I don't enjoy plo because: I'm absolutely terrible and there is no competitiveness (because I'm so bad) whatsoever, and it's more "gambling" aspect in terms of going all in so much with 56% eq which can be exciting but for me I just experience it as stressful almost. Also in a lot of limits people seem to have the nuts every single time they bet the river and as an entitled ****/spewreg this **** bothers me. But pls remind me of this mindset when I reach a stake where there are only sickos left and I'm desperately wanting the nits back.

"Only know that you love here when you let her gooooooooooooooooooooooooo" (passenger - let her go) lmaoooooo

-

Yes thats more or less what I do right now mate, but for me the climb is so important and thats what makes this process fun (so in 6max the road above is visual in the lobbies etc.). And even though I played complete spew in 6max last month, in general I really enjoy this game and as I climb in stakes there come more opportunities (because of regs willing to fight + lower rake) to play 3/4handed which is an amazing format aswell.

So I will keep doing what I'm doing but I'm not not gonna go "all in" on hu and also I want my main studyvolume spend on 6max.

Yeah fair enough, obv if you really enjoy format x and don"t enjoy format y there is still argument to be made to specialize in format x but that's not the case for me. I enjoy both but one gives me more opportunity to climb, which again is the whole fun part of this poker dream pursuit!

So I was playing this reg 2tables in the hu200z pool. And so these hands came on simultaneously on the 2 tables (so at the same moment).

One of the hands is a thin valuebet, one of the hands is a bluff. Villain went full timebank and called the thin valuebet, but folded to the bluff.

Which one was the bluff, and which one was the thin valuebet? And what did I have in both hands?

First hand is thin value with A7.
Second hand is bluff with AK no heart.

i agree with above poster but for fun i'm gonna go opposite, K6s first hand bluff, AQ no heart second hand

Do you think there is a big difference between reg tables and zoom pool on Stars at 50-200nl 6max?

You guys are both right about the 1st hand being bluff and 2nd hand being value. In hindsight the value hand wasn't as thin as I thought it was haha so unconsciously put it out a bit missleading. Woops.

Yes in all honesty I think there is. Annoying thing in zoom is unless you study your databass you don't really see any showdowns, so harder to see what people are up to. But with this being said I think zoom is significantly harder to have a good winrate (good winrate in zoom is 2/3bb/100h). Not only does the fish nit up more, I think also the regs are just naturally stronger. I"m talking about 200nl limits but I think this goes for every limit that the zoomregs are a bit tougher to play. For example in 200NL regtables I can confidently I'm not really getting crushed by any regular I feel like (Martaimrko or some other Croatian regs are doing ok). But in 200z some regs are just beating my ass in the exploit game, and I would like to think they are pretty strong for 200NL players (hate to admit it but vit90 or Lautben are both very good exploiters and beating me in leveling wars). I still think an ok winrate is possible there - I play like 2bb in 200z over 100k hands and I punted like mad in that sample.

I hate to fall in this egotrap of wanting to crush it - Finally I've accepted I'm not gonna bother, also because of my terrible focus and tiltissues. And I advice anyone to not fall in this trap. Regtables is 100% a better decision because you see what people are up to and you just think about your decisions etc. Burn yourself out less fast - and having an actual winrate instead of finding out after 200k hands you are just rb grinding in zoom.

In lower limits the rake is relatively high and people nit up like mad, and 6max is not designed to play 6handed with 5 nitregs because the only winner would be the rake.

The bounty for seeing me at NL500+ remains, but the bounty for 200z is not a thing anymore from now on. I really tried to push through and not waste my time there for a month, and I almost saw it as like a challenge. But like right now regtables are completely dead and to get my weekly rb points (which btw I really need to stop doing ffs haha got sucked in again) I decide to play some zoom, but obviously because of the bounty I can't play 200 6maxzoom. So yeah I played some 100z today and yesterday. And I really don't want to rant to hard or go in complain mode, but yeah it's the same as these Rush and cash pools. Super max nit souldraining meta haha I just had a good session but still somehow nearly lost my mind. I was and still am in a good mindset, but I just don"t want to play there anymore but I still need action so rather play 200z. I think it's understandable.

sharp for not playing zoom. definitely a huge rake trap, although understandable that on Stars nowadays you can pressed to get action.

Of course if you wanted a lot of reg table action GG has tons of tables up to 1k.

This post from yesterday which I made after finishing my session was a bit toxic and written in emotion..... I remember when I was first moving up to 100z and thought it was full of crazy sickos when I first played there haha and I don't want to demotivate people reading this trying to look out for the next limit.

I'm literally a fish in understanding and respecting variance (I think everyone is but I'm maybe a bit extreme) and maybe I was just running cold in preflop set ups in 4bet pots for example. Recently I try to appreciate nits more, almost every decision in the gametree is easy against them and getting put it in the spot by a strong reg sounds cool and competitive (which fair enough is my main drive, and what I love about this game) but in the moment it's a nightmare.

But conclusion: Obviously there is not only nits there, and even if there is I shouldn't complain so much. But this rakeback snapclick grinding meta is just not for me. Again a thing what I keep repeating over and over.... At least on reg tables I started to appreciate the nits more





I was up like 13bi yesterday (only 1 on my main stake NL200) and still frustrated af hahaha imagine appreciating run good




On Monday I had an epic hu duel vs a reg (Vlad510510) which resulted in raking so much, I'm kinding of forcing myself to not let the points wasted and finish the rb challenge.... From next week I will just fully ignore rb again and just focus on winrate. I probably also will stop playing hu from that point, the game is sick but the format is not healthy. If I'm zoned in a duel I can't stop playing, and the swings on a daily basis (without bumhunting) are too crazy. On 6max reg tables the grind is more steady, and I"m being more of a professional (for the most part)

Can't valuebet thin enough these days

jesus

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Let's continue this with same rules/conditions for one more month (untill September 8th). In all honesty I don't really give a **** about handing out this "bounty" to someone (I do obv, but not that this $300 is the reason I stopped tiltmoving up stakes), and for me this is more symbolic - but still if you see me 500+ pls screen here and claim it. But still it feels like some external pressure after sharing my sn in the thread, and somehow it's working....

After last week pushing for the big rb chest, I started to feel the signs of the tank getting more and more empty. And today after clearly getting into the fatigued zombiemode I decided that it"s time for a 5-day break or so and refill the tank. I"m finally understanding where the fatigue, which I complained about so many times, is coming from. I remember going down this rabbit hole on internet/reddit looking for answers, and as a result I came to all sorts of weird conclusions/trying different bs diets/thought I was allergic to whatever etc. At some point I just gave up searching because it was driving me mad, and also decided to stop complaining and just accept it. And now I"m finally starting to understand where it's coming from. I"m just constantly burning out.... I'm kind of a try hard in terms of hours I put in, but I don't think it's that extreme. Like last month + begin this month was a bit extreme ofcourse because I simply just played too much - because of rb challenges and sort of the urge to have more financial stability (which worked out well tbf) - But normally I like to think I burn out of energy relatively quickly. This can be just how I am, not naturally being super high in energy. I still struggle with depression of and on which is clearly not doing any good to my energy levels. My social life, habits, balance & nutrition are there, but inconsistent on a monthly basis. Meaning; that I can do well with all these things and be consistent with it on a day to day basis, but then after I face some challenges I tend to give up too quick (mainly habits/nutrition related).

I'm slowly realizing that I burnout every 1.5 months because I just experience an unhealthy amount of stress, mainly while playing but also because of the whole picture. Especially after big financial swings it ****s with me in an unhealthy way. Now obviously this is a recurring theme in the blog, but after I pieced the puzzle with linking it to the short term burnout phases I'm feeling urged to really do something about it. The stress while playing is the biggest factor. Like clearly I experience getting overwhelmed with emotions on a regular basis (but luckily dealing with them ingame is not a problem at all for me :P). I write a lot about tilt in here. But when I'm in a period where I play so called "complete spew" (so a period I have this storm in my head, being completely restless), It's happening almost everyday where I'm angry snapclicking on the tables. This doesn't mean everyday I puntaway 13 buy ins, but I experience an incredible amount of stress when I'm in this state of mind. I like to call this "panic state" where I'm just being completely overwhelmed by everything. And for example this was going on almost regularly (so x% everyday) for almost the whole month last month up untill the last week. Now the reason I say this is "in my controll" is because I still make the choice to keep on playing when I"m in this "panic" state. And measures can be taken to reduce it. It's hard because I don't see it coming before hand. It happens a lot of the time after I took a break, I jump into the action punt away 3stacks and here we go.

On the contrary side, In the state in which I was for the last 2.5weeks. Poker is easy. I don't experience a lot of stress while playing. I'm focused and have some rest in my head. I don't passionately hate some of my opponents. I don't call down ubernits just to flame them in chat afterwards. I 0%equity-punt away my daily 250bb"s but rather than hating myself I"m content with it, I'm an impulsive restless idiot but I like who I am as a person. Now where is this going, What's the problem now? The reason I didn't take a break earlier is because I'm scared to go out of it. I know when I"m getting started again next week I'm just gonna play complete spew again. Including the self-sabotage, emotional swings and stress. And so this is holding me back from taking a break.... And so I'm still burning out.

Now atleast I'm more aware, and I think it's a nice challenge to not go into this permanantly spew-mode going ool preflop (and everywhere postflop) -mode again. I don't have an answer now though, it's easy to say I'm not gonna do it because I'm aware. If that was true than I would have stopped tilting after tilting 6buy ins away at the NL5 zoom pool... I will make a post about how I'm gonna approach this when I'm restarting again. Now let me enjoy my break.


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And to make this wall of text less boring, here are my results from the last 4 months since "regrind" after going broke. Starting 3rd of April 2023:





With around +$12.5k in rakeback, and -$1.5k untracked it's around +$32.5k

compare your first and last post in this thread its kinda crazy

Hey man, been a while!

Just wanted to pop in and say that it makes me happy to see you making progress in your mental journey, keep it up! Also beautiful results obviously. Those two tend to go hand in hand =)

^ one of my favs posting in one of my favs thread. Warms the heart on a Tuesday morning truth be told.

If you burn out from poker, it's because you are lacking something from life, and poker takes up too much time and energy from your life. This is tough to balance.

Health (are you doing exercise and eating right?), relationships (do you have a large friend group? Do you have a girlfriend or at least sleeping with someone), sleep, hobbies and down time away from poker (preferably real holidays) are all very important to avoid burnout.

appreciated guys

Yes you are right, and yes it's tough to balance for me and a big struggle. As I said in previous post there is a life without poker, but it's too inconsistent. Meaning that some periods I go out a lot with friends, have hook ups/try to date, invest time on hobbies/go on holiday etc. Than some periods like right now all there is, is poker. And as you say; I feel the correlation with mental health/depression and also with burnout. I miss my friends/family in my home country and I don't know if I'm gonna be happy or make it work here... But it's up to me wherever I am, to make it work.

I wanted to post a long "mental health" type post, I'm really struggling lately. But now is not the right time.

Right now I'm gonna take a break from blogging for some time. Poker is going well and (atleast for now) there is not much room for dramatic poker posts. I really enjoy writing. Especially writing about my problems (to a certain extend/debt) so now is the perfect moment to write, but somehow the desire to write is not there. I will be back tho!

Sucks... This is for sure a thread I look forward to seeing updates on.

GLGL!

I want to let you guys know I stop the "bounty" from now on. I"m gonna take some shots at NL500, 8buy ins to be exact. Previous shots went horribly wrong and I need to be disciplined when I run bad. The reason I'm gonna start shotting now is because I had some good run last 2 months and I took care of some stuff that I had in mind that needed taken care of before shot taking, like settling into an apartment, pay the security deposit (which was couple months rent) etc.

I'm not gonna update anytime soon but I wanted to prevent that I had to pay someone $300 for sitting NL500


Appreciated man, at some point I will continue. I wish you good luck aswell!

went completely wrong, tilted like a madman... Roll was finally looking good and I **** it all up in one sit. I'm not in the right state of mind recently and taking shots in 500 was the dumbest thing I could ever do.

I'm very disappointment in myself. I need to quit poker and find something else, it's not healthy. I struggle so much with the lifestyle.

I can rebuild again and again and again, and yes my win rate goes up a bit every time. Or the roll peaks higher, but sooner or later I **** up anyway.


Just to show this is NL200 this year:



Yet I can't appreciate the steady grind... I don't deserve to have any form of success in this game. I don't want to start ranting into self-hate but it's a very painful feeling, this self-sabotage.

I dont understand. You are clearly a winner at nl200 but you want to find something else? I think you just need to find some hobby. I doubt you can find anything close to your hourly which provides the freedom of poker. I would advice to find a fighting camp and train kickboxing or muay thai

You said you are working with a mental coach or psychologists dont remeber. How is that going?