Subbed. You’ve probably said this a million times my apologies but what site are you playing? Also how much rake back are you able to get? Do you find rake to be a big struggle like I do?

FFS, I guess I have to make an undercover account on 888 or whatever and Bumhunt & bluff you for the regstatus regain

Thanks mate

haha no worries, I play on stars and receive with the random chests included around 47% rb (40% EPC + 7ish% of the chests). Yeah, it's pretty sick that if you go break-even you are actually winning by 6bb/100h. Even in 100NL I still pay like 5.7bb/100h rake over my first 20k hands.

Crazy actually that this is all mandatory and accepted in the online poker community. But yeah, with rake back the rake is actually 2.85bb/100h and it's still all pretty beatable in my opinion.

Hey Kidcudi followed you from the other thread.
Haven’t looked through this entire thing but very very nice graph.
I’ve had a rougher time at 100z lol
Is your SN Kidcudi on stars as well?
I’ll shoot a PM if you’re uncomfortable sharing here.

(I've got this video from "TheWakko" stream lmao)

Brilliant. You got in cheap. You played it smooth. And you got all the money!

Hahaha exactly, Just like Gavin Smith taught me

---

Little update:

Since 7/8 days the brain fog has been less of an issue, but ever since then I'm extremely tired. At least I'm able to think straight so this is a small victory compared to my previous state of mind. I'm extremely motivated and overall besides feeling dead tired a lot of time I'm feeling pretty well lately. I'm trying to be very disciplined and avoid punting away money when I'm too tired to play. I'm managing to play around 1.5k hands a day which is like 1.5 hours of play time (I play 4tables of zoom). And before each 30 minute session I'm doing some mad rituals to prevent myself from ****ing up. I'm working on a bunch of stuff to find out where this fatigue/brainfog is coming from and hopefully I will find a solution soon!

Poker itself is going amazing lately. I can't believe this is happening already. I'm beating 100z for around 6.5evbb/100h on my first 30k hands and I'm running a bit over ev aswell. With rakeback included the hourly $ is going crazy. I still had small and big punt sessions and I'm always playing 4tables of zoom (this is costing me some small mistakes here and there) so I think this is a very solid winrate. There is still a bunch to learn, but nice to be on the right track.

I invested part of my roll to finally invest in some new hardware and PIO solver. Now with PIO pro I can just run scrips and go crazy in spots where I have leaks. I bought a laptop because when the fatigue problems are gone I can go wherever I want. I went for a gaming laptop with decent specs to run the sims smoothly:

(Quote from a few months ago haha)



Because of the new hardware I decided to start with a new database one last time, to pressure myself to play without too much hud stats one time so I can try to play more theoretical to practice with it. This database started on August 17th 2021 and because my hardware can handle big databases this will be the last database I make. I'm gonna try to drop results monthly instead of weekly. So I will drop results later.

I'm gonna take shots in 200z when I have around 40/45 bi in my stars account. After the hardware investments and some rl stuff it's time to grind it up!

Peace and gl on the tables

We are in a strange parallel. Just upgraded the pc system here last week and has problems transferring hh data to new setup.

subbed + glgl mate! If you find anything particularly interesting in a sim you've run please share it with the thread

Haha gongratz on new hardware tho

Thanks mate, I will!


---

Back with some more typical struggles in my early career. Like a month ago I made a post how I was struggling to implement all the new theory concepts. At some point I managed to able to apply it well and I played some very good poker last couple of weeks. It was a nice feeling to know what I was doing in a lot of spots. In some spots I can confidently say I'm decent. Last 2 weeks I went on a heater, I didn't play a lot tho but the hourly win-rate was really sexy. Also since I have PIO I've been studying my ass off and I'm trying to dig pretty deep. I'm now at the point where this is AGAIN starting to affect my game heavily. I'm playing very bad, I'm overthinking every spot like crazy. This is causing me too make tons of mistakes and I also automatically assume that a bunch of sh*tregs are all over sudden capable of the craziest **** and I've been making stupid call downs over and over. I don't mind losing a bit, but my confidence is dropping by the minute.....

I will take 4/5 days off studying with PIO (I maybe dig into some data, or buy a course or whatever) and after that I will probably 1-2 table zoom for a bit untill my game gets back to being decent. Next couple of days I will try to play some volume and I'm really gonna focus on rationalize again in every spot. Also when I feel like my game is okay again I will record some footage so that later when my confidence/game is bad again I can review my A/B game.

Have to grind my ass off for like $600 rb. I sort of let go of it, but last 3 playing days I'm down like 12 bi ($1200) which is okay, My br and liferoll are both still fine, but I might aswell pick up the $600. Because the earlier the br is at 40/45 200NL bi, the earlier I can take shots in 200z (I will obviously only consider a move when my game is back to what it was when I was crushing 100z)

Challenge done. August was a pretty bad month in terms of poker due too fatigue, bad play and a little downswing last couple of days. I ended up profiting it for just under $1k which means I actually lost on the tables in August (received $1200rb).

I decided to take 1 month off of PIO, I still have a bunch of other study material to go over so I will keep studying in September (goal is around 10/15 hours) but I will mainly focus on playing. The reason I'm taking one month off PIO is because when I dive deep in some concepts in affects my game short-term (and effects it long-term) and I really want to focus on playing for one month. My study/play ratio has always been very high towards study. That's also the reason all over sudden I'm rising in stakes but now I think it's time to focus one month on playing. I set volume goals and $ in ev goals but I will keep them for myself. Anyway, if this month matches expectations I will go to Malta for a couple months around mid October (also depends if the fatigue doesn't come back, pray for OP ). I will also start playing 200NLz; because of the challenge I decided to speed up the process to just play 2/3 tables of 200z and was pleasantly surprised. The difference between my a game and c/d game is enormous. So to make the best of this I will just play 100z and every time I feel like my game is on fire I will play 2/3 tables of 200z. I genuinely feel confident but just in case I start losing like a madman: When I'm down around 15bi there in my first 10k hands or so I will probably take another shot when my br/ego has regained.

For now I will update this blog once a month so I will show results next month. Thanks for reading.

It's really nice to see that things are working for you, man. You're doing very well! Congratulations! Keep up your performance, focus all your concentration on your decisions and everything will get even better soon!

For sure. I thought a thread titled "MY LAST SHOT AT POKER" was going to end badly, lol, but lo and behold.

Appreciated mate. Yes I will! Definitely something to keep in mind next couple of weeks, I'm also gonna switch from 4 tables to 3 tables in 100z and from 3 tables to 2 tables on 200z (unless the pool is small, than I stick to 3 otherwise I'm constantly waiting). This hopefully will also have positive effects on the focus and decision making.

Haha yeah I can imagine. Last year I ran up a br playing MTT's. And I punted it all away. Then 1 month prior to this blog I began playing cash games in 2NL and in that couple of weeks I kept punting my small amount of winnings away. So when in very motivational spirit, I decided to pressure myself with making a blog with an ultimatum to myself. Looking back to it, very dramatic title haha but it is what is. I guess the pressure worked somehow

This is a post from back in April haha, happy that I kept it all here instead of making a new blog. Would be cool to have this blog as proof to beginning players, that the poker dream is still alive!

Last couple of weeks I'm really struggling again with my mental health. The main things I'm struggling with is Loneliness, anxiety and stress. I was in this "grind/workmodus" which despite the struggle I really like to be in but on Tuesday the brain fog returned. Last couple of days were rough but despite still being "foggy" I'm back doing OK again. Only a month ago I was close to breaking out of this bubble with me going outside again, going to the gym etc. to break my social anxiety. And now it feels like I'm back at rock bottom on this part but at least I've received some new insights.

Since the start of this blog I've been trying to make things work:

Running away from my problems: I've been doing this for years. I'm aware of it for a while but I was always so unmotivated to make things work that I acted like I didn't care and I kept doing it. When I think about it I picture myself going out drinking and clubbing when I felt horrible with a lot of stress on my mind. After various sessions with my therapist I realized this also occurs in the smallest things. This can happen while having a conversation with somebody, and I say something that might lead to the other person judging me. So I instantly make a joke about it: self-mockery as a defense mechanism. But also when I'm thinking about things that make me feel stressed or anxious I instantly trying to forget it. I think with noticeable things I'm doing this on purpose but with smaller things this process occurs unconsciously. My goal is to recognize it and allow the thoughts, try to deal with them well. If there are problems, fix them. I'm not striving for perfection on this part and I made steps already but there is still room for improvement.

Depressed/Unmotivated/Laziness: I've already written a lot on my blog on this part. I've made big steps on all parts. And there is still a bunch of things to work on. But I know where I come from and I'm really proud and satisfied with myself on this part. I've walked around in life for years with the acceptance of me "given up on life". So for me to actually and realistically think about the future since a while can be seen as a victory, but the war is not over yet. Also I can confidently say I'm not lazy anymore and I'm doing well tackling my procrastination thoughts.

Things to work on:

Care about what people think about me or how they judge me: I keep mentioning it, this keeps being a big problem. It got to the point where I'm at right now; I feel uncomfortable leaving my house, in case somebody might see me and have a reason to judge me or talk about me (so that others judge me). I recently deleted all my social media. And I can picture someone reading this thinking, that is a good thing right. But not for me, in order to break out of it I actually need to accept that I will be judged. And the only thing I can do about is not give a **** about it. My whole approach is wrong, I picture myself coming back in life ballin. Since I'm close to decent money (I'm not gonna jinx this month haha), I have this idea in my head of me going back to the mean outside world where people who are just as insecure as me and will all over sudden respect me because I'm not a broke depressed loser anymore. I know this is completely wrong and also running away for my problems. Which means I need to find "this acceptance of judgement" and also get rid of this sick idea before I'm (relatively) successful. But that is easier said than done.

Somebody recommended this book to me:



I'm not necessarily agreeing with everything but this book is exactly what I needed. Also to tackle the self pity attitude with my brain fog and just deal with it the best I can. The mindset alone can help. Maybe I will go deeper on this book in a later post (halfway there), but I can already say the short-term effect is there. I'm reading a bunch lately and I will dig into some more self improvement books like this.

Nice to speak out my mind every now and then, I was going to write some other personal stuff but saved by the bell haha, I'm gonna have diner. Thanks for reading.

can highly second that - DONT GIVE A **** - just dont be an arse is enough (within the law ofc)

... there are 8 billion people on this world, if the majority followed that simple rule the world would be already a so much better place

..... very little people really have an active positive impact on humanity and earth, for the average person just not being an arse is already great

..... this imo also helps not to take oneself too seriously ... dont even wanna talk about the vastness of the universe, if we humans are even special is still highly in doubt

=> relax, be one of the good ones and have fun

PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $141.14 (141.1 bb)
SB: $125.75 (125.8 bb)
BB: $101.50 (101.5 bb)
Hero (UTG): $292.50 (292.5 bb)
MP: $695.99 (696 bb)
CO: $122.95 (123 bb)

SB posts $0.50, BB posts $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has K A
Hero raises to $2.50, MP raises to $9.00, 4 folds, Hero raises to $25.20, MP calls $16.20

Flop: ($51.90, 2 players) 7 7 9
Hero bets $16.30, MP calls $16.30

Turn: ($84.50, 2 players) 8
Hero bets $36.90, MP calls $36.90

River: ($158.30, 2 players) 3
Hero bets $116.85, MP calls $116.85

Results: $392.00 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: 7 7 9 8 3

Hero shows K A: (One Pair, Sevens)
(Pre 74%, Flop 81%, Turn 86%)

MP mucks A Q: (One Pair, Sevens)
(Pre 26%, Flop 19%, Turn 14%)

Hero wins $389.50

Well, that just happened..... Emotional roller coaster is an understatement hahaha V already stationed me down heavily before so I was already not loving barreling it off but when he tank called I was like: **** my l... *exciting mode*

Great Post! You're absolutely right and I think this is something everyone gets wrong. "Easier said than done" is sadly very true also, but just knowing this is the correct mindset is a big part of the battle!

I am personally so thankful that through trying to improve my poker mindset, I discovered that my life mindset & mental game needs just as much work lol.

Do you recommend the book? I've heard lots of good things but have always been skeptical of the self-help genre (a completely baseless assumption but I always guessed its hard for a book to advise on something so personal)

Cheers for the advice as always lock With other words this has been mentioned in the book aswell. Now it's up to me to change my mindset.

Thanks for your comment man. Well done improving your mindset. Without going in to much detail maybe you can tell me/us a bit about it. Did you set other goals/values for yourself in life? Did you try to fight certain thoughts that were part of a considered "wrong mindset"? Personally for me as you said it's definitely a battle but crucial for a better life.

Haha I was also always skeptical on "self-help books" aswell. But for me it was golden. And I definitively recommend the book to anyone. In the book there is mentioned a lot of things I was already aware of. Which the book helped me with, with either extra awareness or explanation on how to do it. But it also opened eyes on a lot of (for example) flaws in my mindset I wasn't aware of. I'm now gonna order some more books of self improvement books and if there any noticeable good ones I might make a post about it here.

I will also keep posting updates about this mindset progress.

Edit: One quote from the book I really like and can relate to:

"Our struggles determine our successes. Our problems birth our happiness, along with slightly better, upgraded problems. See: it's a never-ending upward spiral. And if you think at any point you're allowed to stop climbing. I'm afraid you're missing the point. Because the joy is in the climb itself."

Also time for a poker related post. This month I decided to not study, and focus one month on playing high volume. I set money and volume goals at the beginning of this month: Terrible idea. I began this month really well, but holy ****. The ups and downs are real. This month I"m tilting so much and the damage becomes bigger and bigger. The whole point of this blog was not only to hold myself accountable of being a better human being and poker player. But also because I kept tilting away my bankroll. I haven't tilted away my bankroll. I'm actually up a bunch as I'm writing this post. But this is not how I want to keep going on. This is not how I enjoy poker and the emotional swings are far from worth it. The last 3 days were the low point. Thursday I went on an absolute monkeytilt and lost around 15bi in NL100. Then the day after I went on a complete heater, and with the added rb my bankroll was back to what is was before. Did I learn my lesson? Nope, Yesterday went on an absolute monkey tilt again and lost 15bi again. This is just the last 3 days but the whole month it's going like this. I keep having this ignorant mindset where I admit variance is part of the game but lowkey feel like I should always win when I play focused poker. Nice poker related goal for the upcoming weeks is to start working on this again.

A couple things I learned from this month playing high volume are:
My mental game leaks are nowhere to be fixed and are huge
Rb grinding is not for me
When playing zoom, after months of always 4tabling, 3 tabling should be max for me
There is a lot of money to be made in poker
Poker players are lazy
I have a ****ton of study work to do

So with my tilted irrational mind I've deleted one database from this month with like 40k hands in there. YES, I'm an idiot. I shouldn't have done that and this time I can't blame it on shitty hardware but I can only blame it on myself. I just want fresh tilt-free data to review but I can't seem to do it. So rather accept that and work with the "tilted data" as described in TMGOP to work on that. In this edeleted db I was down around $300 and up around $800 in ev.

This is the current databass that I have from hands in this month:



So with like a total of 1k losses on the tables (databases combined) I'm really disappointed in myself. I completed 3 x EPC = $2400 and I finished second in the leaderboards once for $600. And if we add some other small lb cashes and chest related rb I think the total rb is around $3200.



So considering the time I grinded, it has been a terrible month untill now but atleast it's clear now there is a lot of work to do. I will consider buying a mental game course, and I've got loads of sims to run in the following days. I have some spots that need attention asap. Besides studying I will keep playing a bit here and there and I will do an update how it went at the end of this month.

Time for some ****ing consistency for once

you've got this dude! glgl for the next month

Bro I feel you 100%

This is all part of becoming a professional. The growing pains we go through. Trying to figure out what it is we do best and then maximizing. I can relate to grinding lb and realizing im.not cut out for that type of grind. After playing full time for 1/2 yr I feel like I'm just now finding my groove and grinding in a way that maximizes my potential.

Have you ever read mobius blog on RIO forum? If you haven't I highly recommend you do. Also demondoink first blog was gold as well.

Thanks man! You too! Keep crushing and please don't stack me when I'm tiltshotting 200 :P

Hey man, Hopefully you found "your groove" now.

I have actually read "Mobius blog" a while ago. Great read. Will read it again somewhere tomorrow. Demondoink's first blog I haven't read. The sn seems familliar tho. I have played some hands with him in the 200 pool recently if i'm not mistaking and I think he is a 500z reg from watching content? I will try to find the blog actually and read it. Any other major advice on tilt is always appreciated, thanks for your comment Bobby


---------

Had like an insane session yesterday/this morning. Whole night it went up and down a few bi here and there and then last hour or 2 I went on a crazy heater of binking a stack or 11 in the 100 pool (And lost like 2.5bi afterwards but the hour of power was real). Because I was playing well, and mainly because Charlie Carrol was in the pool , I jumped in the 200 pool aswell. Before this month I was planning on playing reasonable % of volume in the 200 pool but with my idiotic tilting behaviour + I'd like to be rather over rolled, I'm way more carefull with shotting than the beginning of this month. After 300 hands, allthough I was playing really well, I stopped playing there because I kept having scenarios in my head of me ****ing up again like I did twice in the last 4 days. The whole "rise in stake" grind is the same. Before moving up I always say this: "Before I allow myself to play an X-stake I need to have taken care of my tiltproblems". Let me take the time to lie to myself and post about it on the internet again : I need AND WILL force myself to actively at-least try to something about it in the next weeks.

I almost never drop hands here and I will try to do it some more from now, some hands from yesterday, feedback is always appreciated:



PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $100.28 (100.3 bb)
SB: $114.16 (114.2 bb)
BB: $107.60 (107.6 bb)
UTG: $100.00 (100 bb)
MP: $101.00 (101 bb)
Hero (CO): $342.21 (342.2 bb)

SB posts $0.50, BB posts $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has A T
fold, MP raises to $2.20, Hero raises to $7.04, 3 folds, MP raises to $19.01, Hero calls $11.97

Flop: ($39.52, 2 players) Q 5 7
MP bets $12.39, Hero calls $12.39

Turn: ($64.30, 2 players) 3
MP checks, Hero bets $14.20, MP raises to $40.47, Hero raises to $310.81 and is all-in, MP calls $29.13 and is all-in

River: ($203.50, 2 players) 5

Players agreed to run it twice.

River #2: ($203.50, 2 players) K

Results: $203.50 pot ($0.00 rake)
Final Board: Q 5 7 3 5 K

MP shows 9 9: (Two Pair, Nines and Fives)
Board #1 : (Pre 53%, Flop 74%, Turn 86%)
(One Pair, Nines)
Board #2 : (Pre 52%, Flop 74%, Turn 86%)

Hero shows A T: (One Pair, Fives)
Board #1 : (Pre 47%, Flop 26%, Turn 14%)
(High Card, Ace)
Board #2 : (Pre 48%, Flop 26%, Turn 14%)

MP wins $100.50

PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $114.86 (114.9 bb)
SB: $100.00 (100 bb)
BB: $100.00 (100 bb)
UTG: $125.49 (125.5 bb)
MP: $115.06 (115.1 bb)
Hero (CO): $103.00 (103 bb)

SB posts $0.50, BB posts $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has 2 2
2 folds, Hero raises to $2.50, 2 folds, BB raises to $10.00, Hero calls $7.50

Flop: ($20.50, 2 players) J K 4
BB bets $6.62, Hero calls $6.62

Turn: ($33.74, 2 players) 4
BB bets $19.30, Hero calls $19.30

River: ($72.34, 2 players) 9
BB bets $64.08 and is all-in, Hero calls $64.08

Results: $200.50 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: J K 4 4 9

BB shows A Q: (One Pair, Fours)
(Pre 47%, Flop 41%, Turn 36%)

Hero shows 2 2: (Two Pair, Fours and Twos)
(Pre 53%, Flop 59%, Turn 64%)

Hero wins $198.00

PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

Hero (BTN): $209.41 (209.4 bb)
SB: $121.52 (121.5 bb)
BB: $117.15 (117.2 bb)
UTG: $109.77 (109.8 bb)
MP: $100.00 (100 bb)
CO: $128.62 (128.6 bb)

SB posts $0.50, BB posts $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has Q J
3 folds, Hero raises to $2.50, SB raises to $11.00, fold, Hero calls $8.50

Flop: ($23.00, 2 players) 7 8 2
SB bets $11.14, Hero calls $11.14

Turn: ($45.28, 2 players) 3
SB checks, Hero checks

River: ($45.28, 2 players) 4
SB bets $28.39, Hero raises to $187.27 and is all-in, fold

Results: $102.06 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: 7 8 2 3 4

Hero wins $99.56

PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

Hero (BTN): $270.63 (270.6 bb)
SB: $101.94 (101.9 bb)
BB: $100.00 (100 bb)
UTG: $183.70 (183.7 bb)
MP: $100.00 (100 bb)
CO: $100.00 (100 bb)

SB posts $0.50, BB posts $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has A K
3 folds, Hero raises to $2.50, fold, BB raises to $6.00, Hero raises to $16.80, BB calls $10.80

Flop: ($34.10, 2 players) 4 J 4
BB checks, Hero checks

Turn: ($34.10, 2 players) 9
BB bets $8.00, Hero calls $8.00

River: ($50.10, 2 players) 6
BB bets $22.00, Hero calls $22.00

Results: $94.10 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: 4 J 4 9 6

BB shows A 3: (One Pair, Fours)
(Pre 26%, Flop 21%, Turn 14%)

Hero shows A K: (One Pair, Fours)
(Pre 74%, Flop 79%, Turn 86%)

Hero wins $91.60

PokerStars - $1 NL FAST (6 max) - Holdem - 6 players
Hand converted by Holdem Manager 3

BTN: $144.26 (144.3 bb)
SB: $152.13 (152.1 bb)
Hero (BB): $100.00 (100 bb)
UTG: $123.74 (123.7 bb)
MP: $61.66 (61.7 bb)
CO: $75.95 (76 bb)

SB posts $0.50, Hero posts BB $1.00

Pre Flop: (pot: $1.50) Hero has Q K
UTG raises to $2.50, 4 folds, Hero calls $1.50

Flop: ($5.50, 2 players) 5 T 7
Hero checks, UTG bets $1.57, Hero raises to $7.84, UTG calls $6.27

Turn: ($21.18, 2 players) T
Hero bets $19.72, UTG calls $19.72

River: ($60.62, 2 players) J
Hero bets $69.94 and is all-in, UTG calls $69.94

Results: $200.50 pot ($2.50 rake)
Final Board: 5 T 7 T J

Hero shows Q K: (One Pair, Tens)
(Pre 61%, Flop 37%, Turn 55%)

UTG shows 6 8: (Flush, Jack High)
(Pre 39%, Flop 63%, Turn 45%)

UTG wins $198.00




H1Could be losing my mind here, but actually real like this triple off considering regs **** their pants playing deeper than 110bb eff. V tanked whole timebank and called last second before timing out, the tragic scens I could go deeper in analysis but I really would like to know others opinion on this one.
H2 Flopcall is already a punt. I feel like people are so transparent in those pots that it's easy to play IP. But I could be wrong and lose major ev by doing it. Need to start studying 4bp's anyway. Anyway when something seems off I have this urgency to make the plays. Looking back to it this play is ridiculous. I rather try fancy stuff like this when a bit deeper maybe.
H3 What about my combo? I'm assuming rather do this with 2"s than with 5's/6's/7's/8's?
H4I have my reasons to defend combo's like this against some v"s some% but looking back to it I guess better to 4b/fold it pre.
H5Oopsss
H6Feedback on this one is appreciated aswell. Low frequency x/r-B and river I just let the runout decide if I'm gonna fire or not. I will run the sim on this one actually. I'm pretty sure my sizing OTT is off...

I rather show puntskies than boring abc hands... Thanks for reading

I really like line in h1. For some reason rest of hands show in unreadable format on my phone.

Hmm... Weird that the other hands are not showing.

Do you maybe have a link or place where to find the suggested blog?