Guidance of beginners

Hi everyone,

I would like to have a bit of help with my poker game. Just to give you guys a bit of my background. I started enjoying poker when I was 17-18. Used to follow the pro scene, big tournaments, high stakes poker.. the lot. Used to play online but never took it very seriously. Studied a bit of strategy and was pretty decent at 10NL and 25 NL but that was almost 10 years ago... Around june of this year, I went to the casino to play some 200NL for shits and giggles and came up 800$. Quickly realizing how much I missed and love playing this game and that winning 800$ came in handy!

I have a pretty good job but pays enough to survive but not to my desire. I want poker to provide a side revenue and I am willing to invest 20-25 Hours per week. So I decided to invest time and effort into the game but at first I went onto pokerstars guns blazing thinking that I would easily beat 10NL. I quickly lost 1K and another one after that.The general player population has become WAYY better then 8-10 years ago. Emotions, tilt, not knowing what to do got the better of me. I decided to read up on articles, watch videos in order to gather more knowledge about the game. At first, it felt that there was way too much information to digest. Did not know how to integrate all that information into my game. I still continued losing for another 2-3 months ( Donw total 8K or so). Never gave up on my hope and dream to get a stable revenue out of this and also because I enjoy this very very much. I used to be obsessed with competitive video games ( Starcraft ), and once I put my mind into to something.. I don't quit it until I reach the level that I want.

For the past 3 weeks, I would say that I am not losing but I am not winning either. I have identified several leaks that I would like to identify ( amongst many that I have ) and I would hope that some of you can shed some light on them.

- I am always unsure on when to 3bet or when to 3bet light. I often find that when I 3bet light, my outcome is more profitble then its not but I had cases when I put myself in a trap.
- This may sound stupid but ... I have a very hard time FOLDING TP TK and overpairs... I have lost a huge amount of money with that but I also won.. I know this very case by case / hand by hand.. but I feel I have little instinct on when the villian cought 2 pairs or hit a small set.
- Finding the right amount of tables / hands I want. I found lately that I do enjoy playing 800-1k hands per hour. I find it keeps me entertaining and it suits me because my VPIP is around 18 so its not that hard to multitask 4 zoom tables.
- Discipline is an issue as well. My head tells to fold a hand because he must of hit it... but my emotions often tell me otherwise. I truly need to learn how to follow my instinct more then emotion.

Any advice is greatly appreciated and I would love to find some studying partners or just people to discuss poker with!

i think ppl try too hard to win 3 bet pots in general, both as the agressor and defendor. once i started to treat them more like single raised pots i was able to navigate through the hands better.

also if you're having trouble with 3 bet pots, then u should only 3 bet and defend 3 bet with a tighter hand range, get used to how they play and what people show down. it's easier to play 3bet pots when u always have AAKK/AK. this will prob work for u at lower stakes. and help give u an idea/give u confidence on how to navigate 3bet pots.

in general though i think the single best question to ask yourself constantly is why am i betting? what do i want this bet to do? is it successfully accomplishing what i watn to do? is there a different bet size i can utilize? or should i just bet 0 aka check.

Thank you for the reply. I agree and that's what I am trying to do.. ask myself WHY WHY WHY am I making any decision.

are you using a HUD? if not get one asap, it will help your #1 and #2 issues immensely for when to take which action against which player. Not sure how #3 is a problem, so u like playing zoom? sounds great lol, so do I.

#4 discipline is something u need to work on, but it also becomes easier not to give into emotions the more experience and confidence u have..its hard to fold a good hand when u havent had one in a while, much easier when youre already up a lot and feeling good about the session and your poker abilities in general. Similarly when you have more experience and you know youre a long term winner, folding becomes easier because you know youll get more winning hands in the future and this particular hand matters little in the long term unless u decide to waste your stack on it.

I was in your situation a few months ago (started playing poker in april), now im playing NL25zoom and moving up to NL50 when I get enough bankroll. Id be happy to talk poker on skype, pm me if ur interested

Honestly you look like the perfect candidate to get coaching lessons from good players. If I were you I would invest on that, would be much cheaper in the long run. Just make sure you pick the right player to get coaching from, someone that is currently playing and winning in the games, don't mind good graphs from 1-2 years ago.

I fit the profile of these type of coaches as I've won consistently from 2-4 to 10-20nl this year on stars and other sites. I'm sure I could help you a lot. Feel free to search around but coaching is what I would advise to help you progress more efficiently. Good luck!