SMART POKER PLAYERS LEARN FROM LOSING

We all lose.  Losing is, unfortunately, one part of the game which we may not understanding fully.  Poker is a gambling game.  And if you have played long enough, you could have run bad for days, weeks or even months.  It happens.  You may feel that you are playing well and that your opponents are pulling one and two outers  way too frequently. But, what can you do?  You are getting your money in good.  And you are getting called by weak players. It's what you want.  Sure, you had a 94% chance of winning the hand after the flop.  Your opponent caught runner, runner and made a straight.  He did have a 6% chance of getting there.  But, how many times is this going to happen?  And why is it happening right now?  Why can't I win like I use to?  Is the spirit world ganging up against me?

Emmet Fox said, "It is the Law that many difficulties that can come to you at any time, no matter what they are,  must be exactly what you need at the moment, to enable you to take the next step forward by overcoming them.  The only real misfortune, the only real tragedy comes when we suffer without learning the lesson."  We have to learn from losing or the losing is nothing but losing.

Are you making mistakes?  Bad calls?  Bad raises? Playing too many weak hands hoping to get lucky on the flop?   We learn when we make mistakes. That is, the smart players learn by the mistakes they make.  They reflect back. They replay hands over in their mind.  Do you do this?  Do you write down all the ways you should have played a hand you lost?  If you do not do this, maybe you should?  If you want to be a winning player for life, you will have to learn to analyze your losing hands.  Why did you lose?  You could have played the hand differently.   Did you disregard obvious tells of your opponent?  Could your results have changed?  Most likely. 
There are countless pro poker players who were once bad players.  They learned a lot from losing and became winners.  You can do the same.  Smart poker players learn from losing.  If we do not learn, then we are destined to be losers.  And that is not the road to bliss.

Coming soon in August 2018:   How to Become an A+ Student at Poker:  Study Techniques to Master Any Game for Peak Performance.  Get your copy at MitchFreeland.com.