Saturday, February 06, 2010

Life is a game, Poker is a guide to that game

 

When you think of all the things that have stopped you from reaching your full potential as a person those are likely the same things that have stopped you from becoming successful as a poker player.  Both games are very simple; they require logic and control of your emotions.  Most people playing the game are often better than you are; the thing that separates the bad from the great is a plan. 

The reason you do not stick to a plan

Simply put you are afraid.  When I began playing poker full time I left a job where I was very successful.  My boss did not seem surprised at all, after all, I walked in his door not two years before that and blew the doors off, I did things others were scared to do.  I failed often but when I succeeded the payoff was typically worth it.  As you read this there will be a few types of people that will internalize this differently.  Some will find the idea of facing their fears inspiring and will likely take steps towards finding their own plan.  Whether they succeed or not will be wholly dependent on a tenaciousness to take on daily challenges, either at the poker table or in a boardroom.  While there are degrees to the other group of people most fall in the category of reading something like what I am talking about and thinking something like “I can’t achieve that”.  Their excuses often fall in the range of resources, education or access.  The truth is different though.

Freedom to Fail

They are simply scared to fail.  At it’s heart people succeed or fail based on the plans that they create and an intensity to follow and adjust those plans as different opportunities present themselves.  The life of a poker player is very attractive not because it’s easy, it is actually quite hard and it is getting harder every day.  While many people blame training sites, books or software on why they are failing the real reason is that they have not adjusted their plan to the circumstances and others have.

In March of 2005 I was at an interesting crossroad.  I spent most of 2003 and 2004 pursuing my dream of playing poker for profit.  Note that I did not say that I was pursuing the dream of winning the world series of poker or playing nosebleed games.  To a certain extent I was intimidated to dream that big but when the opportunity presented itself I took that shot.  I am a Forty One year old man with a wife and two kids, trust me I was scared of failure.  It was that fear that kept me on a path of discovery that would not allow myself to fail. 

At the same time I was involved in the poker industry as a consultant and then later on as an affiliate.  While most people dreamt of great riches and fame that just was not part of my plan.  Being good at poker provided me with access with influential people and I used that access to develop some of the businesses I own now, bluff.com being the best and biggest of all of the ideas I have had up to this point.  When I decided to focus more on my business projects than poker it took a lot of people by surprise.  I did so for a few reasons:

1.  There seemed to be a gaping hole in customer relationships on the internet.  This was not exclusive to poker but that was the industry I was in.

2.  The focus on content was blinding people to what is really important to poker players.  Namely tools that make their experience playing more enjoyable.

3.  To be the best I would need to seek out weak opponents.  That was getting harder to do in poker (and I knew that trend would continue, at the time I was playing $50-$100 no limit) and many of the people in the poker industry are risk averse, so it seemed like a good spot.

4.  Lastly, it was respectful to my family and children.  I have been lucky enough to be surrounded by people that support me with few conditions.  I wanted to reward them by honoring our relationships.  Beating Phil Ivey in Bobby’s Room is not near as important as developing my relationship with my wife and children. 

How I got here

When I was 19 I sold fresh shrimp that I had flown up over night from Louisiana in the local farmers market.  I had just gotten out of a business that cost me about a year of my life.  That failure was intense and personal, many days I went without eating, virtually every day I was all in.  So from that experience I learned that being all in was foolish.  I learned bankroll management when I was 19 and at that point I had not played one hand of poker in my life.  The shrimp business quickly failed but that time I had a job, which allowed me to have more than one meal a day.  I also met my wife about that same time.  The next ten years were a series of failures and successes that where punctuated by many people who care for me greatly telling me to stop doing whatever I was doing and settle down.  Their advise came from a good spot but I just did not care about their opinions.

See what you want and ask for help

The biggest key to advice is who is your advisor.  If you want advice on how to become an open heart surgeon asking a lawyer will not help you.  Seems simple right? Well it’s not.  Most of the people that will give you the best advice in life will not give it freely or randomly; you will need to seek it out.  You will often need to pay for it or put in a lot of time and research to fill whatever niche you are trying to fill. 

It was not easy to go from selling shrimp on a street corner to being part of a team that is developing some of the most interesting tools within poker.  The journey was fraught with wild failure and wild successes.  Both have come from a place that is not very sexy at all, hard work and discovery.  All of the things I have encountered made me the person I am today.  Poker is just a small part of that but if you think of what it takes to become a good player many of those traits are found in my journey.  One last thing, if you are not good now you should see yourself as better than you are in whatever you do and do not be scared to pretend you are already there when you are on the journey.  It’s called faking it until you make it and anyone that has succeeded in anything is great at it.  See yourself as the person you will ultimately become and the pieces come together a whole lot easier.

 

Tags: fear   failure   success  

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