Oh, Mason, I also suggested firing the proof reader. But, tbh, I got used to your ways and just shrugged after a while. But, for an example, on page 1 is this sentence: 'Her suggestion was to think about things you are grateful for and I guess this is suppose to soothe your mind.........' It's 'supposed!', good grief, and you wrote that a good few times. You also failed to use question marks after questions a good few times.

But, nm all of that, everybody has their thing and I will gladly recommend the book but only to friends and everybody on here. The reason is that I'm not certain that many readers will understand the importance of 'Understanding poker better' and how a true understanding of ' understanding poker better' ought to lead to 'acceptance.' Once a player really embraces the game they can reach acceptance and most of their problems w/ tilt will disappear which is why I like the advice. It's just that I don't think that recs are going to get it. I mean they might but I'd want to be available for further discussion w/ anyone that I personally recommend the book to. That might read as if I consider myself an expert which could be self flattery but I do complement myself on being good at that.

If anybody reads the book and doesn't get a point I'm willing to try to explain as best I can. And you get Mason himself in the bargain. All for a reasonable price!

I'm going to give an example:

I try not to tap the tank but I do have friends and I'd like to see them get better. Sometimes they will lose in a very improbable way and they go off w/ the good old 'How could you call the flop? You didn't have ANYTHING! You didn't even have a draw!' I'll ask them that if they didn't have a draw why are they getting the pot? Of course they answer 'it was a terrible draw, he made a stupid play!' And the answer to that is 'You want them to stop doing that? What happened to you will happen and it had BETTER happen every now and then or poker will be dead in a short while.'

SO many people just don't accept that.

Hi Howard:

This is an error I make that I know is not supposed to be there. A lot of work goes into our books but this one, along with some missed question marks always seems to be there.

I agree with this and it's part of the reason I wrote the psychology book. I also plan on writing some more on this topic for our Two Plus Two Online Poker Strategy Magazine and this may include relaesing my detailed notes on the Cardner/Little book.

One of the things which I believe I show clearly in Real Poker Psychology is that tilt is a processing issue. That is tilt causes the emotion, not the other way around, and that's why issues like tilt "will disappear" once a player, as you say, "embraces the game."

Recs may or may not get it. Certainly what I write is not as inviting as what you can read in many other places both on the Internet and in poker psychology books. But it also happens to be right.

Best wishes,
Mason

Hi Howard:

Let me follow up on this.

What's happening here is that your friend is having trouble processing the information that is presented to him in the form of a "bad beat." Thus his mind locks up and he can't process the information and we see the symptoms of tilt in the form of negative emotion.

However, as the book shows, when a player who understands poker better is able to process the unpleasant information, his mind will convert it to humor and thus no negative emotion is generated and tilt does not occur, and more importantly, this player can now go on to the next hand and not be encumbered in any way by the bad beat.

Best wishes,
Mason

We are in agreement. I often laugh when I get a truly ridiculous hand shown to me but I know it's coming as often as it should. There are simply too many players that don't. We can phrase it all kinds of ways: Players get their hopes up when they see a good starting hand or a favorable flop and get upset when they lose. They are stuck and lose w/ another good hand. Interestingly, if they are up huge in a limit game, the same loss doesn't bother them nearly so much. They are tied to their emotions and aren't seeing the game for what it is, they don't understand it, don't appreciate it and however else we want to express it.

Another example: There used to be a reg at Talking Stick that got constantly barred for some period of time bec of being unpleasant (that's an understatement!) when he got a beat. He was one of those that had a stop win but no stop loss. Not a bad player but terrible at that sort of thing. But I got along w/ him bec I make an effort to get along w/ everybody. Anyway, he was next to me on time when I lost holding Aces. I didn't flinch and he asked 'How can you stand it?' I asked what he meant and he answered 'That guy played terribly and beat you' to which I replied 'It doesn't work that way' he asked 'How does it work?'

People who've been playing for years actually don't know how it works! To anybody reading this here is how it works: You try to get your money in w/ the best of it. Unless you've flopped a Royal you will sometimes lose. You will lose bec math (I'm bad at it but know it's there), the immutable law of the universe, guarantees that you will lose exactly as often as you are suppose (lol) to and if you never lose there would be no poker.

Which is what I tell my friends: The ONLY thing that I care about is that 'they' show up to play tomorrow. That's the ONLY thing that I care about.

ETA: That reg, who was a small winner with which he supplemented his income finally went too far and is now banned for life. He moved to Wild Horse Pass (about 10 minutes away w/o a large selection of games) and got barred from there as well. To anybody reading this, if that describes you, buy a gag and stuff it in your mouth when you play. Better to look like an imbecile than sound like one and lose a part of your income.

Hi Mason

sorry to take so long; hard copy amazon.com

introduction page 2 third to last paragraph about appears as abut
and second to last paragraph past should be pass

also page 26 paragraph one end of last sentence use to should be used to

Best Wishes
Jimi

Hi Jimi:

Thanks for letting me know about these.

Hope you enjoy the book.

Best wishes,
Mason

I recognized I to do the same thing, when reading that in Mason's book. And I feel lucky I'm a the game where players play hands like that or that way.

Hi George:

This brings up another more interesting question. Does emotion cause tilt or does tilt cause the emotion? Here's a hint. The poker psychologists who I'm so critical of say that emotion causes tilt.

Best wishes,
Mason

I find this a very interesting topic and am glad to be talking about it. I've decided to read Tendler's book from the beginning bec 1. I have to have something to read and 2. I'm curious.

One of the primary things that I think happens is that many players bring 'hope' to the game. Then things don't go right, their hope gets dashed in some weird way, maybe they can handle it once but then it happens again, and then Mason's bit about a disconnect happens and they absolutely don't see anything humorous at all. But they shouldn't bring hope into the game. The only thing that should be brought into the game is solid play. Which leads to Mason's 'Understand poker better.'

The bright spot imo (and it's selfish) is that, in my low stakes games, the players that MIGHT have read a book either don't understand it or they ignore it. And what they REALLY don't get is that it's ok to lose a hand/session/week or even month as long as they are happy w/ their play. They don't understand that 'them fluctuations' are a real, inevitable and necessary thing or else they'd have to find a new hobby. Like, the horror, taking their wives to the mall.

What I'd really hate is for Mason to decide to do a youtube on this topic that went 'poker viral.'

I often find when i am mad about something its usually because i am not focusing on the right things or i lose the perspective about it.

Usually a bit of refocusing about the problem help you see it into a new light and it calms you and you start laughing about it because you realize how far off you went .

Emotion is a very tricky thing and imo rationality is kinda the best answer to controlling it.

So yeah, rationality like "true understanding about variance" should help tremendously because it becomes silly to sit at the table and try to win money once you understand variance, so you start to really focus on what is important, that is too play solid...

Trying to visualize how being emotional (such as angry) would cause me to go on tilt. Perhaps it might cause me to exhibit some behavior that could be recognized as being on tilt (throw cards, admonish another player or dealer, play hands against a certain player to "teach him a lesson," etc.). But cause tilt? I'd argue that being emotional is (or usually is), in and of itself, a manifestation of tilt. What made me angry? Should it have? Also, it's possible to be angry (or otherwise emotional) and still play your A game, at least for some people.

Hi George:

I think there's an easy way to answer this question. From the chapter "A Mathematical Model of “Tilt” — Cause and Cure" we're able to see that tilt is caused by the brain being unable to process difficult information that presents itself in a poker game. When the information is processed, humor is created and we laugh or chuckle. But when the "logic disconnect that forms" is not solved, as I wrote on page 12 of Real Poker Psychology.

Thus we can conclude that tilt causes emotion and that emotion does not cause tilt.

And by the way, this puts me far away from what you see coming from the poker mental coaches who give all sorts of advice on how to control emotions to reduce tilt. But the real answer is to improve your understanding of all things poker, especially the large short term luck factor that is present in poker. And for those of you who have tilt issues, your brain should now be able to process more of the unpleasant information that poker provides, and your tilt issues should improve.

Best wishes,
Mason

Did you ever read Tendler's first book?

That may be because the two camps seem to have opposing views as to what tilt even is.

It all depends on how you define tilt. If tilt is making irrational decisions, then you are wrong about the sequence of events.

In that case, the following words of yours take on a whole new meaning.

"It’s my contention that instead of humor, the brain sort of shorts out, or perhaps gets caught in an infinite logic loop similar to what can be caused by some sort of bad computer programming. This leads to frustration, and in extreme cases, irrational decisions."

If tilt is irrational decisions, one must ask what frustration is. Frustration is, at the very least, a manifestation of emotion. So if tilt is irrational decision, then emotion exhibited by feelings of frustration comes before tilt.

Frustration is a variant of anger, definitely a basic emotion, and tilt, in my view, occurs when emotionality is in ascendance over reason. A human being has both, a computer doesn't ... so analysis comparing human behavior to computer functions is inadequate. The basic human frustration in play with tilt is of getting one's will thwarted or having one's way thwarted ... as in wanting to win, not lose. Such losing is also an instance of adversity, and based on the tools and personality one brings to the table, they react very differently to adversity.

It was well worth reading, bringing up interesting points not expected from someone, in my view, so oversimplifying the psychological factors in play at the table. So I would say, in his reaction against poker novice's writing books advising players on poker, he overreacted by emphasizing the one thing they can't challenge: expert strategic play.

Can't argue with expert strategic play. But we bring the self to the table ... and you can't argue with that either. He who eliminates emotionality and personality when trying to account for human behavior is on shaky ground. "Consciousness is infinitely more complex than twice two makes four" ... that Dostoevsky quote seems made for this thread.

Having tried to self-edit, I know it's impossible. A few minor things that may or may not already be mentioned:

Pg. 2, next-to-last paragraph, 4th line: "past" should be "pass."

Pg. 45, 2nd paragraph, 4th line: "out come" should be one word (if elsewhere in book same applies).

Pg. 145, 3rd paragraph, 7th line: "new found" should be one word.

Pg. 186, 1st paragraph, 7th line: "dominant" should be "dominate" or "be dominant in."

I think Malmuth's contention that a player on tilt's "brain is locked up and he or she has lost the ability to reason/think" is demonstrably false. If you gave a badly tilting poker player a written exam on poker while they sat at the table, they would score just as they would when not on tilt. They are fully able to think (in almost all situations) ... just choosing not to play with discipline at the moment. This is because there is both emotion and reason, and one or the other, at various times is in ascendancy.

There is a great example of the kind of tilt (total brain meltdown) that Malmuth considers all tilt to be. He should have used it in the book. He used Clay-Liston as his example, but had he used the much more timely example of Leonard-Duran "No mas" fight ... it would have revealed this point very eloquently. For there was a case of a person completely melting down and losing his ability to act in a reasonable manner, or even in a manner directly corresponding to his lifelong character. Duran was a warrior's warrior, as hungry and vicious as a lion ... but the humiliation and taunting by Leonard, with him helpless to assault or stop it ... led to the total "mind freak."

But this is not what the vast majority of tilt is. It's just frustration calling the shots instead of reason.

You don't have much right in this post. I suggest you read the book, and I mean the complete book before you make another post like this.

First, there are three different states, "tilt," "pseudo tilt," and "searching" that I say a poker player can go into which makes him play poorly, and one of the states, "searching," also has a sub-state which I call "apathy." In only one of them, tilt, do you lose the ability to think rationally meaning that players can still thnk rationally when in one of these other states. However, the current crop of mental coaches don't know the difference between these three and apparently neither do you. And yes, a player in one of the two states which is not tilt but which will cause him to play poorly may, as you say, when given a written exam on poker "would score just as they would when not on tilt."

The first Clay-Liston fight, according to my book, had nothing to do with tilt. It's in the chapter on "Mental Toughness" and is used as an example of an athlete, not a poker player, who was not mentaly tough. At least he wasn't for that particular fight.

As for Duran-Leonard II, that's not mentioned in the book. But I would suspect that it may be an example of Duran lacking mental toughness for that fight even though his reputation was just the opposite. You need to understand that fighters, like many athletes, are aware when they have no chance of winning and do not want the public humiliation of a sound beating. I'm very sure that's what happened in Clay-Liston and is probably what happened in Duran-Leonard II. And if I'm right, Duran did not tilt.

MM

I read it as proven above. I see the merit to what you say in this post, but you have redefined "tilt" then to something that almost never happens at the table. I have never seen a player lose the ability to think rationally at the table unless stupefied by drugs or booze. Never seen it in decades. They can always think except for that rare life moment when someone does something like kill someone and doesn't remember it. The rest of the world defines tilt as having one's reason and judgment clouded or overruled by emotions. All three categories you describe are subsets of tilt ... which is when one abandons, to varying degrees, reason in their play ... not because they can't think, but because they don't want to play "reasonably" in that moment.

Give an example of when someone couldn't think at a poker table.

Liston quit in both fights. I agree that he wasn't mentally tough ... as bully types almost never are.

Duran lost his mind ... and if that isn't an example of your true "tilt" I just can't think of one in any competition, sports or poker. True if you know the history, he was totally out of character for that fight. His mental toughness would thus suffer. But millions of fighters weren't mentally tough and they didn't "no mas" it with the world looking on. He freaked. He did the thing you describe as losing mental function. If he didn't, who did?

I have little tolerance for those who claim I've written something different from what I've written (or said) and then explain what's wrong with it.

Here's the definition of tilt from Real Poker Psychology:

Now if you think that the above only rarely happens, fine. But that's not my experience. As I said in my post, there are typically two other states that players can enter where they'll begin to play poorly and they're very different from the definition of tilt that I give above. If it happens that you're correct and tilt, as I describe it, only rarely happens, then a player who begins to play poorly will usually be in one of the other two states that I also describe.

You need to understand that much of my book is written from the perspective of how to take advantage of opponents who are beginning to play bad. If you think that someone is in State A and they're actually in State B, then instead of taking advantage of their poor play you may be the one leaking money against them instead of the other way around. If you would have read my book you would be aware of this.

As for Duran, he's not addressed in my book, and the way I bring up the Clay-Liston fight had nothig to do with tilt. So why did you say it did in your previous post?

And the following is from our new book Poker and More: Unique Ideas and Concepts; Strategy, Game Theory, and Psychology from Two Renowned Gambling Experts:

You wrote:

Except this isn't what happens. For instance, when a marginal player decides to search for a better strategy, usually because he's doing poorly in a game and is aware that there are a few other players who have much better long term results than he has, he isn't abandoning reasonable play. In most cases, his search for better strategies will produce strategies that have a lower expectation even though he's trying to play better. So notice that this player is now doing just the opposite of what you claim. He's attempting to find superior strategies and has not abandoned reasonable play.

And one last thing. Liston did not quit in the second fight. He was knocked out. However, he did get up and the fight resumed. That's not someone who quit. The fight was then stopped after it was pointed out that Liston should have actually been counted out.

MM

I"m not misrepresenting anything intentionally, just discussing from a different perspective which of course does not see eye-to-eye or relate very well with yours. That's all.

Duran I brought up because from my perspective it was the full mind blown tilt that you describe, from my perspective, though you don't seem to agree. There was a lot of speculation that Liston took a dive in that first round, which is quitting, even Ali thought he did at first, then later retracted that. Whether he retracted for the good of the sport or because he reconsidered we can't know.

For the major point of the discussion, I'll stick to my point that (virtually) no player loses their ability to think at the table, and that no player fails to pass the test given to him when playing badly. It is pure impulse control and emotion in the driver's seat ... not an inability to think. That's tilt. And there just is no tilt by your definition which is obviously not the case.

If we just make one distinction the impasse dissolves. You say they lose their ability to think, I say they just choose to disregard its directives ... thereby effectively not playing by reason. But its two very different things as the test points up, and, as the dual nature of humans, both emotional and reasoning, unlike computers, which points up precisely the flaw of approaching it with computer analogies.

I have no issue with you not agreeing with what I say. Vigorous debate is what these foirums are about. But I do have issues with you misrepresenting with what I stated in my book and then trying to explain what is wrong.

Specificly, my short discussion of the Clay-Liston fight had nothing to do with tilt and it was presented in the "Mental Toughness" chapter as an example of an athlete, Liston, not being mentally tough. So why did you say what you did and state that it was a tilt issue?

Also, if you would have read my book, you would be aware that I discuss other states which players at the poker table can enter into where their play will deteriorate but they're still thinking rationally. Why did you leave this out? Of course, if you mention this fact, it'll be a lot tougher for you to misrepresent what I stated and then go on to prove my position wrong.

MM

As far as I know I said Liston quit and wasn't mentally tough, but I didn't say he tilted.

I then moved on to Duran whom I did say tilted in the most extreme meaning of the word, using it as an example from my perspective, because that is the kind of thing I've never seen at the poker table. Total mind freak. I'm sure it's happened, especially on line probably, near nervous breakdown type incidents.

I left out the mini-tilt stuff because by what you say on here in your first response, it seems none of it is tilt by your definition except for the total "brain locked up" thing. So such minor deteriorating play wouldn't apply to tilt discussion by your definition, as I understand it.