I'll try to make this as short as possible, sorry if it turns out a little too long!
I started playing poker a little less than 4 years ago. Had just gone thru a divorce so chose to play tournys over cash games. I had a friend who helped me with the basics and gave me a book (New Player No Limit Texas Holdem, Daugherty, McCvoy). So I read it and thought I was good to go. Played online and complained about all the bad plays and players. Read some more books, Little Green Book and Real Deal, Harrington Vol. 1, Hellmuth's, Tournament Poker and the Art of War, Hellmuth's, and was ready to win. Didn't happen right away so I chalked it up to online poker. Then I started playing live, hosted a game and joined a few clubs here in Arkansas. Did amazingly well compared to online, so found new life and interest in poker. I used online as a tool for learning. I would print out every hand I was involved in and would run it thru a hand calculator and found out how bad and lucky I had been to win what I had won. Went back and re-evaluated my style and approach and came back bigger and better. Started winning online and just crushing every decent live tourny I played, still had problems with the $20 home games! lol I was mainly playing $20/$50 mtts online and $100/$500 tournys at the Indian casinos around here. Won a trip to the WSOP ($2500buy-in) thru my club and bought myself into a $1000 buy-in. Everything was golden, I thought. About a month before I went to the WSOP (2005) I had a downswing. Was still doing ok online and analyzing my hands, but live started sucking. Seemed every 2 or 3 outer was hitting against me and it seemed I couldn't win a race if my life depended on it. I said it is just poker and kept playing. WSOP was fun, played most of day 1 in the $2500, went out 3rd hand in the $1000, but Hachem was at my table and he went out 1st hand! lol Won enough at other tournys to break even on the trip. Anyway, got home and took a little break. Then when I started playing again it was alot of tough losses. Hate to call them bad beats because most of the time it was good hand against good hand I couldn't blame them for calling. But, since I didn't manage my bankroll properly, paid bills instead of creating a bankroll, it didn't take long to run out of funds to play with. Then I had what I refer to as "the tourny". I was playing good, and getting beat up with the deck. 7 times I had someone all-in and drawing to 2/3 outs and 7 times they hit. I had AA/KK 5 times and won 1 hand. It caused me to miss winning another trip to the WSOP by one spot. So I quit. So about 2 months ago I started playing more. I still seem to be getting it in with the best of it, but when I get sucked out on or whatever, I am having a hard time dealing with it now. I used to hardly ever go on tilt, now it just takes one bad or misplayed hand. I keep going back and focusing on my play, odds, probabilities, and approaching it from that point. A friend of mine says I should approach it from a mental point and gave me some books to read. So I asked her if I read that, will it change the order of cards in the deck! lol Anyway, I am fairly confident that I am playing good poker. But it seems everytime I sit down, I am suffering another unreal loss or beat. So any ideas on how to get thru this or what I can to keep from getting so frustrated would be greatly appreciated! Oh, and sorry so long! I am bored at work!
