Try to ignore “what you could have won”

Once you fold, you should be keeping an eye on what the other players still in the hand are doing. Trying to pick up tells or reactions from them for later use. But try not to keep track of how well you would have done, or could have done. For instance, if someone bets big and you fold AK because it completely misses the flop, when the turn and river come AA don’t look at what you could have one. Seeing hands you could have won if you hadn't folded is only helpful when you're learning to play. If you already have a system down, a style of play, keeping track of what you could have won will tend to make you play looser then you normally would. You start to think you should play hands you'd normally fold, and it can really hurt you in the long run. Teaching yourself not to take those gambles can be a hard road to take. So do watch how other people play, but try not to pay attention to what could have been.

This is certainly true. Once you fold you fold, you can't take it back so there's no sense in allowing it to affect your future play. I have noticed a lot of these hand that "would have won" lately had I chose to play like an asshole, however I didn't stray from my strategy and had a pretty productive weekend winning a satellite entry and cashing 3 times. I do find it hard not to notice what I would have had though because while I am trying to figure others out I use my known cards to help me determine what I think they might have. It's a delicate balance for sure...

I think we should distinguish between the whole of the hand and the instance. If you have AK and you see 3 players behind you doing re-raises, the correct thing in this instance is to fold, even if on the flop comes AAK. Do not think about what could have been, think about the situation you were in and, if you made a good play, you do not have to regret it.

I agree with this. Knowing the cards in your hand like 7x and people bluffing a turned trip 7s could mean information.

This is great advice and is something amateurs can get hung up on a lot in the beginning. I have noticed playing the novice players and hearing their disgust at folding their 83 offsuit when the flopp was 883. Sometimes these players will even change their game based on one individual instance they encountered at a table.

This is called being results oriented and it will seriously dismantle your game!

Yup!

Poker is about focusing on what you can control.

Playing well and making good decisions are all that matters.

The "What-ifs" do not!

I play online. And when I drop the card and see the flop, turn and river that would give me nuts, I reassure myself that if I played, then other cards would open, and I would not be lucky. You should never regret what might have happened. You will be healthier.

For sure you gave us a great advice.But I have some difficulty to ignore “what I could have won”, after I played a very long tournament.

You could say could about anything. When I am playing MTTs I am just trying to go out on a bad bad beat. So then I know I did not make a mistake and a tournament win was not in it for me.

Great Thread. I often get so frustrated when I fold and end up folding the winning hand. I know I shouldn't let this affect but I know I dne of the many poker problems I need to work on.

Goes back to the basics of judging your decision that you made at the time you made them. Going all in with 27 and hitting quad 7s on the flop does not mean I made a smart decision.

I'd defintley agree with the fact to not look back.Having faith in your reads is good but having second thoughts because you were wrong once will only hinder your postflop play.So have faith in your folds and remember even if your j8 was the nuts ,it was a bad call and you got lucky