Staying off TILT

[casey_brick]

Looking for the best advice on how to stay of tilt. I can take one bad beat ok. However when I get into taking two or three I get really frustrated and start trying to "get back" the players that put them on me. I've tried just getting away from that table, but I know I can outplay the fish and chasers........Thoughts?

[AKQJ10]

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I've tried just getting away from that table, but I know I can outplay the fish and chasers in a counterfactual universe in which I'm not on tilt, which in fact I am........Thoughts?

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As my edits show, I think you've answered your own question. Certainly you should learn to limit your tilt, but it happens to us all. Just don't play while tilting, because no matter how big your edge would be if you were playing your best, it doesn't matter. YOU'RE NOT PLAYING YOUR BEST!

You wouldn't play roulette for real money, so why play when your opponent has an edge?

Now, to work on getting better at tilt without losing money tilting, that's tougher. Play lower? It might work, or the smaller money might not matter. Move your money so you can only get at a little of it, and keep playing telling yourself not to tilt? Maybe.

Read Psych forum too, every third thread is on tilt IIRC.

[Poker Plan]

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but I know I can outplay the fish and chasers

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So you being on tilt and trying to get revenge is better than what they are doing???

When will people realise that emotional control is as much part of the game as pot odds, etc???

If you are tilting because of the Mistakes YOU make, then that is one thing....

But if you are tilting because "Your Opponents are making mistakes" (read that again a couple of times)then you seriously need to examine and challenge your understanding of what makes a winning player.

Answer one question:

If you had the opportunity to NEVER suffer one single bad beat ever again, would you take it?

(Stop and think this through before answering)


Please take this post as constructive.
Lots of people post questions such as "I tilt bad, how can I stop"- the issue is very complex. Ypu'll have to do a LOT of work on this yourself. Tilt comes in an infinite numbers of flavours, for various reasons.

[SheridanCat]

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If you had the opportunity to NEVER suffer one single bad beat ever again, would you take it?

(Stop and think this through before answering)


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This is really an important and fundamental question, and it's one that every player who takes the game seriously needs to be able to answer.

Try to formulate an answer for yourself before looking at this thread.

[Chomp]

Tilting is the price young players pay for being young and mentally agile, but hormonal and mentally underdeveloped.

And anyone over 25 who tilts is a moron who needs to grow up.

[LandonM]

Tilt is nothing more than an external and immediate manifestation of a weakness that resides within your personality. Until you master tilt, you have not mastered yourself and until you can master yourself, you cannot possibly win at this game.

Be it in work, business, investing, relationships or any other realm of decision-making, the same thing that causes "tilt" at the poker table is what causes bad decisions elsewhere. If you are a "tilter" in poker, then you are a "tilter" in life and the spectrum of your personal achievement will show this.

[SheridanCat]

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Tilt is nothing more than an external and immediate manifestation of a weakness that resides within your personality. Until you master tilt, you have not mastered yourself and until you can master yourself, you cannot possibly win at this game.


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While I agree with the sentiment that LandonM and Chomp have expressed, I think they're being unrealistically dogmatic.

Yes, tilt will kill you as a poker player. There are countless examples of players who are otherwise excellent players beating themselves by giving into tilt. Learning to control emotions and understand the underlying positive aspects to "bad beats" is fundamental to being a winning player.

However, few people are able to reach that state. Much easier to achieve is an ability to honestly evaluate when you are beginning to tilt. Along with this, you must develop the mental discipline to get up from the game before tilt takes a toll.

Everyone will go on tilt, regardless emotional control mastery. The winners will be those who go for a walk to evaluate what happened -- away from the heat of the battle.

[Tommo777]

I agree - you have to know when to walk away from the table and cool off - too many bankrolls wasted by playing on tilt!

Its good though when you have a player like that on your table!

[Chomp]

Sheridan I don't agree that it is inevitable that everyone will tilt.

Hand on heart, I never tilt. Honestly, never. Sure, I might throw the cat across the room or kick the chair after a suckout, but I never let an ounce of that spill over onto the table. I believe that tilt is like all emotions - you learn to deal with it much better as you get older.

This is one of the few advantages older players have over younger ones (who otherwise hold all the cards, so to speak). It is kind of nature's way of evening up the equation.

Younger players learn quicker, are more mentally adroit, have better stamina, are full of unrestrained agression and self-confidence etc. Older players have better emotional control, can perhaps concentrate better over long sessions, tilt less often etc.

I can easily understand an 19 year old blowing their top at a bad beat and start pressing buttons in frutration. But equally, I can easily understand a middle-aged veteran quietly putting it down to "the long run", and just getting on with it.

[Poker Plan]

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[Learning to control emotions and understand the underlying positive aspects to "bad beats" is fundamental to being a winning player.

However, few people are able to reach that state.

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Surely the fact that few people can reach that state, is incentive enough to try and get there.

Personally, for me: I'm aiming to achieve this and have gone a long way down the path. I realised virtually at the start of my "poker career" that this was at the very centre of the game. So I made it part of my training to work on emotional control, along side the technical aspects.

For me, it's not going to be good enough if I have to resort to getting up and leaving the game because I'm steaming. If I'm steaming, then I haven;t grasped the concept of the game in the first place- so why am I bothering?


Ian