What's the deal?

Hey everyone,
I am new to the forum and have been playing poker for a couple of months now. Since I have been playing, I have a couple of newbie questions. First off, I cant seem to grow my bankroll at all, I dont lose money, I just stay steady most of the time. Usually I am up for most of the time, but then take a few bad beats and slide back down to my original starting amount or lower. I don't really know when to stop when I am playing hot and begin to slide back?

That's the only sentence in your post that had a question mark, and its not really a question...

Anyways, here's my theory: You're not that good.

This isn't something to be ashamed about. You're a new player, you're edge isn't very big (you might not have one at all) and you're playing break even poker.

Here's how you fix it:

Get better. The best ways to get better are to post hands in the hand analysis forums (http://www.cardschat.com/f50/), read good posts that will help your game, and maybe take a gander at a guide I wrote about a few things beginners can do that will help your bottom line even if you don't get any better.

There's no trick to poker, there will be lots of ups & downs. You'll make slow progress, run hot, then lose a bunch. Its a roller coaster ride. The key is that the good players go up higher on the way up, and don't slide down quite as much. That way in the long run, they're slowly earning money.

As an example, here's my graph from my 2009 Stud 8 winnings, by hand. As you can see, there's a lot of up & downs, but the overall trend is that the graph goes up. You're probably not that far into your poker career, and so you're just experiencing the short term swings, rather than the overall trend.

This is just how it goes in the world of poker, you have to tough it out on those downslides, and, take advantage of the upswings.

If your just breaking even then make sure you have rakeback, that way you will atleast be making a profit.

Hey CJ, thanks for the PM, appearently I can't send PMs until I have ten posts. I will definately look more into it! Thanks

CJ I am new to CC as well. How do I get rakeback on as existing account?
Thanks