Aggression and Creating Reads

[Frosteater]

Hi, my name is Frosteater and I'm a newb. Not just to this board but to poker. So bare with me if the following might seem like the most stupid thing you read in a while, I'm trying to improve.

I started playing poker a few months ago and began with basically playing my hands more or less for value. A bit slowplay here, some semi-bluffing there. Nothing to brag about. It was enough to win at $0.1/$0.25 6Max, but I encountered serious problems against aggressive players who took control of the action.

Then I stumbled over Tien's very inspiring 6 Max fundamentals for SSNL players and I like to think that I understood the concept. At least it was pretty clear that I needed to become more aggressive, if I wanted to improve my game (or develop one).

So far, so good, I went back to $0.05/$0.1 and tried my best to enhance my game. I think I succeeded to a degree, but ended up losing money. From losing small, winning big pots to the exact opposite. I thought about the cause for this and ended up with a rather freightening observation: I started to underestimate the opponent.

In fact, there's the following dilemma:
Let's say I start out with AK from the button, raise pre-flop and get one caller. The flop comes and I missed it completely. Opponent checks to me, I c-bet about 3/4 - 1 pot. And get called. Or raised. This creates a quite complicated situation for me since I absolutely hate the thought of giving up that pot. Not so much because of losing the money, more because of the image I might create. If I fold against a hand that had me beat at that point, that's fine, but with my opponent's and my cards unseen by anybody else at the table, the clearly-to-see action boils down to the fact that I put money in the pot and abandon it in case someone stays in the pot. Since I'm rather happy to take down pots without a showdown, this is clearly not the image I want to communicate.

If I stay in the pot, on the other hand, I do so with a draw hand against a hand, that presumably has me beat. I give up control and become the fish. Which I don't want, either.

So, I assume, the outcome of my decision has to come down to the read I have on my opponent. And this is what really baffles me and at the moment I have no clue how you guys are capable of reading your opponents rather consistently.

As I try to put my opponent on a hand, his typical "behaviour" is one thing and I guess, I'm doing not too bad at this. But I have to consider the fact, he plays against me, which might influence his hand selection and betting style. Since I try to play aggressive, he might get the idea middle pair is good enough whenever I bet the flop (which is often the case).

If I give his call/raise credit, I probably would have to fold my AK, which missed the flop. He might have gotten that idea, too, and now he knows my pocket pair hit the flop and I have a set, if I stay in the pot. So, if I call his bet on the turn or make one myself, he will get the idea, I have trips and can make an easy fold. Or he can take it one step further: he knows that I know that he puts me on a set in a situation like that and that I might make a bluff on the turn. So, as long as he has a hand, no matter how marginal, he might consider taking it to the showdown, since most of the time I don't have a set, and in case no ace, king or queen showed on the flop, he can assume I didn't hit a high pair as well.

Of course, I might give my opponent too much credit here but the problem at hand remains puzzling to me:

My decisions depend on the read I have on my opponent.
The read I have on my opponent depends on my decisions.

The second sentence seems plausible to me, since my opponent has a read on me, too, which depends on the outcome of my decisions. And since he knows that I have a read on him (though it might be wrong or he might have no idea, what my read on him looks like) and the cause for my decisions aren't solely my cards but my read on him as well, he has the advantage of this knowledge and is in a situation, where he can base his decisions on this advantage.

So if I want to win in situations like this, I think I have to use the fact I'm aware of this to my advantage. To do this, I don't only have to have a read on my opponent, but make also sure he has the read on me I want him to have. And I don't have the slightest idea how to acomplish this.

I apologize if this is the greatest bs ever posted. But I think that table image and handreading / creating reads are cruxial parts of this game that need to be constantly improved and I'd like to hear opinions and strategies on that subject from people who actually know what they're doing.