I have been a professional player for like 8 years.
I used to handle the psychological part of poker, both on and off the table,
very well in the past and i felt it also gave me
an edge over most other players.

Thats not the case anymore, especially off the table.
Even though the last year has been good to me financially
poker often make me miserable nowadays.

One thing is that i anchor to when i had my highest net worth.

I dont need the money.
I can live very comfortably off the interest rate for a very long time.
I have 90% of my money invested in a very secure way.
Still if i lose as little as 1%, or even a fraction of 1%, of my net worth during a session, i have a hard time getting over it.

When im close to my top net worth i feel ok, just ok,
and really dont want to play unless the games are super juicy
- scared of losing.

When im farther away from my top net worth i feel miserable
, and dont want to play - scared of losing even more.

Even though im never more than a few percent away and the money means
absolutely nothing it affects my mood in a way that my non-poker life suffers a lot.


Any suggestions on what to do?
What to read?
Which coach to get?

Hi Quasar ,

very unlikely that i could give you any advice or help with your problem.
How ever the quote above caught my intention .
Maybe if you describe a little how your mood changes , how your non-poker life suffers it might give other's a starting point .
Sorry , best i can do

I'd imagine if you talked to a psychologist. He would sit you down and rationalize with you that you're richer than 90%+ of the population.

If you lose some, so what? you're still richer than 90% of the population. But you been pro for a long time, so you're clearly good. You'll probably continue to win if you keep playing.

Maybe he'll bring in examples of super rich guys like warren buffet, donald trump, bill gates who lose money but then recover. Or even if they don't recover, so what.

Maybe try to rationalize that your net worth doesn't define who you are.

I'm not a psychologist. Just talked to some for my own issues. They pretty much did this to me.

I've asking for advice on forums for years. Even though some genuine intelligent/caring posters say the exact same thing as psychologists. For some reason it doesn't sink in.

Reading "into" your thread, including the the title of your thread, how many times you refer to money, your net worth, and your reference sometimes that the money doesn't mean anything to you -but other times it means the world to you.
The entire content of the thread is really about your personal insecurity, and the root is probably lack of money. I certainly don't buy into your claim about having gobs of money, BS! No one that truly has gobs of money makes the kind of comments you're making on a poker site with realistic expectations of finding "answers" to your imaginary problem.
Respectfully I do think maybe you have some issue that need dealt with, we all do. But if you have to worry about your "net worth" when playing poker, and how it affects your poker game then obviously you have BANK ROLL troubles.

I think you kind of answered your own post. It sounds like your problems are related to psychological biases known as anchoring and loss aversion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anchoring
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_aversion

You are anchoring to your "high water mark" although it is very arbitrary; there is no reason why you must be so attached to this specific anchor and not another. Also, your losses hurt more than equivalent gains since you are human and experience loss aversion.

I do not think you can do anything about the loss aversion, but I have a couple suggestions to reduce the anchoring effect:

1) Look at your bankroll as infrequently as possible. Cover up your stack size using "tiltblocker" or a similar program. This will prevent your brain from anchoring to a specific value. This will actually help with loss aversion too since you will be less aware of losses. You will be less aware of wins as well, but you are more concerned with the loss side from a mental health standpoint.

2) Try to set your anchor differently. Maybe use the value of your bankroll on the first of the year or month. Keep looking at it in poker tracker to get your brain to make THAT the anchor (assuming it is a more mentally beneficial anchor than your high water mark this year)

you need to find something that makes you happy other than money in your bank. find some sort of inner peace. maybe go to school find something else that interest you, do charity or anything other than poker untill you find what your looking for

It affects me in several ways. One of my interests/hobby is finance and i usually study a couple of hours a day but when my mood changes due to a losing session its no fun anymore and i cant focus. When its worse than just a small loss i even have a hard time enjoying movies and non-fiction books. I feel restless and need to work out or spend time with friends to get my mind off the money issue.

Thats two good points.


Yeah, thats the problem.

I made this post in another forum a while ago.
And it explains very well how i feel.

Im probably burned out. And have some sort of depression.


I need to find those lower form of tricks.

I agree.


I have been seeing a therapist for about a year.
Based on some experiences i had during my childhood i have
an unhealthy fear of of that something catastrophic will happen that i have no control over.

My extreme monetary risk aversion which has developed over the last year
probably has the same roots. Whats weird is this wasnt an issue for seven years and the last year has been good to me financially.


Yes, that has to be the case. Even though i play with a BR of several hundred buy-ins its not enough when i feel like this.
(PLO=huge variance and several hundred buy-ins is pretty standard)
Its hard to move down tho. Hard to focus on lower limits.

Thanks for your advice. I will spend time to read more about anchoring and risk aversion.

Actually i have already read a lot about both. Kahneman, Taleb, Dan Ariely and more. And it's back to that i know how irrational i am but i feel incapable of changing the way im thinking.


"Look at your bankroll as infrequently as possible"

This is hard. Its always in the back of my mind.

But if I consciously try to do this over the next couple of months it might get easier.

Maybe i can use some sort of mindfulness meditation. When i feel those thoughts are present i take a couple of deep breaths and focus on the breathing and let those thoughts go away...

Made me feel good that you even responded to my post

So here's my amateur\noob 2 cents reply

You seem to spend allot of your time having to think and analyse .
Maybe you could do with some more balance in your life .
I mean less thinking and more doing.
Working out i assume means going to the gym and seems to be good for you.
Are there other things that you could be - doing - that would interest you ?
Probably won't help you with your your problem but might make you feel better in other ways.

just seen your post above

meditation is great , give your mind a break

mind's like having time off too

This is spot on. I listened to Tommy Angelo a couple of days ago on the mental game radio show with Jared Tendler and i have now bought a couple of books about buddism. Maybe that can help me find that inner peace.

Tommy said something like this

"According to the buddhist teachings the cause of all of our suffering is
our attachments, and desires, cravings, and clinging and also aversions.

We like things, or we dont like things, all the time we judge everything.

And one of the basic ways its put is:
Anytime we want things to be different then thats what causes us suffering.

If we lost a pot, and we dont want it to be that way we suffer.
If we found out we have cancer we dont want it to be that way and we suffer.

It is our resistance to what actually is, according to buddhist teachings, which is the core of the problem"


Actually since a couple of months i have started to look for voluntary work.
Havent found anything yet. But maybe something connected to homeless people or children.

I think I need to find something that I find meaningful.

Thanks. I will download the audio version and listen to it.

Taking some time off is a good idea. Like i mentioned earlier im probably burned out.

I think you are right on this one OP, you are burned out a bit surely but don't understimate the fact that what you uncovered with your therapist is indeed very strong. I discovered so many hidden things to me that totally changed me in the last year thanks to the therapist. It's sometimes hard, it's sometimes total bliss.
Yoga, Chi Gong, meditation helped me a lot to accept the things as they are.

Those quotes are really interesting. What buddhism books did you buy?

I ordered these from Tommy Angelo's list


The Miracle of Mindfulness - by Thich Nhat Hahn

Wherever You Go, There You Are - by Jon Kabat-Zinn

Awakening the Buddha Within - by Lama Surya Das

The Heart of Buddha's Teaching - by Thich Nhat Hahn

Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing - by Thich Nhat Hahn

Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind - by Shunryu Suzuki

Training the Mind - by Chogyam Trungpa


http://tommyangelo.com/meditation-101/

For sure, e.g. when you wait for games you spend a lot of time alone with your thoughts...


yes, i live a very unbalanced life. Its better now than it was a 6 months ago but still a long way to go.

One thing ive thought about doing is taking a class in cantonese together with my cousin.

If i one day get a job in finance that would be really helpful i think.

Thanks, that's motivating to hear.

I think you missed my point . What i mean is about having 1 or 2 days a week away from what you usually do .
It sounds like financially you can afford to take time out , if your body has no problems then with doing , i mean things like swimming , horse riding , going to a spa , long walks etc. , help some oap's with there garden.

I have been thinking about this. I do go on long walks 3-4 times a week but i probably need another activity too. Not sure tho what to do.
Maybe the voluntary work i mentioned could be a "solution".

*********************

I bought Jared Tendlers audio version of the Mental game and there are a lot of good stuff in there. I found this client story to be close to my situation and my feelings. (I found the text version on scribd.com and i assume its fine to post it here?)






I have had depressions in the past and i think Jared is spot on when he says that the fear comes from i dont want to go back to feeling like i did when i was depressed. Im not sure how to solve it tho.

Jared is basically doing cbt to his client.

This is really hard to fix on your own. (This is just my opinion, it's not impossible. Reading books could "open your eyes" I suppose) Try the blog idea. Write down everything you're feeling and why you think you feel that way. Write about your childhood and your experiences/feelings. That is usually the cause of most problems. Then share it with 2+2, and the internet. Just writing everything down, you'll feel better. The cliche is true, that if you tell people your problems you'll feel better than just keeping it inside. I bet you'll get some good advice/feedback from people who take the time to read your stuff.

Or you could just talk to someone instead. Preferably an expert. That way you don't have to write down everything down. Cost money though unless you can get it free/cheap.

Stuff like "exercise, find other things to do and balance" helps, but they're sort of band aids. You should still do this, but it's not the ultimate fix.

Ty for posting - the client's story.
i can see myself in there and now i have some understanding what your first post was about.
Had a strange one recently. Every time i got a river beat it felt like someone had kicked me in the stomach . I have been playing for 6 years and generally have had no problem accepting that it is just part of the game and often just have a quick giggle and move on. I am just a recreational player , so for me it was easy to take a break and not play until i figured out what was causing it and wait until my emotions and mind where ok again.
Hopefully you problem is not to deep rooted and you find a solution soon.

i have an idea....take the massive 7 figure wealth u have accumulated over the past decade and split it into two portions~90% and 10%.take the 10% and tell urself today's the beginning of ur new poker career and it doesnt matter whether or not u lose this 10% bankroll(which is pretty unlikely) and go on full donkey mode.

the other 90% u can cling on to it like smeagol and his "precious".

i also play for a living and last year after BF when i switched to live poker i had some issues with the transition and found MGOP to be a great help

i track my net worth every quarter(i am active investor) as my main measure of poker success - my goal is to increase my net worth every 3 months by growing the BR and investing the extra $$. i am very focused on this and i don't get how you could even notice your day to day changes in net worth?

some days i lose money in poker and make money in stocks/bonds/gold... other days i kill the poker game and lose money in stocks and make money in gold... so i never really know if my net worth went up or down in a given day?