^ might seem weird if you don't really remember me, but if you are ever in South Australia and I haven't moved/need a place to stay hit me up, you'll have a place to stay for as long as you want, free of course

TT,

Great post, and thanks for the encouragement. Things are progressing well with the book. Probably a couple more months at this stage.

ads

I read the whole thread the other month as well, has inspired me to say the least. Going to go traveling around Australia, working on organic farms, there's a organisation that hosts it all, might even lead me outer country. I guess I just want to say thank you!!!

bump, thanks for sharing. got through the story today.

i would be interested in reading a book as well, but i know the process of getting published is very difficult

good luck

1. something clever, gratz on the five star viewer rating on amazon.
2. because of this thread. i have quit school, and plan to head to australia, Cairns sounds amazing, let's hope i end up there.

ty ads.

What an amazing story.

I'm leaving for London from NZ in two days. Little bit of cash, no job, couple of friends over here. I was scared until I read this.

Hell, the rafting place is going to be my first visit.

Eagerly awaiting the book though

BUMP! Great story, just found it. I'm itching for a change as well..

I got married in April (I'm 22) because I knew she was the one. Unfortunately I feel like having another depending on me is the only thing holding me back at this point. I spent a month in Europe a couple of years ago and felt like an epic infinite tour of the world was in my immediate future. Now, starting a family, I'm not sure.

When you say you're starting a family, you mean she's pregnant? Because if you're having doubts three months into the marriage that can't be a good sign. Try not to start that family now, that is if you haven't already started it.

No, we're not pregnant. Marriage is the start of a family unit. I'm not having doubts about her, or our relationship. I apologize for making that unclear. I do have doubts about what I thought would be in my future -- being a vagabond, at least for awhile, and leaving the place I grew up in to go on an indefinite expedition. At this point I'm not sure that is what's in the cards for me. I enjoy my life, but I still wonder if it makes sense to follow those ambitions in a marriage.

This is without a shadow of a doubt the greatest thread on two plus two.
I have enjoyed ads story more than many books I have read. It is now 4:40 am and I have been up all night reading this tale of epic proportions.

Many props to you ads, from a fellow Aussie.

Leaving for BsAs for 5 months in November, hugely motivated by this thread, thanks again ADS

First time seeing this thread...totally great. Stories like these remind you that you only get one go at it...so stop being a pussy...

For those that want to travel but have little money and a somewhat "hippy" side, check out this thing called "WWOOF" Basically world wide organisation that allows people to stay at organic farms with food supplied in exchange for work, not particularly labor extensive

Please to be at the publishers?

Was going to post a thread about this but instead I'll just ask here since it's relevant. Sorry for making it so long.

I'm 23 years old and work in the dental industry here in the US. I started about a 1.5 years ago, originally hired as a part-time sterilization technician. Since then, I've been proactive about assuming new responsibilities and have become the full-time operator of sterilization and I also manage the inventory for the clinic (it's a large clinic with capacity for 30 patients at a time), maintain a five figure monthly budget, perform repairs in the clinic as needed and work with the dedicated repair technicians that we have contracted, some minor IT work and a few other minor roles. When I was hired I was paid at the maximum salary allotted for my position, and I didn't get a raise last year because of it even though my supervisor intended to give me a cash bonus. I'm not sure of what raise I'll receive this year but it will likely be around two to three percent.

I dropped out of college when I was 18 to try to run a small business but my inexperience and lack of capital was my demise. I worked for my dads cabinet company until the housing market crashed and then worked in retail for about 1/3 of what I make now. I don't have a degree and going back to school to obtain that degree would mean quitting my current job. I had plans to leave my position in 2012 and play poker full time while going to university, but Black Friday killed that goal. I generally like my job, but often times I'm stressed out because I have so many tasks to complete, and so many people expect me to solve their problems. There are ~70 students and ~20 faculty members, and they all come to me when something goes wrong or they need something. Additionally, I'm not sure of my long-term prospects at this job. I don't know if there is room for advancement or not, and even if there is I'm really not the type of person who wants to do the same thing day-in, day-out. This is the first full-time job I've held for more than a year and I am already burned out on the way of life. I get home from work and am too tired/unmotivated to do anything but watch TV and surf the web. My mother works at the same place as I do, so when I visit my parents our conversations generally revolve around work. This bothers me because my mother tends to live for her job, obsessing about office emails and talking about work constantly. Sometimes I feel myself falling into these same habits, and I don't want to be like that because I really don't love what I'm doing. I like it, it pays well, but that's it.

A lot of the guys I played/talked poker with have moved abroad, and quite a few are in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. It's a resort-type town, fairly inexpensive, great climate, close to the beach and San Diego and it's safe. Before Black Friday I wasn't crushing the games, but I'm confident that I can beat midstakes tournaments (average buy-in of $50) for a 20% ROI. Since BF the games have gotten a little softer as well. I worked really hard pre-BF to improve at poker since pre-2011 I just played lots of tables and never studied my game, and up until 4/15 I was on track to make six figures between my job and poker (which was my goal).

I am strongly considering selling everything I own except a laptop, an external monitor, and clothing and moving to Cabo to take my shot as a professional poker player. I'd be living with other poker players whom I respect, my expenses would be much lower, I wouldn't have a morning commute or a miserable drive home in traffic,and nobody would tell me when to start/finish and what to wear. I'd be playing a lot of low-variance, high value tournaments with an estimated average buy-in of $35. After selling everything and saving my money I'd likely have 8+ months of living expenses saved before making the move. I enjoy the company of poker players, and a lot of the guys living there now I have met and hung out with in real life, and I consider them friends. I'd have a great support network down there to help me improve at poker and take advantage of the fun things to do when I'm not grinding like surfing, etc. I have no desire to get married or have children before age 30 and likely not before 35.

I realize there are disadvantages to taking this shot. My job pays fairly well, especially considering our economy at the moment and my age/lack of degree, and I'd be giving up a nice benefits package as well. However, I don't live an extravagant lifestyle and could live very comfortably on $25k/year net under current conditions. I'm giving up advancement opportunities and may hurt my ability to find employment in this industry in the future. Though I intend to make this move permanent (a year or more) I may go broke and have to come home with nothing to show for my efforts and no employment prospects in a tough economy and I have no degree (but I do have a lot of work experience in a variety of fields).

I feel like I'm getting to the point where my fear of not taking a shot at something like this and regretting it forever is more intense than my fear of trying and failing. I've taken risks and failed before, and I remember how miserable it was. But I was also younger, less experienced, not as strong emotionally and didn't know if I had an edge or not. This time around I have data to show I have an edge, and I've already prepared myself mentally for failure. I have no delusions about what I expect to happen and what negative consequences could flare up.

I don't want others to make the decision for me, but my friends and family aren't capable of discussing this with me without letting their emotions get in the way of objective thoughts/criticism. I'd like to hear the thoughts of people in this thread and hopefully adsman himself.

CBorders,

As I get older and a little more experienced the one thing I find myself doing less, in fact I am extremely cautious at doing so, is giving out advice. What I will say is that you can't plan out your whole life, as the world tends to hold such lofty plans in scant regard. And if you do plan out your whole life you restrict your plans to what you know now, which leaves out a great deal that you don't have any experience of or haven't thought of yet.

So packing up and going to Mexico might just be the catalyst to get you moving in a new direction that you haven't discovered yet, as was the case with my own journey to Sydney many years ago. There are risks with such an enterprise, but that's just part of the territory. But at the end of the day only you can make this decision as you say yourself. You won't be able to work everything out before you go, and there are no guarantees in life. Maybe your job is the right thing for you now, maybe it isn't. I don't know, I'm not you.

Having the freedom to be able to make decisions like this is, I think, the greatest freedom of all.

The funny thing to me is that I read all of CBorders post and thought, "Clearly, you want to go. You should just go. There's really no harm in it. You might fail and not have a great job coming back, but you'll get by, look back when you're 40, and be thankful you did it."

Then I thought about if I could do that next year and thought, "lol No way I would do it."

I'm too scared of it, and I wish I wasn't. If you can do it, I'd say go for it. But my opinion matters far less than your instincts.

lol at the idea of me offering life advice to anyone, but here goes.

Cody, I can totally relate to this. You're clearly an extremely intelligent guy and from the limited insight I get from reading your posts for several years, I'd be confident that you'd have a better chance than most of actually coping with the worst-case scenario of this not working out for you. As Solo says, your post strongly suggests that you've already made your mind up on this, or at least decided that you want to do it. You're sensibly holding back and ensuring that it's definitely the right thing to do before making the leap, but you're the only one who can honestly answer that.

A word of warning though: Sometimes the trite, unremarkable advice "It's better to regret something you did, than something you didn't" can sound overly persuasive. In my experience it's just a means of justifying doing something reckless that you really want to do, not that that's necessarily a mistake.

Definitely agree with this. I try not to subscribe to platitudes like the one you mentioned and instead try to accept reality/expectation in situations like this. It's definitely up to me as to whether I take the plunge, but if I ask a bunch of smart/experienced people about the decision and they tell me I'm an idiot then I'm going to reconsider my options.

Thanks for the responses thus far.

CBorders: A big concern is bankroll. Your likelihood of going broke in midstakes MTTs as a 20% roi grinder is all relative to your bankroll and expected living expenses.

I'd say do it; I never personally made a choice to turn pro, it kinda just happened as I was made redundant in my job, delayed looking for a new one as I was grinding poker, then eventually thought 'this is going well, I guess i'm a professional poker player now'

If money isn't a huge thing to you i'd say do it, it all depends with how well you'd handle the x% (as I said, what's your bankroll) risk of going broke and not having a job to go back to vs the 100% risk of looking back and wondering what could have been if you don't do it

Also @Adsman not sure if i've said it already in thread, but as a fellow Aussie, your story is inspirational and I hope my life has been as interesting as yours when i'm your age.

Do it imo. ainec.

24 and living in mexico with your friends by the beach grinding poker!

I think thats all that needs to be said.


Boring sensible points are these imo: You seem well aware of your risk of ruin, you have a plan for that, youre already experienced with working in a budget and organising money, which puts you well above the average person, let alone poker player!

Although I agree you shouldnt justify doing stupid **** with phrases like the one about regret above, id say in this spot be careful not to do yourself out of a great experience while you have little/no ties/responsibility by thinking what youre doing is reckless. Seems more like a calculated risk with a guaranteed upside (8 months at least of the good life) + the opportunity for even greater reward (Pro-degen and who knows), with a down side youre fully aware of and prepared for.

From the way you put it, it really seems a no-brainer!

Something I forgot to mention is that if I do go busto and have to come home I won't be homeless, jobless, etc. My parents will let me move back in, let me borrow a car if needed etc. and my grandparents own a roofing business and they'll gladly hire me. I won't be making what I'm making now but worst case scenario I'd be living at home, walking to my grandparents house to go to work (they live behind my parents), working for $12/hr or something like that with some benefits and a family work environment that I can tolerate. I've worked harder for minimum wage and drove 30 miles roundtrip to do it, so waking up early to do grunt work and eating company-paid lunches isn't the worst result possible. I'm also going to discuss this move with my current supervisor next month when we have our employee review conference. There is a chance that I could get my job back, even if only at a part-time level to start.

Regarding bankroll, I won't be playing the stakes I was playing before Black Friday. I intend to drop my average buy-in about 30% and I won't be taking any shots at larger tournaments like I used to. I also have no trouble dropping down/moving up in stakes as needed and I have some backing options if it comes down to it. I feel like grinding 75-100+ games/day and making 180 mans a good part of my schedule in addition to the good value MTT's is the lowest risk strategy for a tournament player, so that's my plan.

After a lot of discussion and introspection I've made my decision. I was likely decided on this days ago but I try not to jump into things gung-ho without making sure it is a good move.

gl man

Cody, do it..because I'm already planning on joining you

CB,

Why not take a leave of absence form work and go to Mexico for a month or so? Do a dry run of your dream life and see how it goes.

This post reminds me of all the "should I quit my job and play poker?" threads of a few years ago. Every time I would read those threads I would wonder why you can't keep your job and still play poker. Not being able to do so in the US right now changes things, but it seems like there is still a possibility for an intermediate step.

If you are as valuable as you say you are at your job, your employer will rather let you take care of some business for a month than lose you all together, so you can probably work out a leave of absence. Make up a better excuse for why you need it, though.

Like Adsman, I find myself giving less and less advice the older I get, but I can't imagine how trying the Mexico gig out for a month would be a worse choice than either giving up on the dream or bailing entirely on your current life.