I have been exchanging some ideas with Luvdoinit. We are always talking about poker. A number of things he has said have set me thinking about the mindset of some of the people who play poker. He described how he has seen people in Las Vegas put their last few hundred dollars, or whatever, into slot machines on the morning before they leave. He said it is as though they have allocated a certain amount to lose, and just can’t bear to go home without losing that fun money. This is “slot machine mentality.” It comes from losers. It’s okay to be losers. We all are in our own way.

Putting another perspective on it, there was a documentary on British television about Las Vegas. One of the characters featured was an elderly doctor who went through millions sitting in a chair, just putting hundred dollar after hundred dollar into slot machines. She was asked about whether she was worried about losing so much and isn’t it bad to go through so much money like this. Her reply was that she enjoyed it, and she had plenty of money left anyway.

If you think about it, there are plenty of people in Vegas, Florida, or any affluent society, who have yachts and spend millions on expensive hobbies. I guess if you look at things like this, and treat poker as a hobby that you enjoy, then losing that money isn’t so important if you enjoy playing the game. It depends on how much happiness that money buys you. This is what I meant about us all being losers. We all spend money on hobbies. We don’t need to. We just do so because we enjoy them. It is about how much enjoyment we get from spending that money allocated for unimportant, fun things.

If you think of poker as a way of having fun, then fine, I have no problem with that. As Luvdoinit has suggested, if you do look at the game in this way, then allow yourself a certain amount of money to spend on the game per month, spend it, but no more than that. In this way you can protect yourself from losing too much and have fun at the same time.

But if you look at the game as a way to make money, you just cannot afford to have that attitude. I was sitting at the table with someone a couple of months ago who made me think about this. He threw in his last £30 on a JK all in, when there was very little in the pot. He was only going to get called by a much better hand and he knew it. He wanted to double through and was willing to take the worst of it to do so. It was a £25-£100 buy in with blinds of 50p/£1. He got called by someone with a better hand, but hit 3 kings on the 5 card flop and doubled through. “That’s the problem,” he said “I keep going up and down. When I’m down I keep making some back, but never enough to go in front.” I said “that’s okay to just break even. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. Then when you get a run of cards you end up in front.” But I knew he wasn’t going to listen. When he got down to a certain amount of chips he was going to throw them all in as underdog, and hope to double through again. It was almost inevitable he was going to lose his money. That’s what happened. But he didn’t seem too unhappy about this.

The same seemed to apply to nearly everyone at the table. They all HATED to leave with any chips. They were more than happy to just throw them all away with a 30 times the BB raise in the hopes of doubling through. I have been running really really badly lately. I drop down to the lowest level I can when this happens. I bought in for £50, which is not enough, but that is all I’m willing to risk when things are going badly. I played for over 2 hours and won one hand. I decided when the next table charge came around again, I was going to get up and leave with what I had left. That was £21.50 out of the £50. So I had lost £28.50. £10 of that was table charges), and as I got up to leave, an Asian standing behind me said in a surprised tone “you leaving?” “Yes that’s it,” I replied. I think he was stunned that I should play so long, lose so little and be satisfied with picking up what little I had left, and leave. He had been up and down for a while, had hit trip sixes at one point and built his stack to over £250. Yet he lost it all. He was more than willing to mix it up with borderline hands and not be bullied by massive raises. This either wins you a lot or loses you a lot. Generally I think it loses a lot. People lost several hundred in a few hours. This is quite normal. It isn’t as though the game is very fast and loose. It really isn’t that bad. It’s just people are willing to gamble a lot of money on borderline hands, which build big pots when the blinds are ony 50p/£1. They refuse to be “bullied” by massive raises and therefore go into pots with sub standard hands, and then can’t let that hand go beause the pot is so big. I have seen people even go through more than a thousand at that small level.

I practice what I preach. I play very safe. I consider what you don’t lose today you don’t have to win tomorrow. I understand why people have that mentality where they just HATE to leave chips on the table, but personally I hate it. I like to win. That’s the one reason I play. I HATE to lose. I don’t mind sitting through hours of total and utter boredom never playing a hand, because I know that when I do start to hit hands, I don’t have to win too much to be in profit. It is not a style that makes me a big winner or a champion. I am not. But it does make me a winner.