How have you taken advantage of being a poker pro?

[turnipmonster]

nice post, james. I once wrote a song called truth and consequences and never figured out where I had originally heard the title, maybe a sign for that town!

for me, since I've always had poker to fall back on I haven't ever worried about taking long breaks from work. by far the most fun was a 2 month cross country road trip my wife and I took in 2005. we stayed with friends and camped whenever we could. it was a great way to see the country and spend time together. definitely something I'll remember for the rest of my life. since then we've gone on a bunch of camping trips and are looking forward to more (including rockygrass festival in colorado)!

another fun thing I did was take the summer off work and was a street musician in a trio, we played all over europe (sax, guitar and upright bass!). we had a blast, really one of the best times of my life. a little after that I went on a real tour of europe with an established group and it wasn't half the fun, although it was cool play some big shows.

[Entity]

Since I discovered poker quite a bit later in life than most of the players here (I'm 27 now, and didn't start playing until after college), poker has mostly been a pragmatic thing for me. It's helped me pay off a lot of debt, pay for a wedding last September, and buy a house.

The biggest thing that it's allowing me to do right now is work on starting a coffeeshop with my wife. It's something that she's been doing for years -- managing and working as a barista (no, not at Starbucks) -- and an industry that both she and I love.

I'm definitely hoping it doesn't completely fade away in the short term, but even if it has, it's been a great thing.

Rob

[TheWorstPlayer]

[ QUOTE ]
Since I discovered poker quite a bit later in life than most of the players here (I'm 27 now, and didn't start playing until after college), poker has mostly been a pragmatic thing for me. It's helped me pay off a lot of debt, pay for a wedding last September, and buy a house.

The biggest thing that it's allowing me to do right now is work on starting a coffeeshop with my wife. It's something that she's been doing for years -- managing and working as a barista (no, not at Starbucks) -- and an industry that both she and I love.

I'm definitely hoping it doesn't completely fade away in the short term, but even if it has, it's been a great thing.

Rob

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm in the exact same boat (let's get together!) in terms of age, stage of life, and when i started playing poker. I've never put in that many hours, or moved up that much in stakes, so I'm still basically a very part-time mid-stakes grinder. But poker has allowed me to pay for a beautiful wedding, buy a gorgeous engagement ring, go on an incredible honeymoon, buy a near-perfect condo, and go on fun vacations every year with my wife. So it hasn't really let me do anything that I wouldn't have done anyways, probably, but it has allowed me to do all of the things that I wanted to do a lot nice and better.

[AJackson]

Didn't read this thread first time around. Inspirational stuff.

I'm older than most (37) and already had a career going as a custom home builder when I started getting serious about poker. Poker has always been a very nice addition to my income, enough to live on if I had to, but not enough to pull me away from my company.

This year my poker income has become several times my regular income which has me considering a similar lifestyle of some of the posters in this thread. I'm not married, no kids and really not very materialistic, so I don't have a ton of stuff tying me down.

Even though I'm a bankroll (and lifestyle) nit, I find it a scary thought living only on poker. On the other hand, I've spent my entire adult life workign my ass off, why not see the world for a couple of years? What's the worst that could happen?

Hopefully I'll find the balls in the next year to make the jump.

[TheWorstPlayer]

Sounds like you could always fall back on your career. Why don't you take time off to travel and do whatever you want and then play poker as much or as little as you want. Play more if you want more money, play less if you want less stress and more free time.

[JSchnett]

Made enough money to pay for college while still in HS.
Never had a real job.
Traveled to New York, San Diego and Vegas.
Never worry about money and started investing for the future.

[Justin A]

James I've always envied all the travel you've been able to do.

How long are you gonna be out here for the WSOP?

[geormiet]

-I moved to costa rica for half a year.

-I started going to culinary school, which has been a lifelong dream.

[adsman]

Great thread James.

Poker came along at just the right time to supplement my slightly out-of-the-ordinary lifestyle. I've worked as a rafting guide since 1995 and in early 1999 I moved to Uganda to work on the White Nile. An absolute dream job but for the fact that literally days before I arrived a whole bunch of tourists that had only gone rafting the week before got hacked to pieces by some Conglonese rebels. Really heavy stuff.

So overnight we went from 5-6 trips a week to 1-2. We had a sweet setup in Kampala, the big luxury expat house with live-in servents etc, but you still need some cash to play with. I got involved with an expat holdem poker game. There were guys who worked in the UN and other crazy jobs. One night the US defence secretary for East Africa sat down with us. Nobody really knew how to play and I had discovered Planet Poker. So during the day I practiced on the free money tables and at night I tried out plays that I had been working on. It was a no limit game and I did well enough to have a really good time in Africa.

I got fired from my job over a political power-play and had to get out of the country fast. Took a flight to London with about $400 in my pocket and ended up rafting in Italy where I settled down to a good wicket. Raft in the summer for five months and play poker online in the winter while learning to snowboard. It's now seven years later and I'm still here. I've winded down the online poker as it doesn't hold me as it used to. I still think that the games are good but I much prefer to play live. So I pop over to Ljubljana every now and then and have fun with the crazy's over there.

I'm just in the process now of setting up my own nightclub here in the Italian Alps with the opening date set for June. I have to say that without poker a lot of this might not have been possible.

ads.

[imitation]

Lived in China, did unreasonable amounts of drugs and alcohol. Didn't travel nearly enough but got to see parts of China and Thailand. Not really a shining spot in my life because I'm broke now, however it still was a hell of a ride.