feeling a bit frustrated right now. i was feeling unmotivated to play this evening, as i didnt sleep well last night and after doing study group and coaching and some chores i felt a bit tired but decided to put it in at least one session anyways. i played 2 hours and finished with a profit of -$250. towards the end of session, i was getting overly emotional about variance and feeling like i should have quit earlier when i was up instead of finishing out the session. this is a common mental leak for me, blaming myself for negative variance, but im also frustrated that i may have slightly misplayed a couple hands as a result. i know im taking a couple days off as my girlfriend is visiting for my birthday, and i have trouble with losing before a break. im also frustrated as my birthday is kind of just another interruption to the grind for me, and i'm also losing a couple days at the end of the month to help my brother move so i don't really have a lot of grinding time left and my results have been poor this month. im also frustrated that any of these things are even bothering me in the first place at all, because it reminds me of the work i have left to do in my mental game. however, im always a bit more emotional when short on sleep, and really my grind was fairly good today and i stopped before any spewy behavior - so there are some positives to draw on. also, by the time i've now finished gathering my thoughts and writing out this post i can already feel ive put a lot of the negative feeling to rest already.

i will be able to grind a fair amount this coming friday through thursday, probably playing live one of those nights but mainly focusing on online grinding. this month has been a growth process and i would like to regroup and put down a solid week of grinding before month's end that is up to the standard im trying to set for myself.

i reviewed some hands and relaxed for a few minutes and i'm feeling better

i am considering cutting down on live or cutting it out entirely, and also considering more afternoon sessions as i kind of brainstorm improvements to my grind in the back of my head

stay strong, gl

thanks bud

4 hours of online play for a loss of -$850. i feel very happy with the session and my play today. i took an extra day off for my birthday to spend time with my girlfriend, and today i was having a very hard time finding the motivation to get back into grind mode but forced myself to go to the gym and put in a couple online sessions. i ran poorly today, but feel i played well and my mental game was also strong as the negative variance didnt really bother me much and the times it did i was able to quickly regroup. it sucks to lose and this whole month has been an exercise in dealing with frustration, however, if you take all of the sessions where i lost about a thousand this session would be amongst the most well played technically and well handled mentally - so i do feel good about that. going to watch the nba finals tonight and relax and aim for about 5-6 hours of online grinding tomorrow.

Don't sweat it - keep playing w/ the right mindset and you'll get there.

gl

played 4 hours of online today for a profit of +$350. tough variance early on in session but stuck to a professional process. very happy with my grind the last couple days. some of it is just getting more used to the variance, but i think at some point subconsciously i just accepted this month was going to bad and i think it has helped me play closer to my best these last couple sessions.

whats stakes would you say make up most of your action nowadays? $2-$4? i cant recall..

gl

2/4 and 3/6 mostly

occasional 1/2

when i play live its usually 2/5

was having issues with my software today so ended up playing live. 4 hours finished with a profit of +$145.

my last hand a 15bb loose player limps in EP for 5 another loose player calls i raise to 30 with tens the SB and BB both call the shortie shoves for about 75 total i reraise to 175 to isolate and the small blind goes all in for 150 more and i dont really like this and didnt expect it but im priced in and call and he shows jacks and holds (the shortie didnt show but it could have been almost anything in that spot). it was a pretty standard hand but at live poker this sort of thing shakes me up a lot more than it does online. i just quit because i was close to the end of session, but i do notice that i am much more easily tilted at live. thinking about it, i think that socially i want to be viewed as a strong winning player, so subconsciously that is probably exacerbating tilty feeling over negative variance. i mean its not like i went on raging monkey tilt or anything, i just said oh well and cashed out and it wasnt a huge deal, but i do want to be mindful and honest of my mental game leaks, and i definitely seem to have a stronger mental game with my online play than my live play and i want to keep working on that.

TMGoP covers this in the section about underlying goals. It was really interesting for me and I started to kind of realize some things about why I do certain things that I didn't realize before.

Do you think this could be because the underlying goal of being perceived as a good, winning player isn't a factor with the anonymity of online poker?

ya in familiar with that part but should reread it (and the whole book tbh but i have mental game 2 coming from amazon to read on my trip this weekend)

i think it is likely tied to general esteem issues as i think i have an underlying goal of garnering the admiration of the local players as some sort of validation to myself

47.5 hours online
+$625

32 hours live
-$110

here are how things stand so far this month.

i put in a short online session but my head just wasn't in it and i had to stop. i am going out of town to help my brother move this weekend, and thankfully that is the last thing on my calendar for a while that should interrupt my grinding significantly. negative variance has been tough this month, but more than anything im frustrated by lack of volume. some of it is my own fault, and some of it is the variety of life issues that have come up this month. i'm looking forward to getting back in to the swing of things in june.

i think i will play live tonight and hope to get winner there on the month, but if i dont it wont be a big deal.

6 hours of live tonight for a profit of +520. played well throughout the night, although there was one pot where i underrepped my hand and made a fold that i felt was close at the time and in retrospect was a poor fold, likely based on feeling near end of session or not wanting to lose a big pot at the end of the month etc.

47.5 hours online
+$625

38 hours live
+$410

managed to scrape a profit of a thousand out this month. not the best results but much better than finishing loser on the month, and more importantly i think i made some improvement to my grind - mainly getting more accustomed to online midstakes, but i think as a byproduct it's helped me with live 2/5.

im going away for several days to help my out of town brother move, and im looking forward to setting some new goals and regrouping and getting after it in june!

looking at my db a bit and these are my winrates for the year across limits



LOL doesn't matter what stakes i sit i guess i win the same regardless

Looks good !

Wish icould be working with ya ;0)

I'm back in town now after being away for several days helping my brother move up in New Hampshire. It was a pretty draining weekend, and I got saddled with more physical work than and less sleep than was probably wise for me to undertake, but in the end everything went well. I got back yesterday and was feeling extremely drained, and today I continue to feel drained and also sick. I think I got a bit worn out and caught a cold, or possibly allergies.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to getting back into the grind in June. I may or may not play today. I will try some Dayquil and see how I feel in a bit. My girlfriend is coming over for a few days tomorrow, so I won't be able to get much volume in before this weekend, which is frustrating, but I think my schedule should be pretty grinding friendly for the rest of the month.

June Goals

Long Term Goals

$50,000 in profit in 2014
I am on track for this goal.

January: +$6360
February: +$5095
March: +$2010
April: +$6525
May: +$1035

Relocation
This is now really dependent on my girlfriend and getting her out from an upside mortgage before we can leave town really. I expect some good strides to be made in June. With the added delays and the introduction of Pennsylvania and California bills the potential of relocated somewhere other than New Jersey is becoming more plausible, however still looks very much like I will be leaving Rochester this year.

Midstakes Mastery
I made good progress last month improving my tolerance to negative variance and dealing with larger swings. I will say that 3/6 still feels a bit big to me at times, but I don't get those feelings at 2/4 much anymore and 1/2 now feels a bit small. I need to continue to focus on game improvement, and my efforts there have been a bit lax over the last month.

Short Term Goals

80 Hours per Month of Online Play
I would really like to hit 100, but looking at my schedule I'm not sure that it is realistic so I want to set a goal that is attainable but still reasonable. I can generally only play about 4 days a week, and a typical day is 4-5 hours (much more than that is fine on occasion but a bit too much for everyday grinding for me).

Quality Online Grinding Process
Have made good strides but again need to be continually improving and working on it.

40 Hours of Live Play
The quality of my live play is still not nearly as high as the quality of my online play, but I do feel it's getting better and I am continuing to try to work on it. My plan is basically to play live Sunday and Monday nights for roughly 5 hours per session this month.


Study and Game Improvement
I got The Mental Game 2 in the mail recently, so I would like to make some progress reading that. I have also been lazy with my study lately. I'm still doing some study and routinely going over hands, but it's not quite the same as the intensity with which skraper and I were initially delving into GTO concepts. I need to make it more of a priority to myself to put in higher quality study time.

Fitness
I am down a couple pounds after going away to NH and helping move, mostly due to all the physical activity. It's getting sunny and hot out here, and summer weather is a good motivator for fitness and weight loss. I can improve on my exercise routine, but it's in MUCH better shape than my diet. I am going to focus on eating better in June, but really if I can just not snack before bed I know my body and and diet well enough to realize that that change alone will result in weight loss.

I am 6'3", I wear a 40" waist, and I started the month at about 265 pounds. I would like to be down to 250 by month's end. Although 15 pounds in a month is viewed by some as a lot, I know from past weight loss experience that I can easily achieve that if I can summon the motivation and resolve.


Final Thoughts
Last month was disappointing in some ways, but I do feel I learned some things and improved myself overall a bit as a poker player. I'm looking forward to putting down a good process in June. I'm trying to put an increased emphasis on quality study and physical fitness in the short term this month.

I did decide to put in a short session. I played 2 hours online for a loss of -$850. I played mostly 2/4 and am happy with my session. The big pot losses were standard, I ran far below allin EV, and I feel like despite getting stuck a thousand early in session I was able to stick to my plan and play for the scheduled amount of time and play well regardless of variance. I'm pleased with that since in the past a loss to start the month or a loss before having to sit out a couple days have both been tilt triggers, and I feel fairly at peace with the start to the month. I'm also a bit under the weather, and sometimes being a bit weakened can heighten emotional intensity for me, but this time I think being a bit sick and also having a tired sore body resulted in me being a bit more of low energy dulled emotional state.

Played a short session before group coaching today. I played 1.25 hours for a loss of -$250 and feel happy with my play and my mental game was good. I do feel a bit of overall anxiety building from my recent stretch of breakevenish play, but I am happy with my approach and know it will turn around eventually if I do the right things.

5.5 hours online play today for a loss of -$240. i was stuck 1500ish after 1 hour of play and was frustrated, so i had to quit session and take a break to regroup. i was able to come back and grind well the rest of the day, and had actually come back to be winner on the day before getting stacked at 2/4 right at the very end of my session. i misplayed a few hands today, but given i am still fairly sick and with the tough variance to start the day i'm pretty satisfied with my effort. i added another site to my grind and got my software all configured today. i'm hoping to feel healthier tomorrow and get in a quality day of grinding.

Hope you feel better buddy!

GL man, see you at the tables probably

hopefully my sickness is coming to an end. i feel like i am towards the end of the cycle, and today was more manageable. i got in 6 hours of online grinding for a profit of +$900. i played fairly well throughout the day, although i definitely misplayed a few hands. i'm still getting settled in on my secondary site, and getting used to the differences in meta between the sites. adding a couple more tables to the grind feels good. my brain was a bit too slow for the added action a couple times today, but part of that is being out of practice and a part of it was being a bit slow due to dayquil. probably going to aim for an afternoon session tomorrow and live play at night, and if im feeling well enough i'd like to take a trip to the gym in the morning.

thanks guys