Poker Strategy - Self Control

Online Poker Strategy

Self Control

Have you ever played online poker while on a tilt? C'mon, I know you did. Pretty much everyone did. You know the feeling when you show down A trips only for the annoyingly-nicknamed fella across the table to show down a flush? The next hand, you feel an irresistible urge to chase him down and you reraise on a QJo. Sounds familiar?

Well, if it does, than you did play on tilt.

Remember what the results of tilting were? Not easy to forget, huh?

What I'm about to discuss in this article, can well be cataloged as the most important poker-concept of all. It's about the power of discipline.

You see, doing the right thing most of the time, should be no sweat for poker players, just as it isn't really a problem in the real world either. Suppose you are offered three jobs, one of them paying better and with better hours than the other two. No matter how many times you're faced with this situation in your lifetime, you'll always make the right choice. It should work the same way in poker. In reality though, some players don't always end up taking the best one of the three jobs on offer.

The explanation would be, that the game of poker is an emotional roller-coaster. There's tons of emotion involved in the game and whenever emotion shows up, logic usually takes a back seat.

This is what pushes most people to making mistakes, and this is what keeps them from reaching their full potential as poker players.

Most people are simply not prepared to cope with the element of luck involved in poker. Pretty much everyone knows that it's there and pretty much everyone knows they'll come face-to-face with it sooner or later. What almost nobody realizes, is just how emotionally defenseless they really are against this luck factor. In life, there are certain things that make decision-making difficult. All of these things are nicely brought-together in one neat little package bearing the name "online poker".

How can you combat the luck factor? You have to learn to deal with it. Good poker players get hit by streaks of bad luck too, not only weak ones. The difference is how they deal with it. Accepting luck as part of the game and not taking anything personally, is part of the process of learning, however, you need to keep your inner balance all the time no matter what happens. This is extremely difficult to achieve.

Learning to deal with luck, will help you with your tilting, however many players make a whole bunch of mistakes, even when they are in an emotionally stable state, and even though they know that what they're doing is not correct. It's as if there was a little devil coming to life in them and telling them:"see if you can get away with this".

You need to keep that little devil under control. All the poker theory in the world won't help you one bit if you can't focus on doing what you Know is right. Learning poker theory is only the first step towards becoming a better player. Learning how to apply theory, is the real challenge. Have you ever wondered why playing poker online is such a lucrative enterprise for some people, and why it's such a terrible waste of money and energy for others?

Well, now you know it. Winning poker players play their best game almost all the time. That, coupled with proper bankroll management, and other tiny edges like rakeback, will certainly make them constant long-term winners. It will also provide them a truly valuable advantage over 95% of all online poker players.

- by Steve L.