sl8a

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Nothing lasts forever
Poker is no exception to this rule. While many things are out of our control. To be very good at poker and to put the work in to continue to be able to be a professional are not. I feel like through my own inaction and poor life choices these last couple of years that my poker journey may be coming to an end. Not on my own terms, retiring to do something else that I am passionate about, but to ultimately run out of money and be forced to quit.
And this is not through falling out of love with the game. I do something poker related nearly every day, be it play or study or consume poker content. I have been drifting these last couple of years. I bought a house in 2019, cashing out a substantial part of my poker roll, forcing me to drop down in stakes. Buying stuff for the house and continuing to spend money like I was still playing high stakes has took a catastrophic toll on my finances.
Below are my poker results for the last 11 years. Add to that $200k in rakeback and $100k on untrackable sites I have earnt over $900,000 from poker and yet find myself back at small stakes.

Add my winnings from this last few months and I'm around $85k away from a milly. The actual number while nice is arbitrary to my current situation. Nothing that I earned before really matters to my life now because it is gone. What matters is going forward. Giving myself options and really embracing the fortunate circumstances I find myself in. In that I have a job that still gets me excited everyday, that makes my competitive juices flow, that I still have the freedom that poker affords me. Yet to not take that for granted freedom for granted, as when it is gone I'm afraid it may never come back.

Why the blog?
Accountability. I been far too blasé in for most of my career when it comes to volume and effort. Much like my none poker life, I've tended to coast, find the easy route and do the bare minimum to get by. The bare minimum right now has to be lots more volume and lots more professionalism from me.

Where are we now?
I'm currently grinding 100plo, comfortably rolled for 1/2 but I'm farily low on confidence and very wary about running my roll too low. The next big downswing really scares me and I'm sure it will have a profound effect on my game if I even have to think about not being able to pay real life expenses.

Results for the year so far

The plan
60k hands has to be the bare minimum each month for the rest of the year.
$85k would be really nice to hit $1,000,000 in winnings and I think it would serve as a decent narrative for any readers invested in my progress. Although I'm not keen on monetary goals, and I'm not really writing this for anyone else but myself, it's just too obvious of a target to ignore.
Study. I probably do as much studying as playing atm, maybe a tad too much as I can tend to sack off playing and deep dive monker a little too much. The knowledge gained from studying is useless if I'm not going to use it.
Update this as often as possible.

I might be kidding myself, but I think I have loved every second of my poker career so far. Something has been missing for a while, I don't know what it is but I owe it to myself to put 100% into it. We are not going to go out with a wimper. We are going to rage.