For many of us, 2020 was one of the worst years of our lives - if not the very worst. But to keep things focused on the title of this topic, Discipline and Commitment, I am only going to write about my experience of living through the COVID-19 pandemic and how it has affected my life. As you’ll come to know, it the lack of those powerful “d” and “c” words in my life that has been my biggest downfall over the last 9 months or so.

I want to use this space in a way that will keep me both disciplined and committed in poker and, more importantly, in life. By writing out and sharing my struggles with the community I hope that I will come to better realize my weaknesses, what triggers them, and how I can best move forward while relieving myself of an unhealthy attitude towards my situation. If I can be consistent on updating this post and if I am able to receive some feedback or advice from others that have been in a similar situation, I know that I will have a fundamental piece to my self-betterment in place.

As I am thinking now of how to introduce myself, I am realizing that the strongest feelings in my life now are regret and shame. I would like to tell you about how I have been fortunate to be able to work from home since March and have not been personally or directly affected by the virus in any traumatic way, but that only makes me reflect on my experiences with the pandemic through a scope of self-pity. With restaurants and stores being closed and with the attraction of nightlife in a big city vanished, you would think that this would be the perfect opportunity for someone to better themselves financially and in health. I’ve had conversations with family and friends with assumptions that I have been able to save money during this time and work on my own health, both mentally and physically. But the truth cannot be said for any of those things.

Since I was in high school, I have been a constant drinker and occasional drug user. Drinking every weekend to the point of blackout, staying up all night on coke or some variant of ecstasy. Smoking weed every day. But over the last 10 years, despite my many vices, I have also been able to graduate university and I’ve landed a job that I am proud of and happy with in a city that I have always wanted to live in. To some, it may seem like I have an average life with many things to be proud of.

My family and friends tell me that they’re proud of me, saying that I should be more grateful and easy on myself, to be proud of myself. I can’t help but to think that I have no right to be proud of myself. I was provided with a generous upbringing, filled with time playing sports and hanging out with friends. I was told I was smart and capable of doing great things. So, when I look back on how things have unfolded with my personal finances and health, I can’t be proud of myself. I should be doing better. I should have more money and I should be in a better space mentally and physically.

With that thought of “I should be doing better”, and in the vacuum of time during this pandemic, it is hard for me to look ahead towards the New Year with any certainty of improvement unless I take serious and immediate action. In 2021, I actually want to do better.

Since the time the pandemic came to impact our lives in March, I have probably lost around $6K playing poker online. Likely even more than that but I haven’t kept track. About 98% of that money has probably been lost while I was borderline black out drunk and/or on drugs. I’m not a great poker player, but I can certainly build a roll playing $3 to $22 MTTs on Stars. My problem is that no matter the roll that I build or how long it takes me, I am almost guaranteed to punt it off playing while intoxicated. This has been a common occurrence since my first big score of winning the Big $11 in 2017. I can’t keep a roll because I am a degenerate that won’t learn his lesson.

I love poker. I’m obsessed with it. I watch hours of Twitch poker every day and have studied poker courses. I consider myself to be pretty good. My friends would say I’m pretty good and I’ve had some decent scores online and in live cash games. I want to play poker somewhat seriously. But none of that matters when I have no discipline or commitment.

Looking ahead to 2021, I’ve applied a cash game limit, a tournament limit, and a monthly deposit limit to my PokerStars account. My deposit limit is $200/month. When I play drunk, no matter how much I’m losing I will deposit every last dollar from my bank account. I have even done cash advances on my credit cards to rebuy into cash games I have no business playing in, especially when I’m wasted. I have self-excluded myself from playing on PartyPoker and GG so that I have nowhere else to play if I exceed my limits on Stars. I will work to get into a routine of setting a 24-hour self-exclusion whenever I plan on drinking, but the $200 monthly limit will help to restrict me from going completely broke as I have done all of 2020. I realize I should have done this years ago, but instead of regretting this, I will take action now.

I want to live a much healthier life in 2021. Aside from going broke playing poker drunk, I want to get in better shape and minimize my unhealthy habits. Drinking and doing drugs not only affects me financially, these things have also had a great toll on my mental health. My use of drugs became almost a weekly habit, making me feel anxious and probably depressed for days on end after using. When I use drugs, the following days are filled with regret and shame.

I’ve deleted my coke guys number. He was able to come to my place within an hour of a text to drop off coke. I am not able to have that convenience without becoming a degenerate. I have also cut down on smoking weed. I’d like to experience life without being high for most of the time. I used to play online while smoking weed but have recently stopped and I have definitely noticed that I have been playing much better (surprise!).

I guess my plan for 2021 is to take control over my life. I know that I need discipline and commitment in taking control. I will be updating this post whenever I feel as though I have something worth posting, whether it be positive or negative. I’ll update with any improvements I’ve made, the tournaments I’ve been playing and some spots that I’ve been in for hand history and, of course, any setbacks that I have along the way. My hope is that this post will not only make me a better poker player, but a better person – someone that I can be proud of.

UPDATE:

I won't be able to play on Stars until the end of January since I've already exceeded the $200 deposit limit (it accounts for all deposits in last 30 days).

But I've bought the BBZ Bundle to study and will be going through the 20 hours of content to study and improve my game.

I'll update once I've gone through the BBZ content and will post any questions or learnings that I have.

Sounds like you need a girlfriend

GL man remember most important priority is keeping your head mentally strong and im not talking about poker. If it doesnt work out this time I highly suggest you quitting all together. Hope it all works out.

100% quit, find a girlfriend and come back to poker when your in a better place. Poker will always be there but it sounds like your a bit of a degenerate I've across players like you who love to sniff coke and that

Quit! Find a girlfriend, spend time together do some travelling. There's more to life than gambling and feeling ****

Thanks man. I'm just not ready to give up on poker yet because I feel like I haven't given it a legitimate shot with everything else that I have had going on. I need to get other things in order, not just the poker. But if I do continue this trend then I'll definitely have to stop playing for a while at least.

Thanks for reaching out.

I have a girlfriend lol. And it's hard to travel during a pandemic. I should put some more time into my other hobbies which is what I plan on doing.

You're right that poker will always be there. I won't be able to play for a month anyway due to my limits, so I will see how it goes between now and then. Hopefully I'll be able to do some effective studying and improve my game.

I can tell you some gem secrets that I have learned but I can't just give them away to everyone.

All I'm gonna say is this, enjoy life! Go see the misses it's your life no the governments we need love and companionship in our life it's what makes us human. You got a month off to sort things out good, why not spend that month doing stuff that isn't poker related.

Don't study, don't watch poker, don't post anymore. Enjoy your life when your mentality happy and relaxed you will be able to come back and smash poker but for now give your life a break from poker.

Go take our your frustration on the misses, order a takeaway, watch some movies.

Don't think poker, don't play poker just have a break

Imo it's really not healthy to tell OP to 'get a girlfriend', in order to clean up his life/stay on the straight and narrow. What happens if he then breaks up with said girlfriend? Relying on someone else to keep you on the right path seems like a terrible idea, and if you want to change yourself for the better, it has to come from within

Nah thats rubbish

Op go see the misses

I'm definitely going to be cutting down on my poker intake over the next month, but I think this will be the best time for me to study and learn a bit more about about my own game without actually playing. I've never only studied without playing before and I know that I have a lot of leaks to plug before I can get to a level where I want to be.

I am going to be doing a "Dry January" challenge which will be to not drink alcohol at all over the month. I'll see how I'm feeling if I'm able to complete that challenge. I think I've been in a really bad rut the past half year or so and I need to break the cycle - I'm hoping that I can do this in a month. For what it's worth, I was able to stop doing drugs entirely for about a year up until May 2020. Although, to be fair, the drinking still had some consequences of its own.