Anyone can do a new year's resolution. To end the year with a bang, and to start off 2015 with a huge confidence boost. I will be doing the following, THIS YEAR from now to the end of it:
1) No booze. Yeah no alcohol whatsoever. I will go out with friends, I will spend time with haters (AKA family). But I will not touch a drop of alcohol in the process.
2) Excercise Session 7x per week - A session means at least an hour of excercise. Gym, Jogging, Home workout, Street workout, Floorball - everything counts. I am allowed to do 2 phase per day, swap e.g. morning cardio evening gym to allow for rest days.
3) 6hours of poker per day on average - self explanatory. Today after 17:00when I started included my target is 120 hours of poker between now and december 31st 12:00. No table or stake limit really although I won't play less than 4. Cash games only, tournaments don't count towards this.
bonus: no dirty movies of any kind
All this while spending at least 3 days with family. It Might mean I won't go out on New Year's Eve if I'm a pussy and don't end reasonably early.
My gym is open literally every day over the holidays so it won't force me to run in the snow or anything
If I manage this, 2015 resolutions will actually have a substance behind them, as I will know I have the discipline to do anything.
NO nutrition goals because Christmas. But I will eat healthy pretty much porridge breakfasts, BCAAs, eggs, tuna, vegetables. will eat some pasta and rice for cheap carbs, if I eat crap and don't get proper sleep I pretty much have 0 chance of completing it. I am allowed caffeine during this time.
I will post a before pic later today
Thoughts? I have a cold now, lasting some 3 months so it'll make it a proper tough challenge
I'm giving you 1:1 fun bet odds on this, max bet $20 per person. shipped @Stars at the end of the challenge. Just to keep it fun
spreadsheet will be updated, you can ask for a screen at any time.
PT4 sessions will be shown at the end to show hours.
I will record workouts to spreadsheet - basically will have to go by trust? can't think of any hard evidence. why I take max $20 so I don't have incentives to cheat.
So I was streaming for a while, watching dota streams alot (big SingSing fan), tendler's podcast, 2p2 pokercast. . . and also worked in Sales, and as you probably know I am pretty much an attention whore.
And an opportunity came up to do a podcast for Pokerstrategy. To make it easier the first episode was with Vonki, a fellow Microstakes player. Who happens to be a girl. It's a non-serious weekend show that's supposed to be fun, make the community more lively. I played SPin and goes in the first one and Pleno1/Pads, the guy who was a 1/2 reg and shot to 5/10 zoom and became one of the sickest MTTers within the last year joined for a while to talk about goals.
I got wasted the night before, using a focus group of my gf and couple friends to come up with ideas for the show, but I forgot that you also get hangover when you are drunk and I was affected quite a bit
Also didn't turn down Stars sounds enough so sorry if you will think action's on you if you grind while watching.
I'd love any feedback you have, and don't be surprised if I invite one of you LPers at some point if the show gets renewed, it would be kinda cool to make the theme gaming and poker parallels :D
Hello peoples.
Did you guys ever go through or consider one of them longer term staking+coaching deals?
What are the pros and cons of those?
There are people offering 60-90 chops with coaching even on 2p2, just wondering what you guys think about that.
I've had some unforseen real life expenses combined with a downer after a shot at nl50, even tho it's no issue I once again kinda have to play stakes lower than I beat comfortably because I'm a risk avoiding jew
Since I sent them out to test the waters, here's my results since depositing 50 bucks since coming back
This is Nov 2013-1st nov 2013 from $50 didnt save lines + Show Spoiler +
graph from 1st nov 2013 for 2013 when I started playign serious
bb 2013 + Show Spoiler +
A key thing from Canfield's book and his video is this a great mindset to have, at the poker tables or in life: Event+Your Reaction of the event = Outcome
Well no shit Sherlock you might say, but if you think about it and accept the mindset it only ever makes sense to always focus on the solutions and things you can change and virtually never worry/feel bad/even talk about events that happened that you have no control over. Like Variance. Or being broke. Or the news.
Basically it means you will be always positive, except when shit hits the fan and the best reactions also become hard and uncomfortable.
End of October got really hectic, I was hardcore hunting plat star, got it but got into the habit of eating junk food, drinking and constantly worrying about stuff, which led to procrastination, and basically I achieved my volume goal at around 80k hands and 7,500 VPP but It burnt me out a bit and I knew it's time for some good ol' improvement and change to get back on track. This is what I've been doing last few days, and what I will keep doing for the rest of the month - I am posting more to make a commitment to myself to better use the opportunity to a great life that poker gives me.
Now before you puke and turn away at this cheesy quote, bear with me people
Let's pretend we agree with this, and say "fuck it, today is today and I'm going to make it the best damn day possible"
If only it were this simple
Life is complicated. Let's start with...
The past.
Past events and emotions mold as as people, and constantly occupy our head space. That person you pissed off, the money you wasted, those mistakes you made, those unjust bad beats that happened to you, that relationship that fell off. All those things leave residue emotion that keeps coming back, like...regret?
If this wasn't bad enough there of course is The Future
More importantly, the human brain's natural tendency to project future events and estimate them. How will I pay my bills. How will I deal with that meeting I have in a week's time. How will I deal with these people about this "job" I have. What will I cook for dinner, when will I call that bank, when will I meet that chick.
The brain constantly worries, plans, estimates, in other words, it sucks you out of your presence and into the future.
But focusing on the present doesn't exactly mean that we will focus on what we are doing right now. For example you can worry about what other people think about you, invoke bad emotions when losing, think about spet's boobs thread etc.
If only there were a way to somehow dump all that worry about the future, past and the present, and enjoy what we are doing Right now in the moment, without worrying about other things.
Well, I am no life scientist? You guys tell me. I just came here to make a commitment, and tell you that for the remainder of the month I will do this one simple thing that should make living in the present easier.
Basically I know my goals which I thought about and written down after much thought few weeks ago. They are three and Poker and Fitness are the top2.
What
Now the thing I have been doing this week is super simple - 1) after waking up I sit down, think about all the things I can do that day that I should do, that are in line with those goals. And I dump them on a piece of paper. This includes stuff like cleaning, watching a video, gym etc. I pick the ones that are most important, I feel like/can manage that day and write them down. They do include fun tasks like planning a party or a beer with a friend, cinema, volunteering in the community...
2) Second step is breaking my day into manageable chunks. I used to do this for a while back in Scotland, and it's so incredibly simple that I have no clue why I stopped. - I break down my day based on Food
pretty much
Breakfast
Snack
Lunch
Snack
Dinner
Snack
Whether you believe in the science behind speeding up your metabolism by eating more frequently or not doesn't really matter. What this thing does is create natural time slots, broken down by a break filled by food.
If possible, by mindful eating as well where you concentrate on the food, which can act as almost a form of meditation, but it pulls you out of the routine for sure.
The activities that need to be done can be slotted into these time intervals, and/or you can have a list of them that you can do as you feel like.
The biggest thing that is losing me personally money is procrastinating on facebook, skype, etc. the idea is that you have both a schedule and a backlog of possible varied productive things you can do that you can focus on at all times. Variety is important, so having gym, poker related stuff and normal life related stuff like cleaning, street workout, beer with pals, visiting family or even a nap to always be in the mood is something I am aiming for.
here is an example from today. It's super simple, and a mix of Czech and English because, sadly, this is how my brain operates right now. + Show Spoiler +
rest is dedicated to grind. Why
When I did this for the first time this week, I wrote down 17 things I had to do before my head would be ready to focus on the present and I could go for poker properly. It took me 70% of the day.
The next day it took me 10% of the day and the best thing is it cleared tons of my head space - I messaged who I wanted to message to, arranged what needed to be arranged, cleaned what needed to be cleaned, and when I finally sat down at the tables the past, future and the present worry and distractions were muted down.
- The days feels like it has a purpose when you sit down, say today will be great and then plan it to be great.
- during the day you have nothing to worry about as you already planned in the morning. When you play, you play, when you are at the gym, you are at the gym. When you clean dishes, you clean dishes and don't worry about losing playing time.
- During the day it feels great to tick of what you set out for yourself in the morning. A sense of achievement floods your system with the attached chemicals that boost your mood even though you just managed a banality like buy a new outfit.
- At the end of the day, when you finished what you needed to you again feel great, and the day had a purpose no matter if you won or lost at the tables. You made a plan, stuck to it, focused when it counted and there is nothing more you could have done.
Except when you wake up the next day, see it as a new opportunity and improve on what can work better and what will make it great.
The beautiful thing about poker
is that Youmake the day. You have the burden and the opportunity to make it great. There is no schedule. There is no boss telling you what to do. It really is a blank canvass that you can fill however the hell you want.
And for me personally it's time to grab that brush and start to make the painting that people call today if not great, then at lest meaningful.
Hey guys, It's been over a month since last update.
September was well...less than stellar. The heater had to end at some point though, it was a blast during the summer though, drinking multiple times per week, holiday, gym almost daily.
This is September:
65 hours is something I got somehow used to but is awfully low of course.
Oh well at least I managed to
Join a gym
-7 mnutes from my flat, there's multiple climbing walls, training area, and it's in a squash centre with squash, table tennis, tanning beds ...all a man needs
It's like $25/month too, and I've been going 5x per week on average.
Be ill for over half the time
Yeah I have a cold since like the first day I arrived in here, can't shake that sun'bitch got almost used to it now. workouts
The thing about Prague is that there's all I need, loving the variety so far. There's the same organized group as in my last town that do street workouts, help local communities etc. There are people that are trying to excercise, don't drink live by solid principles like no violence, drugs etc. have goals. A lot of people are really young there so I definitely want to stay involved. What's not so good about Prague is the distances and how fragmented stuff is - the last town I was in had 100k people, everyone exercised in the same place at the same time where here it takes me even 70 minutes to get to training and people keep switching, creating small groups etc. Everything is way less personal and tight-nit in other words.
Restarted meditation+ mindfullness
Yeah so last time I really got to Zen and philosophy it turned into a huge clusterfuck where I started to read about science, Buddhism, thought about perspective and meaning of life, and the irrelevance of our day to day lives and goals and I realized that I had to stop.
In today's world filled with petty goals and arbitrary values you kind of have to give in, chase the illusions and create your own and use and manipulate your ego into wanting things as opposed to just trying to be a realist and switching the ego off.
Nevertheless, I got back to meditation, joined a local non religious one first and it was boring and ppl were really at the start of it all so I went to Zen instead, listened to Tommy Angelo's eight fold path on Mindfulness some 8 times but I've decided that this time around I will use meditation for the practical use of calming my mind, understanding feelings, and focusing on the present moment, and completely drop the philosophical part and searching for the meaning of self.
There's nothing as great as taking a bad beat 5 times in a row, closing eyes, mindfully counting to 10 and not giving a fuck about it all of a sudden
Floorball
I immediately joined a local club's reserve team and trained 2x per week. I was immediately noticed and was asked if I'd join em for first team practice sometimes.
To be honest this is one of the things I am unsure about. Training takes me from about 7:30pm to 11:30pm 2x per week in the reserve team, every other weekend I'd have a day or two with games, and the first team practices even more than that. It also tires me out quite a bit and since I am a goalkeeper the social contact is not as great as during street workouts, and not as time effective as the gym. Still it's something I am good at so will probably keep going on and off. It's not a priority for me though.
Poker
Because of the heater my development's stalled a bit. Really I had a blast drinking a ton working on fitness, doing floorball, family etc. but theose 60 ish hrs per month became norm. Which was fine when I took it as holiday, abysmal when I want to get better and make this a proper career since I wasn't learning very much at all either.
I was spewing since the move, and was playing rly well before it but kinda forgot a lot of what I was doing well, started losing and spewing in Prague. There's tons of thing I need to learn, I revisited Mathematics of poker, started watching videos again, posting hands as you have noticed and was talking to some great people from LP - I am really grateful for every comment you have, even when I am tilted and reply with a dickish attitude. I watched a video on RiO, Uri Peleg said it in his strategy battle, Tommy Angelo stresses this but humility and being able to step back and evaluate what others are saying instead of automatically defending yourself is still one of the things I struggle with. But hey, that's because I am human
I moved down to 16 cause of cashouts+badrun but now im back at 25, dabbling into zoom again.
From now on I will prioritize poker a lot more, so far I had lots going on, I had often just 1-2 full days for poker gym and learning per week - super low of course.
My sleep regime got distorted, was ill, a lot etc. So considering all that, fuck it... I did pretty well :D
The expenses are higher in Prague and I'm starting to think about the future too so I am putting my foot on the pedal and Poker will be the highest of my priorities again, and I will treat most choices as poker choices - what'll make me a better player, starting from exercise, what I eat, what I watch how much I sleep etc.
Especially Nutrition and the timing of it will be my focus. So far I have been very roughly focusing on macros, healthy options etc. But Lefort's reply made me rly think
I read neuroposychology of poker and the importance of balancing serotonin dopamine etc. because of mood and focus and what you eat and how much has a large impact on those
+ blood sugar levels need to be balanced.
If you guys have any tips on not only how to eat healthy, but how to time specific macros and foods for a 10am gym, 12:00-23:00 grind and learning schedule I'd greatly appreciate it.
Also I might do a video or a coaching sesh for POkerstrategy soon, that'd be awesome. Even tho with the downer and focusing on life instead of poker past few months I lack the confidence that I'd be able to give people much gf
She found my blog. Oops. It's really strange now- for over 10 years the Starcraft and poker worlds have been completely separate from that thing people call real life. So it was sort of my diary where I could spew whatever I wanted and nobody in real life would find out. My last GFs or anyone else didn't give a toss about what I do really, so it's kind of flattering but also means no more secrets from the dirty corner of my mind, sorry boys
On the bright side we had lots of fun reading through Floofy's posts though you are a genius sir.
It's not the easiest thing in the world to get schedules aligned, she's busy and so am I with the evening activities. On the other hand, I really like the fact that she's successful and has lots going on and I don't have to feel that I'm neglecting her or anything when I focus on poker and exercise - It seems +EV for sure, we do stuff that I would hardly do alone that take my mind off the grind, e.g. went for a "blind exhibition" in complete darkness where a blind person (or so he claimed ) takes you on a tour across a flat, street etc,, did some fun stuff like dinner parties, food festival, table tennis, now spent 2 full days without any poker or computer in her village.. It's fun planning stuff, and even when poker wasn't going my way I felt great in life cause of gym, and stuff we do together.
Our objective now is to make the best decision on every action in every hand, and continuously strive, both on and off the tables, to ensure we accomplish that task to the best of our ability. By altering our definition of success and consistently improving, increasing and diversifying our efforts, we can reach new heights.
I think I have been focusing too much on making my life great through poker, and poker went a bit too much in the background, and now it's time to tip the balance poker's way once more. But hey- still a good read if you are on the grind too much side of the fence.
Sup people.
So yeah I met this girl in Prague at the wedding yeah... You guys said don't be dumb call her yada yada
I did, seen her 2 times afterwards and then she emailed me that a friend pulled out of a holiday in Bulgaria, it;s her and another couple and if I wanna go. Snapcall innit. Here is the pics.
Got a bet about who can get a signed band member...
she won...
but I got it 2 days later too. Almost fell on their apparatus in the process, I was wasted every night
Neon party last night...leaving hotel 6:30, photo taken at 3am
Well that was the holiday.
Couple days before the holidays I lost my flat in Liberec, Landlord couldn't get me normal internet in 12 months, always was here like 4times per month, and a year is a good time to move... And there's a room in Prague for $300 incl. all bills good location in a flat where my younger sister stays and mum rents...And it's 3km from her flat. So in a couple weeks I'll be moving to Prague to pursue proper pokers. Summer is almost done and with it getting bombed 3-4 times per week.
Stay cool LP
After I move I will finally have proper fucking internet so I can start streaming for realz..
Also follow https://twitter.com/LemonOwns
if you want I try to update that here and there with poker stuffs
P.S. it's been pretty much exactly 1 year since I arrived in czech republic.
BEFORE - last August.
AFTER
Yep, I became a douchebag.
P.P.S. no fap challenge = 61days no fap no porn. With 1 exception before holidays (3 times in 1 day no aids aka porn needed even ).
Saturday-that wedding.
Monday -shitfaced, talk about wedding, falied chat up bartender, home 4am
Tuesday - 2 beere, chill
Wednesday - 4pm go for one beer, 6am come home after heavy clubbing - pal got engaged
Saturday (today) - go for one beer, then to local club in my hometown. Got wrecked again. Home 7am
-plus managed 7 times gym in 7 days, one 2 phase day one rest day :D
Dunno where this productivity comes from
Prolly no fap for over a month+TI4 over+shitloads of low weight high rep gym+sprints+taking multi vit supps+BCAAs+meditate (esp when drunk, sooo much fun bitches poking into you+you ignoring them :D)but I'm this testosterone fuelled rage monster. I'm at 84kg, 103 when I got here 10 months ago fuck yeah :D
Loving it really
Chicks are fucking racist man, the moment you get fit suddenly so many want you out of nowhere. My childish charm was here all along...Hello... Why can't the fat race prevail? oO
Well...thanks for reading.
I mean
Week was crazy as fuck...decent volume too.
Prolly won't be able to keep it up tho :D
Here you go guys promised reposted report from that VIP party I went to in Prague with PS. around 40 poker players (1female + 1 wife )
The day has finally arrived, my first Pokerstrategy VIP party.
This was me meeting any online regs for the first time ever for that matter. Since I started in 2009. Thanks to my now worldwide recognized victory in the PS HU Championship and my freshly acquired diamond status I made the list.
Damn you dota that took 2 weeks off my grind this month else I'd go to Wroclaw as well
First order of business still in my home located town about an hour on the victory bus away from the glorious capital was quite naturally The Gym because granted some of the players were expected to be better than me, but DO THEY EVEN LIFT?
I've arrived 75 minutes too early, just to be sure. I decide, quite naturally to meditate on a bench next to some local homeless gypsies for half an hour because granted some of the players were expected to be better than me, but are they ZEN even?
I've mindfully observed the local muff passing by and also a large pigeon performing a mating dance next to a female pigeon. Dude scored and they pigeon french kissed. Foolproof way to pickup females for the inevitable night club appearance later? Acquired.
The meeting point was ingeniously selected as "Franta's cafe". It wasn't a cafe at all, at least not for several generations it hasn't been. It looked more like this
Thank you Jesus for making me a douche bag and wearing a stars black chip hoodie - One of the Czech Community freelancers has thankfully approached me. We've become great friends since then, but naturally I have no clue what his name was anymore
Then, finally we've approached the main group of poker players. Obviously I have been expecting a massive flock of nerds with spots and nerd glasses, but the reality couldn't be further from that assumption. This was the coolest looking group of men and women ripped with muscle and haircuts executed by Justin Bieber's very own hairdresser. I have naturally snatched a picture for you guys
Finally we were off to the place of the event. It was a place beyond Prague in the middle of nowhere with abandoned buildings around. It looked like we are going to become stars and make a continuation of this piece of art, but actually in real life .
That did not transpire, and instead we were graced with a beautiful view of an ancient castle where the food and drinks would be served. It actually turned out that someone has built this castle 12 years ago from scratch, because why the fuck not, making it four times younger than the chick I hooked up with later that night, but I am getting ahead of myself here.
What happened inside is a word of legend now - a magnificent feast, anything your taste buds could desire was there - pork goulash, pork roast, cooked pork, more pork. I could go on.
The conversations were sharp, the moods were high and many intellectual topics were attacked from all angles, I learned many many things that night like:
1) FL still exists, and people make money at it. Christuff and FirstTsunami are basically rock stars at this ancient form that many thought waslong lost in history, along with Atlantis. They even received praise from fanboys all night long.
2) Pointless theory arguments irl drunk are just like your usual skype group and forum clusterfucks. Except you are actually cool when you're power drinking and all people at the table are nerds as well. About 65% of the time, I won these every time by the way.
3) Two people in the room, me and FirstTsunami come from Starcraft background, with elky and Grrr... also playing this proves you can't achieve greatness unless you have said background.
4) When Germans and polish get shots of vodkas, they say "cheers" drink half of it gently, say "cheers" half an hour later and gracefully finish the second part of the shot, even slower that time.Up until that point I was not aware men in those countries get blessed with gentle female organs upon birth.
5) People have not really even heard of liquidpoker. Even the guy that played starcraft was like "team liquid oh yeah of course I know team liquid what kind of a question is that". And had no clue that liquidpoker might be related. Of course I've tried to convince folk it's the best forum in the wrld
After moods were powerfully enhanced by rich fibre, quality carbohydrates and the perfect mix of B vitamins contained in served free beer served we moved over to a retro arcade to compare skills. I destroyed everyone at Tekken 3, and even induced tears in some people's eyes. With Jin Kazama and one buttons when he does that totally op spin. There were Dance offs ( I din't beat anyone, but got the highest subjective artistic marks. From myself.) I almost managed to kill the T rex female in Jurrasic park, no big deal.
Around 11pm with our nerdy sides, shot drinking and poker argument sides satisfied the bus has returned us back to the capital. The night did not end there though. After the Czech community folk departed for some local club, us 3 English speakers headed off to Karlovy Lazne, to score some strange. This club was dubbed "shit with 13y olds" by the locals from pokerstrategy, but we paid no attention to those haters. As literally countless scientific studies have shown* Poker players are the most desirable group of people to the other sex known to man - and with less of them there we had better chance at scoring.
The average age was actually 18, all foreign chicks there. Immediately I went in to test a hypothesis of a couple cheesy pickup lines, and went to use the surefire way to score that macho pigeon taught me earlier. I tried hard to balance my ranges by
- hitting on 16y olds
- hitting on fatties
- hitting on hotties
- hitting on the same chick twice in a row with the same line without knowing
- telling chicks I hate them but my pal told me I'm wrong
When all seemed lost and frankly in theory hot dumb 18y olds are the dream but it just wasn't the case anymore I have decided to widen my range considerably and approached a group of women in their 40s, just for a laugh. Now as you might recall earlier in the story where I was telling you about the age of that castle - that didn't end there
She was around 20, with about 23 more bonus years of experience on top of that as well, and I totally love her and would have babies with her, except she already has two . One of them almost the same age as me of course
And we are meeting again at some point :D
After the club I had 1 hour until the first metro, so I naturally sat down in drunk meditation at Charles Bridge, and even got photographed by someone, possibly by a journalist creating a masterpiece on homless people of Prague.
After that I got lost obviously, but luckily 2 chicks I strongly complimented by calling them "semi-hot" (which they didn't appreciate for some reason?) and some Irish fanboy who said he was a bronze star showed me the way.
I made it still heavily steaming to my 90year old great aunt's flat at 6am to her great delight, and fell asleep, happy, and satisfied, thinking of my antique lady.
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...all a man needs
. 
