BigDonkey's blog

I was thinking recently about what distinguishes succesful poker players from the bad ones. What is the most important trait for being good at poker?
As many good players have indeed pointed out in the past, it is how you cope when the variance is not in your favor. In other words it's not that hard to play good when you run good, but to play good when you run bad. At least for me, this is perhaps the most important part of the poker mastery. Knowing what are the right plays in a given situations, outplaying the "weaker" opponents, etc. - none of this can help you when you lose every coinflip, when your opponents hit their 2,3,4 outers most of the time and you lose your focus and go for bankroll destroying tilt which can easily cover multiple sessions. Even if you are poor player with poor skill just by good table selecting and consistent strategy even if you run bad, you will be more profitable than 10 times better players who cannot control their tilt.

The single most important way how to eliminate the consequences of running bad is to not pay any attention to winrate. Not just treating the chips as chips and not real money for which you can buy this and that, but to completely honestly doesn't give a fuck if you are winning or losing the chips. Focus on every other aspect of the game from physical and mental readiness, through table and seat selection to actual betting decisions in each hand situation.

And this guys, in my opinion is the most important aspect of the game and the key to become succesful at poker. It is also the most difficult to master.(No success here yet)
Everybody knows this, most think - Duh, sherlock, but knowing and doing are 2 different things and it's never bad to be reminded of this repeatedly.

Let me end this article with quoting my friend's comment about his tilt:

"When in tilt and playing 6 tables, I go allin with complete crap, because I bluff everything and what is best, that I don't even know that I'm in a hand I realize when the pot is 100bb and I have complete air and try to take it down somehow"