September

That's still a really nice car!

If you're continuously not hitting the goals, maybe you are not very good at goal setting and motivation? There has been science done on these topics...
http://richardwiseman.wordpress.com/b...-seconds-think-a-little-change-a-lot/

Basic premise is always; don't rely on willpower, you are not as tough as you like to think. To see any real change would need to put yourself in a situation where its very hard to do the things that are messing you up, and easy to do the things that are good for you. Therefore, I think you should move to a Muslim country where alcohol is illegal (inb4 UK is already a Muslim country)

It's certainly a more economical car heh. 31.2 mpg so far as opposed to the 18.9 mpg I got in the M3 heh. Not anywhere near as fun in terms of driving enjoyment and unfortunately the torque steer is horrendous, but it's comfortable, looks good enough, has low mileage (9k miles when I got it) and is way cheaper to run. Can always get something cooler in the future if (when) I luckbox some MTT anyway! Just need to cutback for now while things are going poorly I guess.

Motivation is def an issue. I don't feel the "need" to play or make money I guess even though I know I'm getting older and really should start planning for a more stable future especially as poker only gets harder and I don't have any other avenues of income. I have definitely considered taking myself out of this area and isolating myself, or staying in a place where I only know a couple of people just to reduce the temptations to go out all the time, but don't see myself going through with that either. I guess I enjoy going out too much and even though I know it sucks for health and productivity I just don't seem able to turn a night out down. I've only put in 1k VPPs today and already feel like I had to force myself just to play the 1.5 hours it takes to make 1k VPPs... Still, force myself is what I'm going to have to do I guess.

Might check that book out but I have a lot of other similar stuff which I still haven't got round to reading yet anyway :/

Sigh hate to say it, but you're kinda like the neilly everyone is rooting for. you're a nice guy, and ppl have a soft spot for you because u were one of the best foreign sc players. on top of that you were one of the few ppl who still posted GOOD hand solid, RELEVANT advices. but at the same time i can't help but feel you are a bit delusional when it comes to your relationship with poker.

but it seems like poker isn't working out for you anymore. every time i open your blog, i'm rooting for you. and i'm hoping only the best for you. i'm waiting to see that 100k hands played break out month. but it seems like month after month, you're having the same problems and same issues with motivation and work ethic.

i find that it is easy to put in hours when you have a vehicle or platform that you believe in, due to potential and longevity. i think poker for you at least, isn't the same money making machine that it used to be for you. and i know you have poured in the time and hours, and it is difficult to walk away from such a game, but sunk costs are sunk. you still have a bright future and being young is having AA for life.

poker was taken away from me, as i live in US, and i was lucky enough to have been an extremely average player. because of my averageness i had no problem accepting that i wouldn't be able to play online poker and looked elsewhere in order to focus my efforts and skills. i went back to school, i'm taking phd economic classes which i love and spend countless hours a day.

anyway, in summary, i hope the best for you, and that you may one day find your passion, because the work ethic will follow. GL mate.

imo give yourself a strict time limit as well as ultimatum. (i'm playing for the next 6 months, and i want to make 40k or i'm going to quit for good, because this is the minimum i could make if i had a more traditional type of job)

Clearly poker isn't going as well for me as it did in past years or even months, but even though it's not going well lately I'm still doing much better than I would be in any job I can get given no university degree, 4 months work experience in my entire life and being 29 years old.

I'm still up over $50k for the year with 3 months remaining and a certain $2.8k + $1.6k in bonuses by the end of this month not including what I make on the tables. I still have 2.5bb/100 in EV winrate over more than 500k hands 8 tabling 100+200NL zoom for the year, which is still a reasonable hourly especially when combined with the rakeback I'm making playing that many hands/hour. This is playing an average of 12 hours a week... less than 2 hours a day. If I was working, I'd likely be doing manual labour (Given I'd have severely hampered options given opening statement) working my hands to the bone for ~40 hours a week making less than $20k a year.. I am lacking motivation in poker and I would love a way out, but I have no better option and see no other way but to persevere with it for the foreseeable future.

I appreciate the idea of going back to school and I have contemplated doing just that myself but there really isn't anything that I'd be interested in studying or doing as a job after graduating any more so than poker and I would almost certainly drop out before attaining a degree anyway due to lack of interest and thus motivation, landing me in debt and in a worse situation than I am now. I think this is a fairly realistic outlook, I'm not sure where I'm being delusional. Yea I have fell short of my VPP goals etc, but given I've never made more than 200k VPPs in a year prior to this year I'm still doing better than in the past purely in terms of volume despite hating the game :O And I have played a couple of months where I was putting in ~100k hands this year, just the last 2 months have been particularly low volume months due to additional social obligations, many days spent hungover and ever declining interest. You may be able to make $40k every 6 months in a normal job but those jobs basically don't exist where I live except for people who have worked their way up for years. I don't even live in a city so there aren't many good jobs going and the few good jobs that are going I'd have no chance of getting into with my experience and qualifications in any case.

I am definitely putting thought into other avenues though and I know I'm not going to be able to sustain myself through poker alone for too many years at current levels of interest especially, but I'm not in a crisis or anything just yet and I'm still making more money than I would be otherwise and feel I have plenty enough time to figure it all out

hah i'm in a somewhat similar situation, although i'm only 23. Never been to uni although trying to go next year.
I just got a manual labor job working in various construction sites around the city but still play poker on the side, and also reading a lot of what ppl learn at uni on the side as well.

School is designed to make people stupid but maybe you should go anyway. Changing your environment might be worth it even if does cost you dropping out.

you seemed to be a big winner before I find hard to believe you cant beat higher stakes, maybe you should get a mentor or something. 500nl zoom is quite soft

Well yeah between 2007 and 2011 I was a ~7.5bb/100 winner over 1.5+ million hands at NLHE cash games at all stakes up to $10/$20, I got bored and changed over to PLO early 2011 (Was going to attempt SNE, that lasted like 1.5 months haha), where I was a ~5bb/100 winner ranging from 50PLO to 400PLO over ~250k hands, although I was breakeven at 400PLO for 100k hands. Since getting back into Hold'Em (Zoom specifically) I've been winning at 3EV bb/100 at 100NL zoom and 2.5 EV bb/100 at 200NL zoom 8 tabling and have -1.5EV bb/100 over ~200k hands at 500NL zoom. I truly believe I ran way worse than EV suggests over those 200k hands at 500NL zoom, but I think that even if I am a winner it's not by much, certainly nothing over 1bb/100.. I'm quite surprised you think it's soft, I think it's a pretty tough game and only the biggest sickos are attaining anything upwards of 3bb/100, there are many very good players who have 100k hand samples at losing winrates including nanonoko (Who was still crushing the normal 6max games) based on some tracking site I used to have access to a couple of months ago. Mentor wouldn't help too much anyway I don't think, the main issue is the desire to play and to improve. I'm sure I have the ability to win in those games if I applied myself, and especially so if I cut down to 4 tables but I just don't enjoy it enough atm

yeah you must be insane if you think 500nl is quite soft baal. I remember red baron saying it was as hard as 2knl just because the rake was quite high.

On October 01 2013 17:50 Stroggoz wrote: yeah you must be insane if you think 500nl is quite soft baal. I remember red baron saying it was as hard as 2knl just because the rake was quite high.

It isnt as hard as 2knl at all, the fish/reg ratio is better and the 500nl regs are quite mediocre and many of the 2knl regs are very though regs that will constantly fight for pots with pretty decent balanced ranges unlike 500nl who are transparent most of the time.

Do you have a financial plan?

Like, if you plan on live from poker (which you can't really do forever) you should aim to have a huge margin of profit over your expenses, so your gradual savings allow you to generate passive interests and eventually retire. When you are after a number its easier to find motivation .

Check thewoosel's blog.

But yeah, if you are not doing anything else 30k hands in a month is just being a lazy fuck .

i didn't know of your success. congratulations. i must have gotten the wrong impression from your blogs

I did a quick google search, found this for you Midian!!

It's a summary of the book the other guy recommended.

http://jimsbookreviews.blogspot.no/2010/11/59-seconds-richard-wiseman.html

On October 01 2013 18:27 GoTuNk wrote: Do you have a financial plan? Like, if you plan on live from poker (which you can't really do forever) you should aim to have a huge margin of profit over your expenses, so your gradual savings allow you to generate passive interests and eventually retire. When you are after a number its easier to find motivation . Check thewoosel's blog. But yeah, if you are not doing anything else 30k hands in a month is just being a lazy fuck .

There's no drawn up plan as such, I'm really just aiming to make as much money as I can from poker between now and the time at which I get a job. My main aim in the short term is to figure out what I'd like to do after poker, and head down the path that takes me into that job, be it university, a college course or a trade apprenticeship or whatever it may be. I'm obviously capable of sustaining myself off of poker alone for a few more of years even if I do just play an hour or so a day average... poker would have to get significantly more difficult to the point where I'm playing no higher than 50NL for me to be in a real struggle I think. I feel like I have plenty of time, but at the same time it takes time to complete any course that I'd have to take to get into a reasonable job so the time to start looking is now, so I can apply for a next September start.

Yep I am indeed a lazy fuck More so the last couple of months unfortunately!

On October 01 2013 22:21 mnj wrote: i didn't know of your success. congratulations. i must have gotten the wrong impression from your blogs

Rakeback accounts for a significant % of the winnings I've made this year. I've made 280k VPPs so far which is almost 1mill FPPs at Supernova VIP or $16k in bonuses, then there's the VIP Stellar Rewards, 100k VPP and 200k VPP milestones, the zoom&boom bonuses that were running, the set your VIP goal bonus that ran at start of the year.. It's certainly over $20k in bonuses that I've made on top of cash game winnings so the results I post in my blog don't really show how much I'm winning very accurately when almost 50% of my profits this year is rakeback and bonuses which I don't include in my monthly summaries

On October 02 2013 03:31 Mariuslol wrote: I did a quick google search, found this for you Midian!! It's a summary of the book the other guy recommended. http://jimsbookreviews.blogspot.no/2010/11/59-seconds-richard-wiseman.html

Cheers. Main issue is just getting round to reading stuff, I have so much of this kind of thing on my kindle and book shelves and never find the time to read any of it

On October 01 2013 18:10 Baalim wrote: Show nested quote + On October 01 2013 17:50 Stroggoz wrote: yeah you must be insane if you think 500nl is quite soft baal. I remember red baron saying it was as hard as 2knl just because the rake was quite high. It isnt as hard as 2knl at all, the fish/reg ratio is better and the 500nl regs are quite mediocre and many of the 2knl regs are very though regs that will constantly fight for pots with pretty decent balanced ranges unlike 500nl who are transparent most of the time.

When that new PTR was still up I once sat in the lobby and looked up every single player playing 500NL zoom on more than one separate occasion and I found that most of the players were breakeven at 500NL zoom specifically but were winning at most other games they played and then there were a handful of regs with 2bb/100 winrate and the occasional sicko like OtB_RedBaron, katallo, d3fault or AverageGreg who were all winning for ludicrous winrates. I usually found 1 or 2 regfish (Based purely on winrates, and this would invariably be maxxmeister, MrGamblerrr or JPette333 if I remember their account names correctly) who were losing quite heavily but even they caused some problems just by being very aggressive and maybe 3 or 4 1 tabling fish per 60 players. That's not many fish though when you consider the regs are 2-4 tabling, usually 4, so you don't run into fish all that often relative to regs, therefore you're usually at a table with 5 other regs, usually none of which are worse than breakeven at 500NL zoom and are small winners at 200NL-600NL regular 6max tables. Not what I consider easy tbh. I wouldn't know how hard 2kNL tables are these days, but I assume they only run when there's a fish, which automatically gives it a better fisheg ratio given there's always a fish on the table, which isn't the case in most 500NL zoom lineups. This may be nullified by the fact the average reg playing those stakes is tougher, but then there's less rake at 2kNL too. I'm not saying 500NL zoom is as tough as 2kNL, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's similarly tough personally, at least the games that run around a fish at 2kNL, naturally it's a different story if it's a 6 reg lineup at 2kNL...

On October 02 2013 05:24 ToT)MidiaN( wrote: Show nested quote + On October 01 2013 18:10 Baalim wrote:   On October 01 2013 17:50 Stroggoz wrote: yeah you must be insane if you think 500nl is quite soft baal. I remember red baron saying it was as hard as 2knl just because the rake was quite high. It isnt as hard as 2knl at all, the fish/reg ratio is better and the 500nl regs are quite mediocre and many of the 2knl regs are very though regs that will constantly fight for pots with pretty decent balanced ranges unlike 500nl who are transparent most of the time. When that new PTR was still up I once sat in the lobby and looked up every single player playing 500NL zoom on more than one separate occasion and I found that most of the players were breakeven at 500NL zoom specifically but were winning at most other games they played and then there were a handful of regs with 2bb/100 winrate and the occasional sicko like OtB_RedBaron, katallo, d3fault or AverageGreg who were all winning for ludicrous winrates. I usually found 1 or 2 regfish (Based purely on winrates, and this would invariably be maxxmeister, MrGamblerrr or JPette333 if I remember their account names correctly) who were losing quite heavily but even they caused some problems just by being very aggressive and maybe 3 or 4 1 tabling fish per 60 players. That's not many fish though when you consider the regs are 2-4 tabling, usually 4, so you don't run into fish all that often relative to regs, therefore you're usually at a table with 5 other regs, usually none of which are worse than breakeven at 500NL zoom and are small winners at 200NL-600NL regular 6max tables. Not what I consider easy tbh. I wouldn't know how hard 2kNL tables are these days, but I assume they only run when there's a fish, which automatically gives it a better fisheg ratio given there's always a fish on the table, which isn't the case in most 500NL zoom lineups. This may be nullified by the fact the average reg playing those stakes is tougher, but then there's less rake at 2kNL too. I'm not saying 500NL zoom is as tough as 2kNL, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's similarly tough personally, at least the games that run around a fish at 2kNL, naturally it's a different story if it's a 6 reg lineup at 2kNL...

This all looks pretty solid to me.

everyone at the video making business says nl500 is just sad, Baal must have really improved ^^