Previous part of the book “Mental Game of Poker”: Tilt = anger + bad play (2)
5.2.
Tilting when bad cards are dealt for an extended period is so common in poker that players think it's part of the game. Prolonged periods of bad luck are some of the most unpleasant things in poker, but there are several ways to identify the psychological and technical flaws in your game.
Bad card tilt is the result of bad deals lasting days, weeks, months, or even years and the accumulated tilt during those periods. It's like a vicious cycle that gains momentum when variance causes tilt, leading you to play poorly, which leads to even more tilt, all of which you carry into the next day, meaning you tilt faster the next time. The next time you tilt more, the losses increase, leading to a quicker session end. Then you tilt because you had to stop playing, it starts to weigh on you, and it becomes hard to sleep. You wake up tired and feel the urge to recover, but then you mess up again… you play poorly… you tilt again… you make more mistakes… you tilt more… you play a long session to recover… you fall deeper into poker hell… you think everything will be fine once you win, but you can't do it… you tilt even more… you can't stop playing… you tilt because you can't stop tilting… you think it couldn't get worse… you want to quit poker… but you just need to win again.
Familiar feeling?
Your tilt progression is probably a bit different because we are all unique in our own ways. However, digging deeper, I was very surprised to see how many similarities there are among tilting poker players when they encounter longer periods of bad cards. It's very important to know that such a prolonged period quickly triggers other forms of tilt. If bad beats cause your tilt, then during bad card periods, you will tilt even more because bad beats happen much more frequently during such periods. When things are going well and you lose with aces, it doesn't bother you as much because it doesn't happen often, and the wins are a good counterbalance to the anger.
Bad variance does not cause your tilt. It only reveals the deep-seated reasons why you tilt. If you're not sure what other forms of tilt bad variance reveals, your own thoughts can help you figure it out. For example:
- “It's unfair, I never win a flip!” = Injustice tilt
- “How can I lose like this again!” = Loss aversion tilt
- “I knew it! Damn, how can I play so badly?!” = Mistake tilt
- “I'm too good for this to happen to me. How can I lose to such a donkey?” = Entitlement tilt
- “Now I'm going to 3-bet this idiot. Who the hell does he think he is?! Damn it, I'm shoving.” = Revenge tilt
- “If I have to, I'll play for a week to win.” = Desperation tilt
After identifying all the forms of tilt affecting you with the help of bad variance, read the corresponding section that will help you solve the specific problem. Once you fix the deep-seated causes of tilt, you will stop tilting, regardless of how many bad beats you experience. A long period of bad luck will likely still be annoying, but you will be able to stay calm and maintain good play.
If you can't identify more influencing forms of tilt or it seems that bad variance is the main problem, then a broader approach can be taken. Variance is a complex concept, and players find it difficult to fully grasp. Although many players have a general understanding of it, that knowledge disappears when faced with strong emotions. In reality, knowledge about variance is just like any other skill and follows the same principles. Only what is trained to unconscious competence can be used during emotional stress, all else is still unmastered and requires a lot of work and effort. Regardless of what you already know about variance, you still need to know more. Perhaps for this reason, players who come from mathematics or financial fields often thrive in poker. They have a foundation of knowledge about variance.
Although you can't control variance, you can gain greater control over your game if you have more knowledge about variance. Try to delve deeper into the subtleties of variance to understand more than just the obvious coolers, suck-outs, and bad beats. Ideally, such skills should be constantly improved. Having such a skill allows you to immediately understand whether you are in a bad card period, playing poorly, or others are better than you. All this leads to a much more stable emotional state. More about this in the section “variance recognition skill.”
CLIENT STORY
Matt “mbolt1” Bolt
$3/$6 to $50/$100 NLHE
At the beginning of my career, I progressed very quickly because I was staked and coached by Dusty Schmidt. Such opportunities allowed me to climb the limits very quickly, so within a few months, a bad day when I lost a few hundred dollars turned into a day when I lost $5000. As I climbed the limits, I was doing really well, so every time I moved to higher limits, I crushed them. Until I settled in the mid/high limits, I had no experience with bad variance.
Then I had to endure entire days of losses, which are hard to comprehend when playing at 16 tables simultaneously at the $2/$4 limit. Money was never a big deal, but I never liked the fact of losing itself. I always thought it was much worse to lose $5000 in a week playing at the $3/$6 limits than to lose $80000 in a day at the $50/$100 limit.
Jared made me think about the necessary things and gave me a better understanding of why my brain was acting the way it was. When you play large volumes of hands, you naturally develop a tolerance for bad variance, but discussions with Jared accelerated that process.
Failures are incredibly annoying. In 2010, there were periods when I didn't even think I was playing poker; it was more like a game called “You are a loser.” It seemed like I came to the tables just to lose. In my opinion, what separates a good player from an average one is how they handle periods of bad luck. One of Jared's sayings stuck with me: “Michael Jordan didn't make a dime in the weight room.” I like to think of M. Jordan sweating in the gym without making any money. That's what a period of bad luck is for me – hard work, trying to lose as little as possible.
But it's not easy. In poker psychology, all that is important for a successful poker player often completely contradicts human nature. No one wants to stop playing when they are losing. Everyone wants to recover the lost money. However, when things are going well, everyone wants to finish the game quickly. A good player always wants to stay at the table when they are doing well. All conditions are favorable, and at such moments they usually play their best game (A+). When things are not going well, a good player wants to stop playing, while inexperienced players do the opposite. My experience shows that what you instinctively think is right is often wrong in poker psychology.
Speaking of homework, I was always bad at it, so for a long time, my work was limited to sessions with Jared, but nothing more. Conversations with him helped a lot, but after some time without communication, all that information started to fade because it didn't fully settle in my head. Eventually, after each session, I started writing everything down: my game evaluation, psychological state, and also noting the role of variance. This helped a lot in dealing with downswings. Naturally, all players remember only the moments when they were unlucky but forget those when luck smiled upon them.
I used to think, “Wow, I'm the unluckiest person on earth, this is so unfair, I deserve to win more.” I thought it was okay to lose for a few days as long as the following days were successful and I recovered. I understand that this is irrational, but at that moment, I felt a great sense of injustice and frustration that I didn't get my share of luck. Variance still annoys me, but now I don't focus so much on how unlucky I am.
What is the goal? I try to ignore the results and focus on playing each hand as well as possible. Recently, I had a 90 buy-in downswing, but I know that I played well the entire time because I constantly monitored myself closely.
INSERT LOGIC: YOU CAN'T CONTROL THE CARDS YOU RECEIVE, SO WHY FOCUS ON THAT?
YOU CAN'T PREDICT WHEN LUCK WILL TURN UPSIDE DOWN. ALL YOU CAN DO IS CONTINUE PLAYING WELL.
