Two Plus Two Newer Archives - 18,000 and I'm a beginner again (Goals and Attitude)

I am essentially a break-even player in the micros. When things are running well I can be up to a 1BB/100 player and as low as a -1BB/100 when things are going wrong.

Over 18k hands my stats are 18/9/2.01. My reads from PAHUD are improving. When a non-agressive player bets into me I have to identify what they may be holding and what they may have called my bet/raise with. Calling stations do not fold. Calling stations do not fold...! In my first 10k I bluffed a lot with A-high- it hurt my winrate. I dump pocket pairs more often when there are two other players raising and calling my bets. This is situational of course but on A-high and K-high boards or coordinated boards I just have learned to let the JJ and TT go. Most of the time I find that I was indeed behind and my action was correct. In big pots I have to assume I will win the hand enough to compensate for the times I flop and overs come with action.

My improvement areas and some goals are to calculate odds in every hand. Every hand. This may seem like over kill, but I imagine I was playing the hand, raised preflop and got "x" callers. I want to be able to calculate odds on the spot. I do this a lot when I had A8 in the blind and the flop comes J83 or TT8. I want to learn when it becomes appropraite to check raise. I am going to read some lit on this subject, after all I am a beginner again.

Over the next couple months I will be very busy with work and will not have as much time to play and study as before. I think this will improve my game though. I find when I stop playing even for a few days that the concepts I read or discussed become more evgraved in my memory. Kind of like in college when I would study for 6 hours straight and not remember a thing. Then I would study and hour and take a break, play some poker (oddly enough) and then resume studying. I know what works for me and what does not. I need to better understand not only the game of poker but my reasoning my psychology and how it effects my overall game.

I initially bought into PokerStars to clear a bonus thinking it would be a cinch to clear at the LOW limits. Meh heh [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] This is why it is called learning process. 18k later I am undoubtely more confident in my skills but just as confident that I have TONS more to learn. I'm off to read GSIH. It's a book I missed.

Thanks for listening guys and of you have anything to add please do so.

-Google-