as I was going deep in a tournament. I ended up finishing second in it after losing a couple all ins heads up.

I've actually played $5k a few times this month too, and managed to make a little profit from those shots. Me and my friend have been discussing moving up and taking more risks quite a lot throughout WCOOP, so I kind of just told myself to stop being such a pussy and play higher stakes cash. I see guys whom I played against and, at the very least, held my own against move up and on to bigger and better things. Yet here I am, stuck within the comfort zone of $2k and below. It's not happening any longer!

Overall I ended up having quite a decent month. Including rakeback etc I made around $13.5k from tournaments and cash, which I was very happy about given the fact that I was down almost $13k at tournaments at one point and was literally losing at them for the entire month until the last couple days. But I finished strong with around a +$10k day on Monday (I got second in the Bounty Builder $33 for like $7k, and I also won just over half a buy in at $25/50) and then on Wednesday I had like five or six deep runs simultaneously- getting second in a GG tournament for $3k, winning a Stars $55 hyper for $4k and then having some other decent scores for a +$9k day.

I was really happy that I kept going until the end, cos usually I just kind of stop playing in SCOOP/WCOOP's after the Sunday, unless I have some Day two's on the Monday. However I decided to go until the final day, despite the much smaller guarantees etc, and was promptly rewarded with some positive variance!

Overall I would say that it took me a bit of time to get back in to the swing of playing tournaments. It probably took me a couple of weeks before I started to feel like I was playing well, but towards the end I felt like I had an edge on the regs, which was nice. I only play like $100 ABI tournaments cos I need to prove myself at these stakes before I move up, build confidence and gain an edge on my opponents, but for now I am definitely heading in the right direction!

Anyways, today I just caught up with some stuff around the house that I'd been putting off for a bit- doing the washing and especially cleaning the house. It was as if it had been covered in a layer of dust for the past couple weeks cos I've been having people working in the house throughout this period. So I gave it a thorough clean today and tomorrow I will get back to exercising again- most likely playing golf as the weather forecast is decent.

I feel very tired today and drained, so I'll likely take a bit of time off poker and then go back to focusing on cash again.

GG.

MTT results

Thought I was gonna win a stack here

Tournaments

On Sunday I played tournaments for the first time in months (bar the odd random Sunday Million entry). It's funny because in tournaments there is so much losing and busting, that you often think you are playing much worse than you actually are. For example after Sundays session I said to myself that I played terrible at tournaments (I was also playing cash at the same time, which I won at) but having reviewed my tagged hands, as well as all of my hands in the $1k 6max, I actually played pretty well.

Of course I am sure there were inevitable mistakes in other tournaments and in other hands that I did not tag, but it's funny how we often allow poor results (or lack of cashes) to talk us in to thinking that we played poorly.

The $1k 6max was a pretty fun tournament actually. I'm not sure if I would have bought in directly or not, but I managed to get in to the tournament from a $55 satellite. Obviously I should have a decent edge over the bulk of the field in this format, at least in a post flop sense, but it was actually nice to see on my review that my pre flop sizings/range construction etc were actually fairly accurate too. There is a decent bit of guesswork in game for me in terms of what goes in to 60bb 3bet ranges, 80bb 3bet ranges and bvb ranges from the sb (what hands I should limp vs raise for example) because I typically play 100bb ante-less poker.

Cash games are obviously an incredibly tough game to master, especially in spots like bvb or when you get deep stacked, but tournaments are so complex in the sense that stack sizes are always changing- which means you have to have vastly different 3bet ranges based on your stack size, and vastly different post flop strategies based on your stack size too. Top pair at 20bb is a fist pump raise/stack off, top pair at 100bb not so much. Then you have icm as well, that can completely alter a typical ChipEV strategy.

My plan during WCOOP is basically to play every Sunday, and then just play some tournaments alongside my regular cash game grind on other days.

I've started to watch Pads course videos again too, and especially the play and explains that help me to get in to the mindset for playing tournaments again. Personally I prefer to just use a solver for studying post flop, but watching an elite player actually playing and giving his thought process is very beneficial imo. Then I use GTO wizard to review hands and check pre flop ranges etc.

I was starting to lose interest in studying tbh. I think this was mostly down to the fact that I was almost always studying the same game (6max cash) and mostly by myself, but recently I've started studying with my friend again (1-2x per week) and mixing up my study- sometimes doing HU, sometimes tournaments, and covering spots at 6max cash that I often overlook.

Today was my day off from grinding, so I studied one spot in 6m for around 1.5 hours with my friend, then later on (after I'd been to the gym etc) I decided to review my hands from the $1k 6max mtt, which took another 30 mins or so. In all honesty I could have easily studied longer in the evening, but I didn't last too long in that tournament so I ran out of hands haha.

So perhaps if other people are struggling with the motivation to study, maybe it could be a good idea to mix up your routine and study a slightly different game or a different spot, or think about studying with other people (or perhaps by yourself if you typically study with others).

In all honesty I feel like I need a proper holiday in order to mentally reset before getting back on the grind for the remainder of the year, but I am getting some work done on the house atm and it's my bday etc soon too, so I'm not sure if I'll have much time this month. I have barely done any travelling this year (only to Germany for the Euros) but I think this will change a lot next year again. Then WCOOP also just started too, which means the cash games should be a little better than recently, and obviously some of the tournaments are worth playing too.

Anyways, this weeks post is probably not the most exciting one in all honesty, but I think this is merely a reflection of where I am mentally and the fact that I need a break.

Oh, and last week I played some $5k again for the first time in a while, so that was fun. Hopefully it runs more this month and I can have some more opportunities to grind it.

GG.

This river tilted me ngl

Fish (who typically 3bets garbage) hero folds! :P

RunItTw1ce This was more just a one off because I am friends with him and he asked me on to his channel. Maybe we will do another video together at some point, but it won't be a regular occurrence. I have no intentions of making a Youtube channel. Maybe I would make a training site at some point but obviously that wouldn't be free content.

I had nothing to do with the audio as it's not my channel. But I think he knows what the issue is now so hopefully there won't be any audio issues if we do another video together in the future.

Personally I'd say the video is still worth watching, even if the audio is poor. You can understand most of what is said if you turn on subtitles and listen carefully.

RunItTw1ce
Personally I would just pure raise ott vs this opponent with 87. Given the way that he just played the other SRP hand on a FD board (xr flop/x jammed ott) we can assume that he is capable of putting nut combos in to his turn x range- which decreases hands like 33 from his betting range. Also, the guy was using massive T sizings and in this instance he goes small.

So for both of these reasons (the non x raise ott and the small T sizing) I am just going to assume he has Kx or a bluff almost always and raise for value. Then if he jams I will just figure it out based on timing etc.

I think its very important against these somewhat erratic players that use lots of multiple different sizings and likely have big imbalances in terms of flop x raise frequency, T barrel frequency, how they split their ranges across multiple sizings etc to make sure we are exploiting/adjusting to them across every single street and not just on the river. So that means 3betting the flop more often vs their flop x raises, raising more ott when they use custom small sizings, calling more ott vs their double barrels etc.

Obviously folding/calling rivers is a good exploit to make against them as well, but I think its just as important to punish them on earlier streets as well so that we let them know they are up to no good and we won't just allow them to get away with murder with over aggression on the flop/turn.

I'm not saying Luke allowed him to do that, I'm just talking generally and how I like to adjust to these types of regs.

Nice video btw, was a fun one to watch!

kakofigueiredo Hey mate. I'm not sure if it's the best idea for me to discuss strategy with my opponents tbh, but if you ever arrive with this combo on the river then I don't mind the call as you obviously block AA/KK which will always take this line in my shoes. You could argue this is a better call than some random pocket pairs like TT/99 etc.

Sorry I haven't gone in to more depth on the hand but I think it's best if I keep strategy discussion with my opponents to a minimum, cos I already play against some guys I'm friends with (who I also discuss strategy with).

It's nice to play with you too and good luck at the tables!