Mind Over Money

Poker is anything you can get away with!

The power of mind over money is rooted in mental bias . It is our own idiosyncratic way to distort our map of reality. Just as the menu is not the meal, this map is not the territory--because everyone experiences gambling differently. When your reality check bounces---change your map.FLOUNDERS verses ROUNDERS -The difference in playing with the belief and intention of winning against just being social.

For the poker Balla, nothing is better than when that average Joe Player sits down at a poker table. Why? Because he just sat down with money he INTENDS to lose! There is no more +EV situation, and most tables in a live poker room are filled with players exactly like that. When you treat No Limit Hold em as only a game of chance instead of skill, it is not a law of probability, it's a fact for games with negative expectations: Risk of ruin is 100%.

A Joe plays when he "feels" like it, a Pro, all the time! Call them perpetual shortcuts JOES make when losing poker ASAP; and as any of the PROS will tell you, they don't need cards to win--that's for amateurs. Pro Players specialize in other people's biases! especially that malignant optimistic one that beats its chest and says, "I'm the best player at the table".

Poker is a game of partial information, and when you have a competitive advantage you have to take into account this and, more important, behavioral factors. There is wise.... and there is otherwise:

Behavior Has ConsequencesIrrational default modes of playing tend to show up in our game both when we win---the House Money Effect chip overload of playing loose with their money, and when we are getting on tilt with bad beats: That's when emotion and even confidence cloud our judgment and misguide our actions. The Volatility and Variance of NLH rewards patience, a clear mind, and, selective aggression.

American Airlines AA and the Concorde Effect—A True Story at the $100 Buy-In Bicycle Casino- Eating Dessert First.I’m UTG, deep stacked with four limpers. I raise and get called by all four. I should muck right there but I don't. I’ve got pocket aces. The flop is low ball 3 4 7 rainbow. I bet big-a Dan Harrington "information" bet to see where I am at... and lose three players. The turn is a 5, a possible straight. I bet big again and get re-raised all in. I insta-call. The river is a blank. I flip over AA and Lift Ticket has Pocket 66. for the nuts.

The very next hand I get pocket kings--it was Dijon Vu, the same old mustard--My emotional return on investment however, my EROI, was saying "SEAT OPEN!" and the table could smell it and I got everyone calling, a family pot. I actually wanted to go home broke..and even though I tripped up, I lost to runner, runner, heart flush. I did. That's right,wanting to lose money. And that emotional return was more of a payoff than the financial one--when my black Kings got cracked by suited connectors (hearts, a baby flush!).

Granted, too much respect for money makes you a bad NLH player but I walked away from that session with knowledge: First, that my brain is the "most powerful computer." Second, when on tilt, my brain is the most powerful "broken computer ."Tilt makes us sub-optimal for evaluating rewards, sizing up risks and calculating probabilities. It's like selling the car for gas money.I walked away with a less broken computer, less sabotaging behavior, and more insight into the fact that self-delusion is more than possible in poker - it's highly likely!Behavioral Finance ---

The Black Box Flight Recorder has a name for my crash landing -- The Sunk Cost Fallacy --the refusal to get out of a losing position, because you've already written the money off -- resulting in losing even more money. The British and French governments continued to fund the Concorde project long after it was determined that it was a loser---merely to justify past investment in it, rather than assessing the current rationality of investing.

You have an over pair on the flop and bet big. You get called. On the turn the texture of the board is dangerous. You bet out in the dark---suddenly you are stuck as your opponent straightens out.We are in fact more sensitive to decreases in our chip count than we are to increases in them.

Doyle Brunson, a member of the MENSA Poker Club says: Great players lay down great hands. In fact, the ability to accept a loss and get away from a great hand is probably the most important (and difficult) skill to learn in poker. It's the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.The ability to take a small loss to avoid a big one is the hallmark of this poker genius.We all start out as geniuses, and then allow our emotions to de-genius us. If you put good players into bad situations they usually turn bad.

Poker is not a form of gambling---but gambling is a form of ---loose-aggressive--- poker.All gambling involves betting, but not all bets are gambling. It depends on how much control you have over the outcome and how much luck you think you have at the moment.

Betting on positive expectations and predictable outcomes.—either you hold unbeatable cards or make other players belive you do, that’s a skill set that pays out 10x over time. A bet is a declaration that says I have a better hand than you---Find out if it the truth or a lie, act accordingly to disappoint your opponent. Unless you have the stone cold nuts, when you bet you want opponents to think you do, and fold.

Either raise or fold, but rarely call.Always aspire to be a nobody in poker. A nobody bets only when the odds are favorable. Gamblers are somebody--They splash the pot, make loose calls , bluff off their stack and bet money at unfavorable odds and eventually lose it all. A nobody cannot lose; he eventually wins all the money that "somebody" players risk. Most Somebodies idea of a good lay down is to flat call. Bluff raising for him is out of the question.

NLH is a safety net for somebody gamblers. Not knowing what he is doing because he doesn’t know what he is doing—shields him from his own efforts to lose! These kind of players back into a lot of hands and split pots., and generaly confuse nobody players.

Zero Sum and Then SomeSerious poker is a POSITIVE -SUM GAME. Everybody gets what they want or need. The game itself helps the pie expand. And in (game) theory everybody simultaneously wins in a positve sum game. Yet if Poker is all about reading game theory books and learning ABC theroies and systems, then the games are really like used bookstores---dead information. The game sure doesn't look like a used bookstore, thanks to dealing with everywhere--- ubiquitious internet poker. Nobody players routinely make more cash than people who work in used bookstores!