unless you can bill hours from anywhere in the world

You might have misunderstood. young, smart, hardworking individuals do not box themselves into a dead end job after "retiring" from poker. We can blame variance for poor poker results, that's fair. But there's close to ~0 variance in a real career if you're truly smart and driven.

As for the rest of your post. We might have another misunderstanding of what hard work means. Half mindedly watching poker training videos or studying pio independently is not hard work. Even if it was 500 hours of study (which is prob 10x too high), that's still a drop in the bucket to the amount of study and research that other professions require.

I'm going to respectfully disagree with your assertion that all poker players are dumb and/or not hard workers simply for our choice of career. There are a plethora of reasons a young, smart, hard working person might pursue poker over a traditional career. If you're interested I can expand on some of the reasons, but I doubt you care

I mean, tbh I kind of agree with your second #. It wasn't hard work for me to become (relatively) good at poker. I loved every second of it. What's your point? You think it's too easy to be a poker pro? That seems to contradict your assertion that no smart young person would choose it.


also you gave me a good laugh at "traditional careers have no variance", thanks

It isn't really true that a career has close to zero variance. Unless you want to get stuck to a mediocre job, those are indeed close to 0 variance.

Of course a normal job in most fields have regular progressions and constant wages. But there's also risks in many jobs. Some things that you work for many years may become obsolete with AI, or not as much valued by society. Most professions also have a ceiling of earning much lower than poker, unless you build your own company, which have much more risk so it gets more earning potential.

As for the age factor, it's clearly important. As you get older it gets more difficult to stay at a chair for long hours working and concentrated. Even if poker isn't as demanding as other video game in terms of mental speed for decisions. Technical ability and overall knowledge is certainly more important. I do believe that it gets harder playing many tables as you get into the late 40s+. I doubt nanonoko could start playing 24 tables making reasonable good decisions at that age as he did in his early 20's several hours a day.

Doyle Brunson was a school teacher. But he decided that he was able to persue poker instead.
A lot of his contemporaries were smart but uneducated.
Times have changed since for sure. But even though I'm far from a pro, I still don't get this assumption that some people have that poker pros today are only pokers pros because they're stupid bums who can't do anything else.
A lot are. A lot who claim or try to be pros are nothing but degenerate gamblers. But this was surely also true in Brunsons time.
I'm not a pro but I'm not bitter.
And I don't hold any animus against poker pros.
Stupid bums. Just kidding!

Lol

Bangbang

This
I don't play much online anymore but full time live is way more tiring than full time online

Sitting on my ass at home was way better
And you could take breaks whenever you wantee-at least for cash

Taking breaks live often involves leaving the casino to go home/your hotel then being on a waiting list again when you want to play some more

Personally basically all of my play now is live
I played a **** ton of hours during tournament series when cash games are good and you can get a lot of quality hours in
Then I'll take a couple of weeks off,soemtimes longer
All hours aren't equal,and I have to travel for poker

So yes I could have played more hours this year
And they would have been in way worse games on average than I played in,with higher expenses per hour and I wouldn't be as sharp/focused when I need to be

My expectation would be to make more money during those hours but not enough to reduce my quality of life and it would increase the chances of long run burn out

For me this has worked well

hahahahaha..... Best laugh ive had in a while.... 0 variance in a real career??

Hope you survived the past 12 months

He just says random stuff that makes no sense because he's super angry for some reason that some people are able to successfully win and save up a bunch of money from the game of poker. Every once and awhile he says something of value but for the most part there's no point in engaging him as he has already decided he doesn't want it to be true that some people in poker are successful long term so all of his posts are biased and negative and illogical.

This is about as true as it gets!

No, it's not. He's thinking it's the same poster, bumpnrun and it's not. The guy has a point, if you're that good at your job irl in a demanding industry, you have very little worries, or at least you should.

That's ****ing laughable. No variance in traditional careers. That's a good one.

Being good at your job doesn't necessarily mean you will have a job or do well if you are able to keep your job. Your boss just might not like you for some reason or the company is moving to another country ect ect. Many people are "good" at their job and still get fired or layed off. If you are a person who doesn't kiss ass but are great at your job you might find yourself unemployed.

not true at all. at least not in the legal field, specifically real estate law. Attorneys eventually become too expensive for firms so they get laid off and the firm hires someone fresh out of law school willing to take half the salary. The only way to avoid it is to become a partner, which takes as much or more luck and charisma as it does skill. I know multiple people this has happened too, and I only know one lucky enough to be a partner in a firm after going through it with other firms.


That's the only industry I have specific knowledge of, but I'm sure it's not the only industry where job security is not 100% dependent on performance.

I think I'll take my chances as a lawyer that has become too good. Somehow I think I might land on my feet!

after a couple years looking yeah, probably

Was talking about upswinging. Sure one small aspect of what he says somewhat makes sense and at times he even says something completely correct. Unfortunately the other 80% of his posts are just biased hatred for the idea that anyone can be doing well for themselves playing poker for a living. Who knows why that is, usually it's because someone can't do it themselves, but it really is amazing how angry this guy gets at the idea of people being successful poker players.

In terms of this specific point though that you are referencing, it's definitely not true that there is no variance. It is certainly much less variance and much less risk when compared to say a live tournament pro or something. But there is obv plenty of variance in normal professional growth. That doesn't mean most people shouldn't get normal jobs though, they absolutely should. Everything in life has variance to varying degrees. Weigh the pros and cons of each path and then live with the possible outcomes.

+1 well said

ok that makes sense..... First time i posted in a few years.. Was just completely floored, Hahaha. No variance in life either I suppose.. Lmao

Lol but wait.... If you're really good at your Job there's no variance...

A couple of years sir? Where are you looking Hellmuth Hellmuth & Brunson?

Again, if you're that talented and driven in your profession there will be little to hold you back. That goes the same for poker.

Great thread, great variety of experiences/opinions. I'm only 29 but I played pro full-time from 2008 to 2013, or 19 to 24. At the time my motivations were money and freedom, and to 19 year old me I had a ton of both. Looking back the freedom was the biggest positive. I was able to travel/live in 15+ different countries and have some pretty amazing life experiences very few people my age (even now) have ever had. As for money though, I work now full-time as a data scientist. The money from poker was good but people underestimate how much money you can make in other jobs if you're the type of person who can succeed at poker. I just finished my 4th full year at my 9-to-5 and including retirement contributions+benefits I'm going to clear 150k. If I had skipped the poker and finished school+got a job right out of school I'd almost definitely be in the 200-250k range. This is right around where other people I went to high school with are that went into a similar field. Now I'm not saying that's easy to do, but I think most people good enough to come close to 6 figures in poker in 2018 could do it.

In addition, the work is far less stressful. Don't get me wrong, stress and variance still exists (lol at a real job having no variance), but it's naturally a lot lower with less built in randomness and working for someone else has the benefit of them eating some of the remaining variance. And people talk about all the freedom poker gives you, but for everyone in this thread who used their poker winnings to travel and go on trips there are another 100 poker pros who didn't leave their hometown or who "traveled" but never left the casino of whatever city the poker tournament they went to was. And you can also travel with a 9-to-5. I now get 25 vacation days per year (in addition to the company-wide 10 holidays) and can work remotely as long as it's not a regular occurrence. I generally do 1-2 international trips per year, which isn't as much as I traveled playing poker but I also don't have to "work" during my trips at all.

Anyway there's obviously downsides to a 9-to-5 as well. In poker I loved nothing better than someone being an arrogant idiot and being like "well now I get to take your money". In a corporate environment, oftentimes that arrogant idiot is a VP making millions per year who you need to impress in order for your career to advance, and oftentimes that VP will then use your work in order to advance their own career. And I certainly don't mean to downplay the positives of poker. I made so many friends and so many memories that will last a lifetime. I learned things about myself and life that I never would have being coddled in college. I'm so glad I made the choice I did to drop out and play poker, and similarly glad I was able to finish my degree and get a real job afterwards. I saw my share of people who crashed and burned and resorted to scamming and/or coaching (but I repeat myself ) and/or moving back in with their parents in their 30s when the money ran out. And everyone talking about the downsides of poker have been spot-on. It's a lonely game, variance is a *****, and although you may still enjoy it, definitely don't count on your current passion continuing a few years after you've been doing it full-time. You will run worse than you ever imagined you could, you will begin to question whether you're even a winning player anymore, you will begin to dread playing, and you will begin to play worse as a result of this, which leads to it being even more likely that the downswing continues.

Also finally if you have a 9-to-5 and think of yourself as "working for someone else", you're doing it wrong. Just as in poker you are working for yourself, and you are selling your services to other people. Improving your skills equates to you either getting a raise at your current job or being able to find another job that pays more, because you have something they value. Depending on career you could look into being a contractor/freelancer as well. Look at yourself as a 1-person business. If you're working a 9-to-5, that's only because the most profitable way to sell your services is to agree to provide 40 hours/week of your labor in exchange for a paycheck. Especially as you get better at your craft, you'll find more and more "customers" who are willing to be more flexible whether it's alternative work location/hours, fewer hours per week, more freedom to choose your own projects, etc.

I'm 43 and I recently started driving a truck. Its great because I get to play at a lot of different poker rooms and I actually do a lot better playing strictly for fun.