Great post, thanks

Thanks for all the positive PMs guys. Many people keep asking me for a specific list of books that I recommend to help with relaxation and meditation. So, here's a quick list:

Voices of Insight by Sharon Salzberg
The Art of Happiness by The Dalai Lama
A Life Less Anxious by Steve Pavilanis
Wisdom of the Ages by Wayne Dyer
Your Erroneous Zones by Wayne Dyer
You'll See it When You Believe It by Wayne Dyer
A Still Forest Pool by Jack Kornfield
Everything Arises, Everything Falls Away by Ajahn Chah

Happy reading!

Thanks for all the great info guys.. GL today

would it be good to do yoga or tai chi once a week or so? if so, which is better?

rhethorical question i guess, it must be good..


oh and boywonder, you have nothing to do with the betfold issue

When I first read this I was like "wow this is great, too bad NVG is burn op to the ground with flaming" --- really glad to see everyone is receptive to this, nothing has helped my game more than getting my head right off the table.

Solid advice here Steve.

Many people also don't understand the proper way to breathe. One reason the Buddha has a big belly could be because of the Hara. If you take your index,middle, and ring fingers side by side and put the top of your index right below your navel, the bottom of your ring finger will rest on your hara.

The hara is your center and I would encourage all to look more into it. Hara breathing is exactly the opposite of how most westerners breathe. Most people breathe in and puff their chests out. Hara breathing allows you to maximize oxygen intake.

Meditating is much easier with hara breathing and practice. When you breathe in you expand your belly and when you breathe out you contract your belly. It helps to use visualization techniques at first, imagining your stomach as a bowl that collects a glowing white hot energy that grows brighter and denser upon each breath.

when you breathe in you would imagine the energy filling the bowl in this direction
( <--

when you breathe out your stomach contracts so the energy would fill the bowl in this direction

--> )


Many people will try to silence their inner dialogue without much success. They simply have a great deluge of chatter going on and focusing only on breathing at first might be to great a challenge for the novice..

something that helped me when I first started meditation was this piece of advice:

Every thought you ever have involves words. We are linguistic creatures. Imagine every thought that crosses your mind like you are typing the words of the thought on a computer screen in your mind and speak them with your inner voice.

" I am starting to get hungry"

In order to quickly jump into a meditative state repeat your thought with your inner voice but this time pay attention to the spaces between the words.

"I...am..Starting..to...get....hungry...."

You can even repeat it over and over and cut off a word each time you repeat it.


If it makes any sense, your goal is to put your mind in those spaces where there is no thought. It will sound like a frequency of energy and you want to home in on that frequency and become the space between the words.

I just wanted to point out that, according to many major schools of Buddhist meditation, the goal of meditation is not relaxation nor is it to make your mind go blank.

The goal is mindfulness, i.e. awareness. And, in fact, distracting thoughts play a central role in developing it!

This is an important point with practical applications.

According to these schools (referred to alternately as Therevadan, Vipissana, Insight, or Mindfulness meditation) concentration and relaxation is pursued for the purpose of slowing down the mind so that you can observe it better. You are observing your thoughts and the feelings associated with those thoughts. Thus, the ultimate goal is to not stifle the distracting thoughts, but to be mindful of what they are and how they are formed.

By exercising in such a manner, you will be more aware of what your mind is doing not only while meditating, but when you are going about your normal activities (i.e., playing poker).

Mindfulness is particularly applicable to poker, since the stress of the game tends to make people act reactively, impulsively or in an otherwise irrational manner. Even when you are "relaxed" you can still exhibit these traits when on "autopilot."

The problem with practicing meditation as a purely relaxation device is that it's more of a way of putting out the fire once it's started, which is certainly important. But ideally, one would prevent the fire from being ignited in the first place.

But by training yourself to be aware of what your mind is doing moment by moment, you can be better able stand apart from destructive emotions, dysfunctional thought patterns and reactions, as they happen. The inevitable consequence of this weakened negative emotions and reactions and a greater feeling of peace.



Yoga is typically more rigorous, closer to exercise than meditation. I highly recommend it as a way of staying toned and supple, and to work your core.

Not sure about tai chi, but i suppose it must help with maintaining coordination and smooth movements-- good for when you have to slide chips in the middle on a big bluff

people's elbow, best nvg poster of 2010.

what are people's thoughts on the law of attraction and poker?

I have been using "Holosync" by Bill Harris, on his centerpointe web site. I am not going to link it, because I dont want to be deleted for spamming or advertising, and am totally unaffiliated with him.

His program uses binaural beats in a soundtrack to force your mind into the meditative states. I always found meditation hard, and found my mind wandering so much that it was pretty ineffective and felt like a waste of time. I got the sample CD and loved it right off the bat. I've been using it now for about 9months and am a few levels into the program. I often will listen to a track called "Quietude" while playing poker. It helps me maintain mental focus, and I feel quite zoned in. Similar to those who say they play well high. I used to use bananas, but have quit now for a few months as well, I find the meditation to be very helpful in that aspect of life as well.

There are many programs out there that use binaural beats to help you meditate, the concept is sending different tones to each ear that then forces your brain into alpha, theta, delta wave patterns that meditators get into, many of them are free and quite decent.

4Card

Or you could just throw off a batch

Either could be a tremendous help as they offer both physical exercise as well as relaxation. When it comes to relieving stress and learning how to slow down, I feel being physically active in some way is a necessary addition to leading a balanced life.

Personally, I've had great results with workouts that incorporate strength training (lifting weights, pilates, etc.), cardiovascular training (running, cycling, etc.), and lots of flexibility work (yoga, stretching, etc.). The most important thing is that you are physically exerting yourself in some way nearly every day. If you've never worked out regularly, tag along with someone who does, or join a gym and get a personal trainer. Working out will do wonders for you both mentally and physically.

Cool stuff. Along these lines there's a great iPhone app I've used for relaxation called "AmbiSci BP" that provides binaural beats as well as soothing ambient music. Very calming...

i couldnt find that app, do you mean "ambiscience pure meditation" ?

I'm running so f bad, getting rivered so many times since new year's that this "meditation" thing went out the window!

OMFG god, it's a f joke!!! While tiping, just took a 3-outer on the river on an mtt, wtf is going on, I can't belive it, this is just f nuts!!

you need to take control of the situation.


1- take a deep breath in


2 -hold for 5 seconds


3- think of all the times you have taken a bad beat and all the times you never get that lucky


4 - breath out


5 - cash out your bankroll


6 - pursue a career with a steady salary instead of wasting your time/money/effort/life on poker

Great read, Loved.
Printed out and everything

Lol, of course!!

But daamn, it's frustrating to get it in good and get screwed, or run every AK, QQ and KK into a better hand. It's been a tuff year so far, lol.

I'd like to add to the excellent recommendations with "Peace is every step: the path of mindfulness in everyday life" by Thich Nhat Hanh. You can find it here on 'zon. I came across his teaching when Huck Seed mentioned it on the Two Plus Two Poker Cast and it as helped me immensely.

Mindfulness is about being present right now, not suffering anxiety about the past or the future; not racing to complete something to get on to the next thing. It is about enjoying the miracle of life right now. It is also about examining the intentions and emotions behind our actions. This obviously has great resonance for poker players.

Meditation practice is a wonderful way of being mindful but we can also be mindful in our daily lives. We can pick triggers, such as sending an email, that remind us to be mindful, take a few deep breaths, be present and aware of what we are thinking, doing and saying. We could even pick a poker action such as being on the button and take the time to be present.

If we do set triggers for mindfulness, we will often forget. But the time that we realise we have forgotten, perhaps hours later is in itself a moment of mindfulness, akin to the moment in meditation when we realise we are no longer listening to our breathing.

I also really recommend the 4 part podcast on "Mindfulness in Daily Life" by Andrea Fela that you can find here.

It's a nice post and some of this meditation stuff is along the lines of what I've been contemplating lately and I enjoyed some of the basic ideas in there. But I also have to call you out on the 30 minute thing:


I'm pretty sure that's exactly what you were saying and you couldn't have been more clear:

You weren't saying, "hey...get away if you're tilting." You specifically referred to how long your brain can go before it needs a break whether you took a bad beat or not.

If what you really were saying was this:

then you wouldn't have made the reference to 30 minutes in the first place. You would have just said, "sit out after a bad beat."

I'm not debating the advice either way. But it's kind of funny to go so specifically into "sit out EVERY 30 MINUTES" and then say "I'm definitely NOT to quit your tables every 30 minutes."

Power of now - eckhart tolle
kind of out there but it works like hell

Nice read thanks. No way i can rbeak every 30 mins though it takes me about 30 mins to get my tables going lol. Breaks are a good idea though and I should prob incorporate them at least every 2-3 hours playing 16+ tables.

Well, i suppose there is some differentiation between quitting and sitting out, as quitting your tables could be viewed as totally exiting the tables, whereby you would have to find new tables when you got back from the break. But I think that sitting out a hand or two and getting up from the chair to stretch or something is different, and seems like a decent idea.

I looked into meditation for a number of reasons, of which poker was a big one. I personally can tell when adrenaline is being pumped into my system, at least to some degree. I feel my heart rate accelerate, I feel my limbs gain strength (the bouncies), I feel my breathing get faster and deeper. I have studied enough biology to know that this cannot possibly be any good for my poker. Sure theres the external appearance of these symptoms, and they may happen when bluffing or when having a strong hand, so its not the worlds worst problem to be visibly adrenalined up, it may well be subtly different though for nervousness/fear vs nervousness/excitement. The thing that made me think to try mediation is that we as humans have an evolutionary "fight or flight" response with adrenaline. The brain phsyically gets less blood when we are adrenalined up. The counter to this is the "relaxation response" which pulls the blood from the extremeties, and back into the core, and restores higher brain function. At the times of high stress in a poker game, I want my opponents to be jacked on adrenaline, and reacting with their primitive brain, and I want my own body to be calm, relaxed, and thinking clearly. This takes practice, and meditation seems to be a good way to practice the relaxation response and breathing techniques.

My thinking was, Worst case scenario, I spend 30-60 minutes a day introspectively thinking about the near past, near future, and how bad can it really be to spend a little time actively in the moment and letting your brain have a little quiet time to sort things out. Can't have too big of a down side other than the time invested.

One of the recent live final tables I was at, I looked around at the table, and just consciously focused on the current mental state of all of my opponents. Most were severly mentally drained, many were jacked on alcohol, caffiene, and/or adrenaline. They start to do strange things like ship small pairs over obvious strength, or make huge folds or other errors that they simply might never make if they were fully rested and mentally alert and focused.

Tournament poker as well as cash games can often turn into a test of stamina. Meditation can provide an additional benefit in creating this mental fortitude. Certainly practice can as well. I have no doubt that there are many poker players who have never meditated who may have greater mental stamina and ability to control their fight or flight response than I do, but it has come through experience or phenomenal genetics. One thing is for sure, in my mind, that those who take an effort in developing their ability to FOCUS and SUSTAIN this focus over long periods of time, will have far better results over time than those who do not.

4Card

www.centerpointe.com
www.meditationprogram.com
http://www.synchronicity.org/
http://www.jetcityorange.com/meditat...ral-beats.html


Each of these has at least samples for free of binaural beat meditation tracks you can try out. Be sure to use LOSSLESS codecs if you place them onto your ipod or mp3 device (like wave, or lossless aiff)

4Card

Best post on 2p2, and its in NVG lol!