Winning and losing sessions

[Praxising]

Read The Poker Mindset. Solve problem. It says in this book that:

You are involved in a fanstasy that there is such a thing as more than one session. There is not. There is only one session. Sometimes it gets interrupted for sleep, or for other things. Then it continues. The players change, sometimes the venue, but it is all one long poker game.

No magic makes your chips less at risk the very next hand if you are in a "new session." Every hand is a new hand of the lifelong session.

Now, mess up the chips or cover up the part on the screen that has your chip count on it. There is no money, there's just this hand, this time, in one long game.

[PantsOnFire]

[ QUOTE ]
You are involved in a fanstasy that there is such a thing as more than one session. There is not. There is only one session. Sometimes it gets interrupted for sleep, or for other things. Then it continues. The players change, sometimes the venue, but it is all one long poker game.

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For many poker players, especially beginners but even experienced players, this may be the number two concept to grasp being right behind playing tighter.

[foal]

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Now, mess up the chips or cover up the part on the screen that has your chip count on it.

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Hah, don't do that! You need to know how many chips are in your stack to play properly.

[Piemaster]

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Now, mess up the chips or cover up the part on the screen that has your chip count on it.

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Hah, don't do that! You need to know how many chips are in your stack to play properly.

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Unless you are playing limit of course [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[quirkasaurus]

i don't see any problem with quitting early if you are ahead.

personally, i don't pay much attention to a winning / losing
session, i pay attention to:

if i'm up OR down at a table, and i feel like "i have NO CLUE
how these guys are playing!!" -- i leave.

if i know i'm playing good, up OR down, I stay.

i don't agree that there's "only this one hand" at all.
the longer you sit at a table, the more "meta-game" stuff
should start coming into play, ( seeing betting patterns, etc... )

i HAVE noticed that if i get considerably up at a table and
especially if i've been playing for a while, and i know i'm
getting tired and losing my focus, i do indeed start playing
like a complete moron. as soon as i detect this, i quit.
( may take a few horribly played hands and losses! )

jmtc ( new acronym -- "just my two cents"

[foal]

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Now, mess up the chips or cover up the part on the screen that has your chip count on it.

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Hah, don't do that! You need to know how many chips are in your stack to play properly.

[/ QUOTE ]

Unless you are playing limit of course [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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Oh yah. But you'll still need to reload sometimes. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[morphball]

Maybe it's more of a problem that you don't stop when losing?

There is nothing wrong with quitting a table when you have >= 10% of your bankroll on it and it's at risk.

[orange]

I have the same problem.

Some steps I do to change this is:

-play on different poker sites. This is the main one I think. Spread your money around so you have separate bankrolls. So if you run good at one site, leave it and go play another site (rinse/wash/repeat). I have my money spread across a few sites, and I know if I experience this hit-n-run session then I can always play another session somewhere else.

-Play many short sessions. ie. your up a lot, then you'll probably stop. Wait a few hours, evaluate, then start again. I usually play about 2 500 hand sessions or so, depending on how my game is going.

And, try to really avoid watching the cashier button. I know it's difficult but try and stop looking at it. (I can take some advice here too, I need to stop checking mine!).

[obiedman]

[ QUOTE ]
Maybe it's more of a problem that you don't stop when losing?

There is nothing wrong with quitting a table when you have >= 10% of your bankroll on it and it's at risk.

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this never happens. i'm actually very overrolled for the games i play.

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-play on different poker sites. This is the main one I think. Spread your money around so you have separate bankrolls. So if you run good at one site, leave it and go play another site (rinse/wash/repeat). I have my money spread across a few sites, and I know if I experience this hit-n-run session then I can always play another session somewhere else.

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this is an interesting idea, maybe i'll start doing this more. i have my money spread across different sites, but most are more for tournaments than cash. i'll give this a shot, thanks

[Unknown Soldier]

i came to this forum to post the exact same thing.


[ QUOTE ]
You are involved in a fanstasy that there is such a thing as more than one session. There is not. There is only one session. Sometimes it gets interrupted for sleep, or for other things. Then it continues. The players change, sometimes the venue, but it is all one long poker game.

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this is the rational point of view, and I'm pretty sure we are all aware of it. (If you aren't then you probably aren't a very serious poker player), but it's pretty easy to let emotions run us over. That's the problem.