i am in my 40s and still playing for a living

sure there are many robusto to busto stories always have been and always will be. one reason is that poker skill is different that money management skill.

even at 40 i feel like there are a million options outside of poker

Yeah, no lawyer has ever done anything beneficial for society.

My god you cant really be that dense can you ??

And either has any poker player right?

Just finished my first year as a poker pro and alot of it was live games. I sort of see the point live poker can be demorilizing and i live in the UK not many big games near where i am. But i made triple what i have ever made before in any jobs i previously have had and am pretty happy with it obviously. My 2 sunday major finals helped with the bills for sure though!

So yeah no regrets and bring on the second year!

He didn't say they hadn't.

This sentence is so stunningly idiotic it's horrifying.

Lawyers provide no valuable service? Really?

I didnt say he did.

Tldr. The key is winrate and your living standards. Up your win rate and you'll be happier. Play less hours make a lot.

I didn't say you did.

oh no you didn't

It's easy to get confused because of the name but Muskegon Heights is actually a borough of Detroit.

Bump

As an MTT player, I'll look at my hourly (which should rise over time, given that I enter new levels) overall and send (hourly*50%) to my bank acccount while keeping the other 50% for my enterprise.

Therefore, the more MTTs I ship, the higher my hourly gets and also my "real hourly" increases, while it still isn't as high as my "actual month hourly" which lets me keep enough money to let my bankroll grow.

I graduated from a top business undergrad in Canada in 2012, luck-boxed a management consulting summer position after 3rd year and full time position after graduation. It's what most people on here would consider a good job, 75K + bonus starting, benefits, travel etc. However 9 months into the job I realized that professional services definitely wasn't for me (perhaps no form of corporate life) but I couldn't leave before 2 years without paying back a ton of my signing bonus.

Then a miracle happened and business slowed down a lot and an opportunity came up to leave in early June not only without paying back bonus but with a nice package (~4 months living expenses). I didn't leave work to play poker per se but rather than look for work immediately I decided to spend my newly endowed free hours during the summer playing live 1/2 to see where it would go and then decide in the fall if it made more sense to continue with poker, i.e. move up to 2/5 or to look for work (goal is to save enough to not have to nickel and dime through grad school, hoping to do a masters of econ & philosophy in UK in next few years).

So far I'm 352 hours in since June 18th, all games at 1/2 and am at ~$30/hr overall. However the last 100 of those hours were in a digital room where there's 55 hands/hr and lower rake. So the breakdown is really $21/hr in live dealer games and $58/hr in this new room. I think more like $40-45/hr is realistic in this new room which would theoretically allow me to make the same cash salary of old job in ~1/3 of the time. So no regrets so far

Tread very carefully with extrapolation and remember to account for risk. But good for you and good luck.

^This. Some years back, I'd come home from a job that paid $48K/yr and use my late night grinds to pay some bills and have some spending cash in my pockets. I don't see why more people don't do this.

I always read these threads and think this is a huge problem with 2+2's mindset about playing live. A lot of kids just don't seem to have the same background I do. I'm a smart guy who grew up pretty poor and have worked since 14. I know hard work. I've been at my current soul crushing retail job for 6 years now with no hope of advancement and general terrible employee morale every where I look.

It is absolutely attainable for me to earn more money off of playing a 1/2 game than my current job. It's 10PM-6AM every night so I have almost no social life already. It is full of dumb and grumpy people so poker is no different there. I live within my means and budget my money. I don't have a college education. Why should someone like me not essentially treat 1/2 as a second part time job? And if during that proving period, I'm a winner, why would I not try to do it professionally? I've already experienced plenty of downswings over 200k hands online. I don't have much of an opportunity at my current job and it's just getting me by. I basically see almost no real risk of trying to play professionally. It can't be any more of a grind than what I currently do.

I always understand the posts explaining the risk of going broke and the need to bankroll. But I don't have any desire to live any kind of "baller' life. I don't bet on anything else and hate pit games and slots. Every time I read a post about how terrible being a live player must be I think of a pretty entitled kid who doesn't quite understand that a lot of people don't make even 40k a year.

Not mention I live 30 mins from Atlantic City where there will be a a blooming online market place to try.

Ever consider looking for a new job?

What would you do in X# of years, where X isn't that big a #, when poker popularity has almost completely died off, and games provide little money for anyone but the house?

The risk of playing professionally is that your electric bill isn't going to put itself on hold because you're on a month-long downswing.

I make such comments all the time on this site, and I'm the furthest thing from entitled there is in this world.

Of course. But based on the area I live in, my main immediate future options are try and find a new job in a poverty laden seasonal economy during a recession or try out poker. The third choice is what I have been doing which is playing on the side. The issue with that becomes that I simply don't have the time to devote to the game to build my roll. And once again, if I live in a reasonable, professional manner, and plan correctly, my electric bill shouldn't be impacted by a downswing.

I still don't think I'd ever become a strictly live professional poker player. I just also question how much of an actual difference for someone like me there is. I understand the point when referencing someone with a good education and an area with better job prospects completely. I'm just not in that spot and see poker as a chance for some self built income to try and move forward.

One of the things I hated about consulting was the faith they put in forecasting and extrapolating Thank you.

^^ Wasn't trying to bust your chops about getting a new job, just thought it was a fair question for the convo.

I know several guys that relocated only to find out that was the worst idea every. Most are working at 7-11 now.

People don't realize that poker gives you a job and that job remains somewhat static from now until you retire. That's cool and all and poker is awesome, but it's a pretty generic linear path. Unless you are baller enough to invest in businesses and use your other skills to put your bankroll to work you'll be stuck on that felt for the rest of your life. Some people don't mind this.

However, I know that my tastes may change in life, and I don't want to ever wake up at 40 with nothing to show for my life except a winrate. Poker is good for a lot of people for a couple years, a few people for many, but only one or two for the rest of their lives.

What's the difference of a winrate vs waking up and going to a real job where you have to drive an hour? In the end it's a job. the winrate is the same.

Oh I know. I answered it as such because I think I am in a minority position on 2+2. Either way I'm still fairly content with poker being a side hobbyjob and not my profession but that's merely due to my bankroll size. Once I've saved a reasonable amount, I'm gonna evaluate even further.