Falling Hard

There has been much said on the ego and the extreme amounts of self-control it takes to keep yourself in check at the most annoying and frustrating of times.

Recently, I deposited 60 dollars onto my first ever online poker account. I'd only ever played live before this, since I started sneaking into Vegas casinos at 17 in my best looking suit and tie (and hair-clippings that I'd pasted onto my jaw with theatrical glue). Online poker seemed a whole new world, not necessarily in the way the game is played but in the massively greater amounts of willpower you have to have to stop yourself from just being plain stupid.

It was 3 weeks since then when I finally hit my $1000 dollar goal. I played on average 2 hours a day, altogether 32 hours after the 3 weeks. I felt real good and was playing like a normal person (is there such a thing?)

This is when it happened. I said to myself, I can take this game down. I can keep building at insane speeds and never have to worry about smaller losses because this thing is just too easy.

Wrong. All of a sudden the full weight of my ego came flooding back and in the space of about 1 hour I'd lost half of my profit and found myself back down to playing .50/1 NL and trying to make it back. Since that day, and that was one week ago, I have been up to 1200 and down to 300 and up to 900 and now back down to 600. To a higher-limit player, these swings are not that big and happen all the time.

To me, a guy who's only just learned to play 6 months ago and who still has lifetimes in learning left, what do I do? It seems that now I'm at a plateau and the winning sessions become losing sessions, the losing sessions become sessions to try and get it back, and some sessions are just absolutely insane, as if I've let all my skill go out the window and am treating poker as if it were some mad gladiatorial battle that can be won through sheer brute force (all-in, 60% of the time, sitting down at a table and playing the first hand on tilt from last night).

I'm just writing this mainly to vent and in some ways to seek counsel on how I can put an end to this childish streak of bigheadedness. How do you take control of yourself? How did you learn to do that?

Stop. Don't play another game until you read up on Bank Roll Management (BRM). You're playing way outside of your BR and you're very lucky to have not gone broke yet. If you keep playing the games you're playing you will soon. If you have $600 left that's great. I'd suggest pulling out a hundred or so in case you go crazy again and wish to redeposit. Take the remainder and play within solid BRM guidelines. Yes, the winnings will come slower, but the loses will be smaller and if you're a good player you will show long term gains.

Good luck.

You would be wise to take this advice.

WV...thanks for the advice. i'm pretty much playing with my bankroll and i guess that's the reason for all the swings, no?

That is the exact reason for the swings. I would much rather have a steady increase in my bankroll rather than winning $400 and then losing $300, etc.

Read this How to Build Your Online Poker Bankroll: Where you Should Start and this Bankroll Management .
That should send you back on your wining ways

thanks alot guys...as i said i'm new to the online poker world and i think this stuff will help. live just seems so different to me, i have more control and i make better decisions. has anyone read zen and the art of poker?

I have not, but many here have read that book. Search around the site, there are many book reviews around here.