Book Nearly Done, Glad I'm Not a Pro Player, Merry Xmas

Well The Mental Game of Poker is nearly done, we are having a ‘cram week’ the first week of January to tie up the loose ends. Its took slightly longer than the original plan of April this year to finish it off, but in fairness Jared and I both maintained full time jobs instead of lightening the load for a short while, so in the respect and given that it’s a pretty involved book, it’s probably a success timing wise.

Spending 12 months essentially shadowing a sports psychologist who works with poker players has been amazing. I think most players would jump at the chance to do this, I certainly did, because the positive impact on one’s game was a shoe in. It was for me, Jared has cured me of several crippling poker leaks for which I am very grateful. But the biggest thing he has done for me was a huge surprise, he has freed me from poker.

I was the sort of player who couldn’t put poker down, I had to play most days, not for mega sick sessions, an hour a day was fine, but I had to play. Right now I have played one serious session in about 4 months and I couldn’t be happier about it. Poker will be there tomorrow and working with Jared has helped me go off in different directions. I think it’s helped my job at PokerNews which I am really loving right now and I am also reading a shit load.

Thankfully I still love the game, the industry and the people. I haven’t completely fell out of love with poker, merely having a hiatus from playing. The one thing this whole experience has opened my eyes to is how much I would hate to be a professional poker player now, the games are so much tougher and I fear for a lot of guys the wrong end of 30 who might have nowhere good to turn if poker went south for them.

The one thing I think ALL pro poker players should actively have is other interests and other ways to make money. The game is so vulnerable in a regulatory sense and a good player can become a bad player so quickly if they don’t work on their game, the game could leave a lot of people in the wilderness. Thankfully poker does open lots of doors and most of the people who make a crust from it are usually very intelligent.

Anyway, enough doom and gloom. I am off to the annual Christmas Eve jolly with the lads, I am not looking forward to Christmas Day at all as anyone who follows the blog will understand this year, but the Christmas Eve Bomber is always my favourite part of the festive period.