this one is a late review... but I want to share

I was one of the lucky guys that got two free mental sessions with Simon in late 2020. Sessions were amazing! Simon was a great listener that had awesome thought provoking questions that helped me face my own problems and demons

I'll be honest... I went into these sessions all in, opened myself up to total stranger (something I never did in my life)... and results are amazing and impact goes beyond poker.


Don't be stupid/scared, take the free opportunity... help yourself, get better... nothing you can lose

I deleted msg 2x before I found some courage to admit to myself that I need some help. He is also cool guy, that I still enjoy exchanging a msg or two from time to time

This was a promising week. I found a mode of playing that excites me more, and I found a way of improving that excites me more.
More to come!

1) You get a good mentor
2) You go through a lot of pain in order to actualize yourself by yourself
3) You put in a TON of hard, disciplined work

...in order to have the kind of success that you want for your life.

As a coach, I'd want to push you towards one of the three, which you'd notice if you worked with me for a few sessions.

In the past weeks, everything got worse on paper. Lots of complications, fewer pay-off's, more stress.

It's good that I find time to focus on mental game when I really need it the most. This has been the most stressful time of my life, and I am dealing with it.

One day at a time.

Have a good weekend friends, because it's a time to relax. Especially when you feel like you don't have the time.

Sweaty times!

I'd say that that guy would be lucky indeed if he had good reasons to focus on the mental game side of things...

So yeah, grinding a lot, getting used to a much worse situation and dealing with the stress, that's what I am doing.

When you read this in the future you'll remember 1st of July 2021. That's when it all started. So I am taking it from there one step at a time.

I've been asking myself a few questions:

What's pressure like for you?
How do you know when you've asked too much of yourself?
How far are you habitually stepping out of your comfort zone?

Share some of your answers, if you would. Here are mine:

I feel pressure in my gut, and I get impatient as a sort of underlying state of mind. I know that I've asked too much when that state of mind hasn't reliably changed for the better after a few weeks of doing what I am doing. I habitually step out of my comfort zone into what I used to call the chaos zone, because there's the opposite of learning happening there.

And with that, have a great week friends!

Just another week of grinding. There's been progress compared to last week: A more focused grind and some productive play. This was the last week of play for this interval, which means that there's a week of meditation and contemplation in store for me.

Have a great weekend!

So as I missed my post yesterday, send me the following in order to grab that Free Mental Game Session now:

• Send me a PM in which you introduce yourself and let me know what you want to use that Mental Game Session for. I'll contact the lucky winner by Tuesday, next week.

As far as my week is concerned, you know, it's the usual: Some meditation, some breathing, some contemplation, eating healthy, getting good sleep, overall just preparing mentally for the next four weeks of heavy grinding. Same old, same old.

So have a good week yourselves, friends!

I don't know how it is for you, but if all I did was play poker I'd go crazy. This was a good change of pace. I practised some breathing techniques, did some meditation and some contemplation. Same old, but it keeps the mind fresh. Now's weekend time, then a week of grinding. Same old, same old, I know. Just grinding along.

Have a great weekend!

Have you wanted to play better for a while, but feel like you're missing something crucial? Well, here are five ways that you can improve your posture and breathe better during your sessions:

1. Set a timer (for 10,20,30 minutes, whatever you want) and take five slow, deep breaths every time that timer beeps.
   
2. Pin one post-it-note to your screen: "Sit Up Straight.", or "Breathe more deeply", whichever seems more important to you right now.
   
3. Wear a rubber band on one wrist; https://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Wristb...ber+Wristbands Every time you find yourself in a suboptimal state, swap the wrist to notice how often that happens. Then close your eyes for one or two seconds, making sure you see the insight of your eye-lids consciously. Then take one slow, deep breath, making sure that the outbreath is longer than the inbreath. Then you'll be more relaxed.
   
4. Put a glass of water on your desk. Every time you take a sip, take a deep, slow breath.
   
5. Pick one opponent. Every time you enter a pot with him, sit up straight.

So while I am dishing out Mental Game advice... I missed my post on Tuesday, so one of you is going to get a FREE Mental Game Session with me. Can be about posture, breathing or anything else that bugs you. Just shoot me a PM and introduce yourself and I'll pick a lucky winner by Tuesday next week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWQx...annel=JREClips

Another week of grinding. I wouldn't have expected this part of the journey to take this long. But now that I am here, things make sense. So let's keep going.

Some random things:

• I got a new M1-Mac and jeez what a treat.
• Have you ever noticed that when you breathe too slowly and deeply for a few minutes, so slowly that you feel like you're not getting enough air, it feels like your lungs are pressing against your back muscles and your spine with each in-breath? I wonder what that's about...
• I was anxious today, and then I went for a quick run. Afterwards I felt much better.

Have a good weekend friends!

Two unusual ways to have way better downtime:

Most of us are quite consistently doing our job and little else. When I was moving up. the habits I built looked like this:

Once I woke up around noon I would play poker or talk poker and then I'd watch some friends play, or I'd write down thoughts and ideas about, you guessed it, poker. When I'd leave the house it was for a trip to the supermarket, and that's the one good habit that I kept: Cooking good food. During the night, if I couldn't sleep I'd get up and play a session... that often turned into chatting on Skype, too, and then maybe calling somebody and discussing a few hands. During downtime I'd watch poker videos. On the weekends: Same routine. All of this was available 24/7. It was sort of like living in the mental equivalent of a casino for years.

Now take a deep breath.

I don't know about you, but if you're sometimes feeling stressed, or if you can't seem to get rid of some tilt, then you need some downtime. You won't need it that often, but you'll need it consistently, say once a week or even once every two weeks. It needs to do two things for you:

1) Get your mind off of things
2) Get positive emotions going. You'd want it to be something that you enjoy, that you're curious about, or that's exciting.

And if you're somebody who feels driven to work a lot, then you want that effective downtime that you can use as a really useful habit for the high-intensity, stressful times in your life. Do it every few days, and do it right. Really build that useful habits for the months and years to come. You'll look back and realize that you can attribute a lot of your success to a habit like this.

So here are two unconventional ways of getting some quality down-time:

1) Solve someone else's problem.

I got this idea from "Men are from Mars, woman are from Venus" of all places... John Gray says that men love to put on their Mr. Fix-It Hat and solve other people's problems. Now while that might not be true for everybody, I know that solving a hands-on kind of problem that's not my own helps clear my mind like little else.

2) Do the Wim Hof Breathing Technique

Sit down and take 30 quick, deep breaths. Add a long exhale and hold your breath on empty lungs for as long as you can. Breathe all the way in, hold for 15 seconds, and repeat the whole process one, two or three times. That's the Wim Hof method in a nutshell. Even if you don't have straight up amnesia during some of those oxygen-induced high's, like I used to get all the time, you'll still feel full of energy, even sort of giddy, after just 10 to 20 minutes of this.

Try them out, and have a great week.

So I've been wondering which Mental Skills people would admire. To stay clear headed or to bounce back quickly? To be able to play for huge amounts or to have very good bankroll management? Even with those two examples, you can see that it's somewhat different for you than it is for others. Let me be very clear:

There are Mental Skills that are going to be right for you.



Because as with most activities, you can break down playing poker into different skills like playing for hours every day with a strong focus.

To take a step back I'd like you to understand that your Mental Game generally only matters when there's something that's keeping you from doing what you'd like to do. So there's a pattern to what keeps you from playing your A-game, and when you encounter that then that's when you start worrying about your Mental Game more.

Many people only start working out once they notice that their opponents, who DO work out, have a stronger focus and can deal with swings better emotionally. THAT's when you work out more yourself.

That said, what IS wrong with your Mental Game? You see, there may be some things wrong with it, and this what people don't want to hear at first, that are wrong for very good reasons.

Because maybe playing poker isn't what you're meant to do. Or as Jordan Peterson once pointed out, and I paraphrase:

If you struggle with any homework or test then you're studying the wrong thing [at university].

Another week, another few steps in a certain direction. I've been thinking about this and doing some work on it...

https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/2...nally-1794061/

...and the types of responses that I got make me think that most poker players haven't. (...done work on it)

That vibes with my general impression of most people: You'll get some replies when you talk about psychological concepts, steps to take or lists to make. But when it comes to visualization and uncovering internal processes that are linked to the more creative and dreamlike states of our minds you get very little. I've heard people say that we live in a culture that's very left-brain centered. That's good for me, because I can help introduce right-brain type qualities into your life, and those are good for you. But first and foremost, they are good for me, and I am going to use that side of my brain (the right side) more in my development as a poker player.

So with that, have a good weekend friends.

Every small step in some direction, as long as you go in one direction for a while, say at least 2 weeks, is progress. But how do you know which direction is right for you? Well, here's my 2 cents on how to spend a day... so this was my day today, including how I'll likely spend my evening.

• 7:30 AM -
  Get up. Check your OURA ring (link) for sleep quality.
  
• 8:00 AM -
  Have good coffee and breakfast (Shout out to these guys! Click the first image for their location via google maps. And if you're in Berlin anyway... come and say hi!)
  
  
  
• 9:00 AM -
  Meditation
  
• 9:15 AM -
  Start work: Play 1 hour of a focused session. This is where the magic happens.
  
• 10:15 AM -
  Keep playing, but tone the focus down a notch.
  
• 12:30 PM -
  Lunch. I like to get my energy through fat's and slow burning carb's. "To each their own" is what I've heard so many times that I can just go with my diet for months and years, with the occasional experiment thrown in... (shout out to Longple!)
  
• 1:00 PM -
  Go for a long walk. Use the Jawliner (link), do some slow breathing and do some focused thinking on playing poker, constructing ranges and creating strategies. I like to do all of that while walking outside, undistracted.
  
• 2:00ish PM -
  Get back to work. For me, this means just to play another relaxed sessions.
• 4:00 PM -
  Do the occasional blogging or writing.
• 5:00 PM -
  Leave the office. You're done for the day.
• 5:30 PM -
  Cook a good meal
• 7:00 PM -
  Dinner
• 8:00 PM -
  Another walk. Walk slowly and contemplate or think.
• 9:00 PM -
  Relax.
• 11:00 PM -
  Go to bed (Remember to charge your OURA ring).
• Read.
• Visualize, dream, mull over some stuff that you enjoy mulling over until you fall asleep. I could do this for hours, even though I generally fall asleep within 45 minutes.

For me, what this means (and I can only face this with some humor sprinkled in) is that I've cut back on almost anything that's not playing poker.

I've got my bases covered when it comes to staying sane, naturally. You know, hanging out with friends, taking nice vacations, having good sex. Don't worry, I've got that, like most of us do. Cause otherwise we'd go insane, and that's really what I am starting to believe more and more. So no, I am not going insane and yes, that matters because it's all nice to pretend like you can be that lone wolf living in that tiny world (a cage) on groundhog day... but let me suggest that you can't.



You need all kinds of things for your physical and mental well-being. I mean, who am I to give advice? We're in this together, and even though you'd think that everybody had that great work-life-balance nowadays, they don't. So we're leading the pack, and that's why this feels so uncomfortable. It's a big responsibility. And if you're like me then this is your first life, too. We haven't done this before. This living. Let's do it a little better soon, if not now. I know, those motivational videos always talk about NOW, because they work with pressure, and they aim to reprogram your nervous system to love pressure.



And I am sure that you will, because you're reading things like these and you're deep in the poker world. You're putting in work, and you know how hard it is for you. You're doing the best you can. Imagine that you can take off that pressure occasionally, too. Just relax. Take it easy sometimes and come back refreshed. Be fiercer and stronger when you do. Relaxing is a skill. You're probably coming from a world where it's a unicorn, too. (Read: Nobody has ever seen it in real life, except when they were children. But us adults, we know that it isn't real... nobody really relaxes, right? Too busy.).
Time to recalibrate that nervous system in new ways: Things weren't as they seemed, when... Well, here it is, and that's the truth: You may work in ways that you think aren't optimal because you've never taken things easy, you never recovered, you've hardly ever taken the time to breathe. You know that I am talking to those of you who procrastinate, but also those of you who give it a ****ing 150%, but who don't love the pressure yet. Take it easy sometimes. Lean back, get yourself a beer, and watch a movie with somebody. Take a long bath. Meet a friend, order in some pizza and talk about women (or men).

And have a great weekend!

Your attitude, no matter what attitude it is, can either make it easier or harder for you to succeed. If you'd engineer an attitude now, then you'd want that to be an attitude that makes things easier.



"Man my attitude was just terrible" - "He's got a bad attitude" - "An attitude of gratitude" - ...

But what is an attitude?

Rather than pinpointing the exact nature of it, let's describe your attitude using it's properties:



Your attitude can range from basically ignoring something to being ultra-focused on it on one axis and from absolutely loving or appreciating something to hating or even despising it on a different axis. If you really want to make out with a girl and you pointedly ignore her then that would be one (of four) extremes, and if you hate somebody right now but give him your full attention then, well, your blood pressure won't be that great right then and there. So I want you to understand that your attitude determines at least your emotional state and your level of focus. Why is that important?

Because it means that you can engineer your attitude to serve you well (...or not. Or you can do a half-assed job of it). Down to some important details, you can determine the ideal level of focus and what sorts of emotions you want to foster. Can you imagine being totally immersed in what you're doing? Of course you can. But what is it that you're imagining? What's the first thing that comes to mind? So the next step is to imagine that you're totally immersed in playing a session. See what you'd see, hear what you'd hear and feel what you'd feel right when you're that immersed. It's this easy: That's what you want to focus on more. That's when you want to minimize distractions, breathe more deeply and fully and sit up straighter. The fear of enjoying the moment can in fact lead to developing a habit of doing the opposite of those things, so don't think that you can't learn something new about yourself right now. Are the solutions of your problems often easy things that used to be in your blind spot? You bet they are, that's why so many mathematicians solve complicated problems in their sleep, because that's when, after having given it your all, you're so relaxed that the noise is being put aside for you to reveal what's important. Imagine how easy poker could be if you had a few of those break through moments. Would it be like having a neuralink in your brain that feeds you gto-solutions in real time, at least from time to time? It's certainly the way people describe what it's like to play in the zone. It's as if the right play was absolutely obvious. What some people would give to experience even ten minutes of that exhilarating state of mind... and the bad news is that once you've got the neurons for it firing together, poker is just the beginning:

Experienced meditators sometimes describe big revelations being downloaded into their consciousness from above!

Well, that's so out there. Don't deal with that right now. Stay in your little comfort zone. Don't forget to complain from time to time. And alcohol helps, too (link).

This week, a lot of things felt like a huge waste of time, and the past weeks also felt like a huge waste of time. "Waste of time" as in

- This week was hard
- I didn't get even close to immediate gratification
- I have no clarity of what the point of it was

Poker can feel like a waste of time, too, and there's a chance that it is. Being single-minded about something is both the road to success and the road to failure. Quotes like that make me want to throw up sometimes. Yes, I am in that place. It's no fun, and I've only got myself to blame.

Peace out!

I've progressed on my journey, and I've decided not to give away free mental games sessions anymore. Instead, when I miss a post on Tuesday or Friday, you'll get a mental game session with me for 39 €, which is a 75% discount from my usual rate.

So, as I've missed my post yesterday, one of you lucky basterds is going to get that 75% discounted Mental Game Session to take your game to that next level, or to plan out those three next steps that you need to take in order to take off. Simply send me a PM and say:

- Who you are?
- Why now?
- What do you want to get out of it?

I'll notify the lucky winner by Tuesday, next week.

Good luck!

Decent week, small improvements, nothing big. You can tell by now, dear reader, that I am pruning myself like a bonsai. Slowly, but surely. There often isn't much to say. I hope that that's going to change one day.

[x] 7 focused sessions of poker
[x] a handful of long walks

Here's something fun:

What do you want to get out of this session?
(A liberal mix of fact and fiction, because it's fantasy and imagination that really gets your mind and body aligned to achieve what you want to achieve)

Alex sounded like a nice guy. He wanted to really get things going and make that big leap into the next higher stake. Mentally, he was focusing a lot on tilt, but there was something else going on, too. "You see, tilt is what happens in game." I told him, "but your preparation is what prevents most tilt." He realized that preparation was key for him, because he had picked up some poor habits along the way. He needed a plan, and he needed it now. So I helped him make that plan, which usually only takes half an hour or so. It took just 20 minutes. I heard back from him a few weeks later, and he'd made some progress. But more importantly, his mindset had changed. He was now focusing a lot less on the in-game tilt and a lot more on these hidden factors that make or break a career. He was surprised to find out that this change in attitude alleviated a lot of the pressure right then and there, and that his level of play improved by itself.

Have a good weekend, Alex. And you too, friends!

What do you want to get out of this session?
(A liberal mix of fact and fiction, because it's fantasy and imagination that really gets your mind and body aligned to achieve what you want to achieve)

Sam had an answer to "Why now?" that I found intriguing. There's a saying that 90% of success is just showing up. When it comes to improving your attitude, that's certainly true. Because when that day comes when you finally decide to do something about it, that's when you begin to unleash your power.

It can be frightening to behold. Have you ever met that kid again after a few years who you never noticed and who competes in triathlons now and is the CEO of a start-up? That's what I am talking about. Sam is definitely that kind of guy in the making. It turns out that when you're ready, you do the work yourself anyway. It's not a surprise to present Simon, but boy would past Simon have been surprised... he could have saved himself so much tension! Nowadays, I like to think of it like this:

All I do is support the, well, atmosphere, so to speak. I like to be the circumstance that supports your break-through, you could say. The trick is that the break-through is coming anyway. Sam liked all this a lot, it made sense to him, and it explained a few of his past experiences, too. Or so he said. After an hour, he knew what he was going to do, and as is usually the case, I didn't prompt any of it. I feel proud in these moments, after hanging up, without really knowing why. I guess because I am learning that humans are more amazing that I used to think.

So have a great week friends, and prepare to crush!

Decent week again. Am I always more optimistic than I should be? I feel like many small things are happening that are good. Who knows man...

[x] 8 focused sessions of playing (2 a day)
[x] a handful of long walks

Have a good weekend friends!

What do you want to get out of this session?
(A liberal mix of fact and fiction, because it's fantasy and imagination that really gets your mind and body aligned to achieve what you want to achieve)

Ali was actually a friend who came to me for help. He didn't believe in himself, and he didn't believe in his game. That was his answer, and as you know, that's not an answer. What I like to point out sometimes is that you don't need to believe in yourself in order to win at poker. It just makes you feel better, but even though feeling bad is unpleasant, it's not a must to feel good. It sounds so simple, but people forget all the time:

It's allowed to feel terrible, even for prolonged periods of time.

Now, Ali didn't want that, of course. Who would? Once you think about it, you realize feeling bad can be as bad as a full-time job, cause you've got to work on it all the time! You need to belittle yourself in your own head continuously, for starters. And while that is pretty dumb, we all do it.

A first session can be like that: You don't know what you want, only what you don't want. That's when nobody can help you, yet. Because before you know what you want, all you're doing is running away, and that is going to get more exhausting the longer you do it, which is really all you've got to understand. It's as simple as 2+2 (See what I did there?). But then, you've got to make that mental switch to move on mentally:

If you stopped running (from)... where would you like to take a break? And what's even more fun to contemplate: Where would you like to arrive?

So have a great week friends, and prepare to crush!