Internal Poker Battles: Get Out Of Your Own Way

By Author: suzanne james
Total Articles: 6
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Every poker player fights internal battles at some point. It's inevitable, even for the most famous names in the game. What most professional players know (and have learned over time) is that we can get in our own way while playing poker, so they do their best to know themselves and to be comfortable with who they are when they sit down at the table. Not being able to do this probably defeats more amateurs and beginners than any luck of the draw or bad beat ever will.

It's not absolutely necessary to be a quiet, contemplative genius like Chris Ferguson. You don't have to be a more outgoing and jovial sort of player, like Daniel Negreanu. Waiting until you are a father time poker legend like Doyle Brunson definitely isn't the key to success in the world of Poker. He built his success by playing poker well for decades. But along with experience and poker smarts a successful poker player must be satisfied with himself as a person to ensure long-term success.

Of course, there is the basic concern of playing with scared money. This really isn't as much an internal battle as some other psychological traits. It should ...
... be relatively easy to understand that the money we're playing cards with is needed to pay bills or is not needed to pay bills. However, some people do wage this war. It's one of the more common internal battles for gamblers and professional bettors in any game. Entire books have been written in an attempt to help people understand what scared money really is and to help them deal with the issue.

When a player tries to come to grips with some of the voices and demons that keep him or her from poker success, it may be necessary to dig into one of Schoonmaker's books (Your Worst Poker Enemy for example). If uncertainty and suspicion are consuming you, maybe you should try to get a handle on things behind the scenes so to speak. Read Dirty Poker or one of the few other books that pull back the curtain.

On a personal note, I have struggled with some early exits at Hold ‘Em tournaments that greatly increased my paranoia. A few lightning bolts on the turn or river have shown me the door much earlier than I would have liked. My internal battles have included the age-old Why is this happening to me? debate. I have also found that an opponent sitting right next to me has gone deeper into a tournament by playing aggressively, when I am not comfortable with that style of play. This led me to question not only my playing style but also to look at who I was in other areas of my life. I was conservative on a consistent basis and aggressive at rare but necessary times. But would this help me win at my favorite games of Hold ‘Em and Seven-Card Stud?

No one has all these answers. But you can bet that most of the professional poker players who find themselves in a zone when they are playing have all but eliminated those internal battles for the moment.