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Title: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Raindogs on April 22, 2006, 04:19:14 PM Apologies for my first post where I included a link to the thread of this post originally posted on the 2+2 forums.
I read this yesterday and it struck me as one of the best articles I have ever read on Poker psychology. Quote When I read Irieguys post I wasn't planning on responding, I rarely respond to posts, because most of the time I am the dissenter, and frankly, it isn't good for my long term financial situation. As I started reading the responses I soon felt obligated to respond. He is so close, but travelling in the wrong direction. The wording he uses in the text lets me know where he is at on the "path," so to speak(the very beginning). Let me start with the words success and failure. These are words that mean such different things to each individual that to use them to label your accomplishments, or lackthereof, is setting yourself up for a long ardurous journey, that most won't finish. Success and failure are just ideas created by society to improperly judge others against ourselves. There are no successful people, or rather, using these words, I should say that there are no failures and everyone is a success. Quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everybody will eventually run worse than they thought was possible. The difference between a winner and a loser is that the latter thinks they do not deserve it. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This statement is truer than anyone can know(even though I think most of you do know, it just seems impossible for me to believe that someone else can understand). What he says about winners and losers though, will keep you from attaining a more complete game. There are no winners or losers, to think that, is to let yourself be affected by negative variance. If you are not in the positive for the day, then you therefore must be a loser, and so the downward spiral begins. All of those negative ideas must be eliminated from your mind, or you will not perform to your potential. The trick is recognizing these negative ideas, since there are so many and so commonplace in our society, it is a large task indeed to sort them out as real, or just ideas created by the masses. Our labels for winners and losers simply identify individuals who play the same game a different way. Just because one person doesn't achieve the same goal that I strive for, doesn't make that person a "loser." Everyone is the same, and everyone has the same potential, some just direct their energies in different directions. The sooner you can get that into your head and really believe it, the sooner you will start to have a real understanding of the game. Quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am beginning to realize that most people don't have the psychological fortitude or spiritual perspective to manage the vicissitudes of this game. I also believe that of the very small number of professional poker players who have been successful for more than a few years, most of them are actually quite lucky. I believe that there are many pros who will fail once they begin to experience average luck. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I really believe that everyone has the "psychological fortitude" to manage the vicissitudes of the game. It is simply a choice. A choice to change the way you think about results. Stop thinking in terms of winning as good and losing as bad. The two concepts should be grouped in your mind exactly the same. When God "blessed" man with shame, failure became a real entity we had to deal with. That is what we are trying to achieve when we label a person as a failure, we are attaching shame to A meaningless act. Throughout my life I have been around alot of people that most would classify as "failures" and not one of them seemed any different than myself. The problem comes to life when a person starts their downswing, which we classify as "losing," they begin to suspect that they may "fail" and rather than become susceptible to the shame that comes with "failure" they decide to quit. They stop because they fear things that aren't even real. The people who come to realize these negative labels aren't real, either concretely or intuitively, are the same people that do not give up, no matter how bad things seem to be running. Eventually they become the "professionals" in whatever walk of life they choose. You have to find your own way to deal with these thoughts that have been brainwashed into your mind for your whole life. Identifying every negative thought as it creeps into your mind is a start, it takes practice to monitor your thoughts, but you cannot eliminate what you do not recognize. I try very hard not to allow any negativity in my life, ask my brother(ship_it_tome) how upset I get when he is at my house, playing, struggling, for hours on end, and finally says "I can't win." We get along very well, but I get very irate with him when he utters those deadly words, as I am sure you all have muttered them at one time or another. Quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I think you can learn how to avoid this trap of psychological betrayal. I think I'm beginning to learn it myself. It involves turning your noise filter all the way up. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Turning your noise filter up will work for a time, but eventually it builds and seeps through at one time or another, and everything that has been blocked comes pouring out at once, which creates the very worst tilt imaginable. Believe me, I have been there many times. I have come to realize that it is much better to acknowledge the negative or angry thoughts as they arrive, that doesn't mean just noticing their presence, when they approach, actually talk to your mind and announce their arrival, and then identify the reasons behind them. As your mind comes to realize how trivial and meaningless these thoughts are, it will eventually stop creating them in the first place. It takes alot of time and effort to do this, but the long term results will be well worth it. OK....SO HOW DOES ALL THIS REALLY RELATE TO POKER? The game that most of us play is really very simple. You get 2 cards, 5 cards come up, and you do a little betting here and there. Best 5 card hand wins. With a game this simple, why do so many people have so much trouble ending up ahead of where they started? The real game is about people, not the cards in your hand. If you know a person well enough, you can read their hand, and once you know what they have in their hand, the game becomes a cakewalk. The problem is, we have all of these predisposed ideas of who a person is based on ideas that have been placed in our heads by our society. You have to be able to eliminate all of these ideas. Once you train yourself to be completely judgement free, you will become a more complete player. Anyone can read a persons hand based on his actions and seeing common tendencies, ie., a beginning player will commonly bet small when on a draw, and bet big when he has a made hand. What about more experienced players? What does it mean when they bet 2/3s of the pot one time, and than bet pot the next? They are certainly experienced enough to know not to bet the same pattern for the same types of hands. So how can you figure out what they have? Well, get to know him, watch him play. Try and figure out what he is thinking, he has to be thinking something. Put yourself in his spot, what kind of hand would you have if you were betting like that? Now do this for every hand for every player that is in the hand, for every player at the table, for every table that you are playing at. Try and eight table while doing this exercise. Put effort into every single hand that is played out at your table, not just the ones you are involved in, every single hand. Every time there is a showdown, and the losing hand is mucked, open up the hand history file, and see what he had. Go through the hand again and see if you can figure out why he willingly showed down a losing hand(something that should rarely be done.) I call this an exercise, but this should be done on every single hand that is played out at any of your tables for the rest of your poker career. This is how you become a real player, then you can ignore the "sng" formula and really start to play. Post flop is where the real game is at, and it is fun to play. Use your bets to pull information from your opponent, and then when you know what he has, trust your judgement 100%. If you think he is on second pair, but will not fold unless you bet your whole stack, then bet your whole stack(unless of course you have a better hand than second pair, which is unlikely since players like us can rarely beat bottom pair), even if it means your tournament is over if you are wrong. Practice trusting yourself, you will be wrong enough in the beginning to doubt yourself, but don't let that stop you. There is a strong possibility that I am the most active player in the world, and I can honestly say that this is something that I do on nearly every hand. Imagine, 6000 hands a day on average, just watching and learning, with no predisposed judgements of the other players. This is what it takes. Bad beats are no longer bad beats, they are just the cards coming out randomly, evening themselves out over time. What is really important is learning the thousands of languages that different people speak through their actions at the table. Believe me, it isn't some spiritual science, it is listening and learning without prejudice. Gigabet Now if I can only learn to think like that .... Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: byronkincaid on April 22, 2006, 04:46:33 PM We're not allowed to link to 2+2? I thought it was other UK forums you had this agreement with? 2+2 will let you link anywhere and it hasn't done them any harm what with them being the biggest poker forum on the net.
Not my forum and none of my business I guess but IMHO if helping blondes become better poker players is any kind of an aim of this website you would be better off having a weekly best of 2+2 threads link rather than pretending they don't exist. The poker analysis forum here has some great stuff in it (and it's getting better all the time) and some of the posters on it will more than likely become world class players in time but some of the stuff on 2+2 is light years ahead. Anyway I'm probably just biased cos most of what I have learnt about poker (not much I know :D ) was posted on there. I doubt I'm the only blonde who could say that. All just IMHO, not really something that I'm getting stressed out about just a point of view. I hope this doesn't come across as a rant cos my New Years resolution was to stop doing them :D Thinking about it I remember a couple of days ago Tighty said someone couldn't link to the 2+2 thread where a few of the best posters got together and made a video of a sng with all their comments. I've been playing sng's for a living for almost 2 years now and it taught me stuff that I didn't know and stuff I had forgotten about. For blondes who are beginners or cash game players looking for a change that video is probably worth thousands of $$. Maybe I'm being unrealistic in that obv this place is here to make money but so many people have become friends now it just seems a bit strange that if some brilliant thread appears on 2+2 they are not allowed to be told about it. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Sark79 on April 22, 2006, 04:57:06 PM I like this kind of stuff. On the Fulltilt website, Howard Lederer writes an article about it
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Josh on April 22, 2006, 05:06:03 PM Are you actually able to see a mucked hand through the history?
I think that's ridiculous. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: I, Zimbra on April 22, 2006, 05:38:16 PM Are you actually able to see a mucked hand through the history? I think that's ridiculous. Only if the hand was mucked at 'showdown', on the river... and only then on certain sites/networks. Tribeca, for example, doesn't have that feature. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Royal Flush on April 22, 2006, 05:51:16 PM Are you actually able to see a mucked hand through the history? I think that's ridiculous. A showdown is a showdown, Mucking is ridiculous Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Karabiner on April 22, 2006, 06:40:58 PM Some terriffic prose there, and real food for thought.
Thanks for putting it up. Right I'm off to do a little meditation......... Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: TightEnd on April 22, 2006, 07:50:57 PM byron, i'll ask tikay to have a rethink about the policy specifically for 2+2
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: byronkincaid on April 22, 2006, 08:41:09 PM Poker in the Times 8)
http://timesonline.typepad.com/poker/2006/04/invasion_of_the.html (http://timesonline.typepad.com/poker/2006/04/invasion_of_the.html) Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: AndrewT on April 22, 2006, 11:11:06 PM byron, i'll ask tikay to have a rethink about the policy specifically for 2+2 Surely the internet is based on linking to other cool stuff - that's how it all started. Copying things verbatim from other websites is a different matter though. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Raindogs on April 22, 2006, 11:36:05 PM I originally posted a link but this wasn't allowed. I did make it clear where the post originally came from and quoted the text to make sure it was clear that it was not my post. As regards the issue of copying the text, this post was made on a public forum and as such is already in the public domain.
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: byronkincaid on April 23, 2006, 12:21:10 AM I always enjoyed a GigaPost, shame they seem to have stopped now.
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: TightEnd on April 23, 2006, 12:06:27 PM Surely the internet is based on linking to other cool stuff - that's how it all started. yes, but blonde has a policy of not linking to other poker fora. I've asked for this to be reviewed though. We'll be in touch Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: AndrewT on April 23, 2006, 12:19:20 PM Surely the internet is based on linking to other cool stuff - that's how it all started. yes, but blonde has a policy of not linking to other poker fora. I've asked for this to be reviewed though. We'll be in touch Thanks Tightend. I think a distinction need to be made between, for example, linking or copying live updates on other sites (which Blonde can't get involved with) and more general 'this looks interesting, what does everyone think' type stuff. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Royal Flush on April 23, 2006, 12:25:21 PM I persoanlly think this is a bit silly, what is the reason we cant link?
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 12:35:23 PM Gigabets posts on there are amazing, he does seem to be thinking on a whole new level at times.
Loved the stuff about creating a table where the shorties are on his left and the bigger stacks on his right and him being the "dam" stopping the money as it travels clockwise, i had to read it 4 or 5 times before i started to grasp the concepts. Unfortunatley he got a lot of grief over an STT challenge and has almost stopped posting. I also am in the camp with Byron (can you pm me a link to that video mate?) Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 12:41:10 PM IFM what video are you talking about ?
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: byronkincaid on April 23, 2006, 12:41:39 PM http://www.madhotpoker.com/replayer/index.html?indynew.txt (http://www.madhotpoker.com/replayer/index.html?indynew.txt)
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 01:01:47 PM OK, we have always had a rule - no Linking to other Poke Fora. It just seemed sort of "correct & proper" behaviour. When we first started doing Live Updates, I was pretty miffed when another site "lifted" our content word for word, excluded the blonde-specific stuff, & passed it off as their own Update. Poor form indeed. Then another site started lifting our Updates, without accreditation. I resolved that a), that hacked me off, & b), we would set an example & behave in a proper, correct, & civil manner, & not mess around with other sites. That includes not allowing any of them to be flamed on blonde, & we kinda hoped they would all reciprocate. In the main, they do, though there has been some blonde-bashing elsewhere lately. So be it, we will maintain our position. But after some thouight, & exchange of ideas, we have decided that linking, occasionally, to such as 2+2, (probably the world's best & certainly the biggest Poker forum), will do no harm, & apparently 2+2 are cool with that. So, apologies for the about-turn, but the 2+2 Link is OK &, if done in reasonable moderation, will continue to be as & when appropriate. But the no-links" ban to other British Poker Fora remains in place. If something interesting is Posted on, say, The Hendon Mob, by all means refer to it, & say where you saw it, but do not link please. It's nothing to do with potentially losing members to other sites, it's just decent behaviour. I am also advised by our Techies that "Linking" is a bad thing for our SEO, so it's clearly very important we don't damage that, as traffic figure dictate, for example advertising rates. A big up, too, for the civil way in which Byron, Andrew & Raindogs argued the case coherently & rationally. The Mods & myself make these decisions collectively. But I'm at the tetchy & difficult age, & when someone says "DO/DON'T DO THIS THAT OR THE OTHER YOU CRETINS" or get all arsey, I dig my heels in, & get all awkward. But if the case is presented & debated in a reasonable manner, I'm a pushover. It's an age thing. Thanks guys. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: byronkincaid on April 23, 2006, 01:05:55 PM cheers tikay
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 01:14:59 PM Linking will not hurt your Search engine optimization here, the engines look for the quality of the site you are linked to, i.e. the other sites traffic, if it is also good, it can only be better for you.
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 01:17:10 PM That link doesn't work Byron, did they take it off?
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 01:18:48 PM it worked for me, i have the HH too you will need them to view it
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 01:23:46 PM You have to open it in IE
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 01:27:27 PM Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 01:29:58 PM Linking will not hurt your Search engine optimization here, the engines look for the quality of the site you are linked to, i.e. the other sites traffic, if it is also good, it can only be better for you. Ahh, thanks bundle. I just don't undertand SEO, but the Techies keep telling me that Links are a bad thing for our SEO. I'm happy to accept your view on this - who'd trust a techie, eh? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 01:31:37 PM That link doesn't work Byron, did they take it off? Sigh. You just don't get techie stuff, do you ifm? I mean, it's obvious it needs to be opened in IE. Cant beat the old IE. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 01:34:33 PM That link doesn't work Byron, did they take it off? Sigh. You just don't get techie stuff, do you ifm? I mean, it's obvious it needs to be opened in IE. Cant beat the old IE. Actually boss i have a "script blocker" on my PC that prevents sites from running code when i open their pages, that is why it didn't work. Have you sorted out your lappie so you can download poker sites ? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 01:47:29 PM He doesn’t need to download poker sites. He just goes out and buys one.. ;tightend;
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 01:53:31 PM That link doesn't work Byron, did they take it off? Sigh. You just don't get techie stuff, do you ifm? I mean, it's obvious it needs to be opened in IE. Cant beat the old IE. Actually boss i have a "script blocker" on my PC that prevents sites from running code when i open their pages, that is why it didn't work. Have you sorted out your lappie so you can download poker sites ? Oh I see, you use the script blocker route. I'm not a big script blocker fan myself, I'm more of a codex man. The Lappie - yeah - sorted it. Well, Jen did...! Dunno what the prob was, but it's OK now, thanks. Talking of which, my PC......It used to open up automaticlly to blonde, but I got attacked by a virus a few weks back, & it messed up a load of settings & stuff, & now it open up on another site. (Some sort of Security centre). How do I change it so that it will opn up in blonde as the "default"? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Karabiner on April 23, 2006, 01:54:42 PM The link works fine for me using Firefox, but everyone is sitting at the table with AAAA :D
It says something about cutting and pasting hand histories into the box, so that excliudes me ;technophobe; Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 01:59:41 PM Tikay are you using Internet explorer as you browser ?
well if so click tools at the top, then click internet options, then type in blondes address where you see the other address then click apply and ok Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:02:00 PM The link works fine for me using Firefox, but everyone is sitting at the table with AAAA :D It says something about cutting and pasting hand histories into the box, so that excliudes me ;technophobe; yes you can see it in firefox, but can't run the hand Histories, so it's usless in firefox Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:08:42 PM Tikay are you using Internet explorer as you browser ? well if so click tools at the top, then click internet options, then type in blondes address where you see the other address then click apply and save Err....., how would I now what browser I am using, & where would I fnd it? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:11:01 PM at the very top of your screen it should say Internet Explorer Or Mozilla Firefox or net scape...
look for one of those names at the very top of your screen Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:16:38 PM Thanks. I'm Internet Explorer, & I went into Tools & changed the Home Page to blonde, but it still keep openig up in Microsoft Security Center (sic).
Do I need to re-boot for it to take effect? Thanks for your help. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:19:42 PM no you should just be able change the address and click apply then ok
then close IE (Internet Explorer) and open it again and it should take you right back here. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:23:53 PM Tikay i just did the same and changed my IE home page to blonde, it works without even having to close it down. if you keep having the problems then you have been infected with a browser hijacker.
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 02:24:46 PM what is the address it takes you to?
just type it out without the www. bit. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 02:25:38 PM http://www.cexx.org/hphijack.htm
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:26:31 PM Tried that bundle, still no joy.
By "close Internt Explorer" do you mean close all the windows that are in IE? I have 2 Poker Sites open, nothing else, & when I go to "START" / "Internet Explorer" it still opens in the Microsoft Security Centre. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:27:51 PM what is the address it takes you to? just type it out without the www. bit. securitycentre.com Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: The_nun on April 23, 2006, 02:28:08 PM I tell you something Ian...You are far more handsome than your AV
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: TightEnd on April 23, 2006, 02:30:06 PM Yes he is.
Still an awkward bugger though. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Ironside on April 23, 2006, 02:30:26 PM you have spyware on your pc tikay you need to remove it
there are free programs out there you can use IFM printed one yesterday Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 02:30:47 PM what is the address it takes you to? just type it out without the www. bit. securitycentre.com Not microsoft then Tikay................... Use this :- http://www.spywareguide.com/onlinescan.php Nun:- awwwww shucks Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:31:43 PM no you don't have to close the poker sites, infact you shouldnt even have to close IE really...are you sure its microsoft Security Centre.
Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:32:29 PM http://www.cexx.org/hphijack.htm That appears to be what has happened, & it looks too daunting for me to attempt to "fix it". When it first appeared, I thought it was "offiocial" from Microsoft, it said "you have been infected, you need spyware, it's free" bla bla bla, so I downloaded, & it ended up costing me (conning me..) $79. If I did a "system restore" (see, I do know some things) to "pre-attack" would it get rid of it? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 02:34:04 PM If I did a "system restore" (see, I do know some things) to "pre-attack" would it get rid of it? NO!!! Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:38:26 PM what is the address it takes you to? just type it out without the www. bit. securitycentre.com Not microsoft then Tikay................... Use this :- http://www.spywareguide.com/onlinescan.php Nun:- awwwww shucks I am sure this is what I did last time, screens were popping up left right & centre, so I did ione of those "Free Scans" & when it got halfway through it said "pay $79" so I did....... If I run the "Free Scan" on ifm's link, will I end up paying again? Iron says I have spyware, & use the link ifm Posted yesterday - is that the same one he has Posted just now? Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Ironside on April 23, 2006, 02:40:55 PM i think its the same link and i think its free
i use spywaredoctor which is one of the best spywares programs out there and its only about $27 so you were seriously ripped off i would also check that the card you used to pay for it hasnt been used anywhere else without your knowledge Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: ifm on April 23, 2006, 02:41:41 PM You have to transfer $79 to my pokerstars account :D
It is the same link and it is free and it is highly recommended (i got it from tech support at tiscali). Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 02:43:14 PM Tikay, DON'T BUY ANYTHING, you can use all the free stuff. its the stuff you buy that infects you so you will have to buy other stuff.
use the link IFM posted. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: tikay on April 23, 2006, 02:54:35 PM I wish I had asked you guys last time.....
I just ran ifm's link, it found 9 "suspicious programmes" & de-installed the Spyware thing, & now it's fine, it opens up in blonde. Thanks to all of you for your help. Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: Karabiner on April 23, 2006, 10:42:53 PM Watched and read the STT, well worth it thanks a lot for the link Byron.
It worked perfectly on IE, even for me ::) Title: Re: Zen and The Art of Poker - Full Text Post by: bundle on April 23, 2006, 10:51:16 PM Watched and read the STT, well worth it thanks a lot for the link Byron. :)upIt worked perfectly on IE, even for me ::) |