Poker Blogs

Been reading through half of the book, and it's really good. So I thought I'd list down most of the important stuff I've been through so far (Most for my own benefits).

Understand and Accept the Realities of Poker

- You need to understand the Five Realities of Poker, but more important you need to accept them. The Five Realities of Poker are:

1. Poker is a game of both skill and luck.
2. In the short term, luck is king.
3. In the long term, skill is king.
4. Poker is a game of small edges.
5. Poker is a game of high variance.


Play for the Long Term

- If you are looking to make money from poker, you need to play for the long term and accept the short-term risks.
- A player who puts too much emphasis on his short-term results will be prone to the following errors:

- Playing to get even
- Protecting a win
- Tilting
- Getting mad at bad players
- Making rash changes to his game


Emphasize Correct Decisions over Making Money

- The big advantage of playing poker for the long term is that you can focus on the only thing that is important: making correct decisions.

- "correct play" is defined as the best play you could reasonably be expected to make given the information you have available.

- If you make correct decisions, your short-term results are irrelevant as you will make money in the long term.


Desensitize Yourself to Money

- It is difficult to make correct decisions at the table if you are scared to lose the money in front of you.

- You could fall into a number of traps by playing scared:
- Not protecting your hand properly
- Not value betting your good hands enough
- Playing too tight
- Not calling enough in big bet poker
- Not bluffing enough

- Two factors tend to contribute to how likely you are to play scared:
1. How strong is your bankroll?
2. What is your attitude to money?


Leave your Ego at the Door

- Your ego may lead you into several traps at the table, the following eight being the most common:
1. You might call bets that you shouldn't.
2. You might allow a personal feud to cloud or override your judgment.
3. You are likely to try too hard to get even.
4. You might play in games you can't beat.
5. You might make plays to impress your opponents.
6. You might not drop down a limit when you should.
7. You could inadvertently give away information to your opponents.
8. You might scare away players who you would rather stay.



Remove All Emotion from Decisions

- Many players let emotion affect their poker decisions, yet emotions should have no impact whatsoever on the decisionmaking process.

- Emotions can cause you to make sub-optimal plays that you would not otherwise make.

- Many types of emotions can affect your game such as anger, frustration, misery, fear, happiness, pity, pride and nervousness.

- A poker player has two defenses against his emotions:
1. Do not play when you are in an emotional state that may cause your play to suffer.
2. Acknowledge your emotions, but don't allow them to affect your decisions.


Dedicate Yourself to a continuous cycle of Analysis and improvement

- In order to ensure long-term success at poker, you must commit to an ongoing program of analysis and improvement.

- If you stop learning at poker, not noly will you not improve, but your game is likely to regress.

- There are many reasons why long-time players might become less keen on learning over time, including:
- Complacency
- Illusions of mastery
- Loss of enthusiasm
- Stagnation

- Top players may disagree on many things, but the one thing thta they will voice resounding agreement on is that they are still learning.



Oh crap lol, it got a lot longer than I thought it would, still got like 3/4 of the book left, I'll take more later lol. Wanna eat, my eggs are getting cold xD

Overcoming Your Instincts


Actions and Reactions

- In poker, the link between action and reaction (or in this case, between decision and results) can be difficult to identify.

- Just because you are winning does not mean you are playing well, and just because you are losing does not mean you are playing badly.

- In poker, the laws of action and reaction do apply, but in a very different way than in everyday life. The results of your actions will be extremely volatile in the short term to the point where they are almost not worth worrying about.

- Make sure that when you make a link between poker play and its results, you are looking at the result of many, many trials.



Setting Goals

- Broadly speaking, setting poker goals for yourself can be good, but they should never be monetary targets. There are three important reasons why:

1. You have limited power to achieve monetary goals.
2. Conclusions are difficult to draw when you miss a monetary target.
3. Monetary targets detract from your true goal (making correct decisions).

- Setting goals in poker is important, but they should fulfill two important criteria:

1. You need to have the power to directly achieve the goal
2. The goal must not conflict with or detract from your ultimate aim of making the best decision as often as possible.


Is "Average" Acceptable?

- If you are an average player at poker, then you are losing money. Poker is one endavour where average is simply not good enough.


Risk Aversion

- No matter what attitude a poker player has toward risk in his everyday life, he must adopt a risk-neutral attitude when sitting at the poker table.

- A player who tries to play poker in a risk-averse manner may be prone to the following:
- Chasing opponents out of pots too often
- Not value betting enough
- Playing in less-profitable games


Greed

- When playing poker, you need to get rid of all pretenses that greed is a bad thing. Greed is not only acceptable when playing poker, it is vital.


Woolly thinking

- Woolly thinking is any line of thought that contains a logical flaw - any deduction that, when you break it down, does not make sense. The problem when playing poker is that every bit of woolly thinking will cost you money.

- Some types of woolly thinking in poker include:
- Considering irrelevant variables
- Misunderstanding probability
- Results-based thinking
- Spurious regression
- Acting on principle
- Superstition


Summary

- It is important that you break out of the pre-programmed thinking patterns and develop a new kind of intuition that we call the Six Truths of Poker Intuition:

1. Actions and reactions are only tenuously linked.
2. Setting short-term monetary goals is counter-productive.
3. Average is not an acceptable standard in poker.
4. Risk neutrality is the only acceptable attitude to risk.
5. Greed is good.
6. Clear logical thought is required.


*Stretches fingers!!*

Essential Attitudes for Poker Success


- The hands that have a big emotilnal impact are those where you lose a big pot.


What happens When You Lose a Big Pot?

- How much losing a large pot affects you depends on several factors, including:

- How big the pot is
- How good you felt your chances were of winning the pot
- How you lost the pot
- How your session or recent results have been going
- Whether it is in a tournament or cash game
- How adequately bankrolled you are
- Your attitude

- When you look at all of these factors combined, you can see why it is difficult for many players to tune out their emotions completely.

- Fortunately, what is really important is not how much losing a big pot affects you emotionally, but how it affects your play.

- Beware of the following pitfalls that may snare a player who has recently lost a big pot:

- Berating your opponent
- playing the next hand badly
- Playing badly in similar situations in the future
- Tilt


Reaction to losing a Big Pot

- There are four stages in how players react to losing a big pot:

1. Anger
2. Frustration
3. Acceptance
4. Indifference

- Each stage represents a better reaction than the last.

- Players at later stages will be better able to rationalize the loss of a big pot and not allow it to affect their play.


Applying the Poker Mindset

- A player might read and understand the four stages to losing a pot, but still be unable to consistently react in a way congruent with stages three or four. There are two main reasons for this:

1. Emotions are difficult to control.
2. His entire approach to poker might be wrong and everything goes awry from there.

- Understanding the seven attitudes of the Poker Mindset can help correct your approach to poker, which in turn will help you to respond better when you lose a big pot.

- Whenever you lose a big pot, rather than focusing on your emotions, focus on these two important questions:

1. What does that hand teach me about my opponent's play?
2. Could I have played that hand better?


Bad Beats

- Broadly speaking, there are three ways you can lose a pot:

1. Bad Play
2. Bad Cards
3. Bad Beat

- The average player gets angrier over bad beats than over any other kidn of lost pot. Some of the reasons for this include:

- Entitlement - Players with a strong hand will often (subconsciously or otherwise) belive they are entitled to the pot.

- Rewarding Bad Play - For the myopic player, bad beats are seen to reward bad play.

- Directed Anger - Anger is often stronger when there is something for the anger to be directed at.


- Bad beats are the best way to lose a pot as you make money in the long term when your opponents make mistakes:

- Bad play makes you money in the long term
- Bad beats keep bad players playing
- Bad Beats encourage bad play by rewarding it
- A good player will take more bad beats than he gives
- Bad beats are an integral part of the game

- Bad beats are a good poker player's best friend!

Essential Attitudes for Poker Success


Running Badly

- A downswing is a period when a player earns significantly less than their expected win rate over a number of sessions.

- The high variance in poker makes it inevitable that you will suffer sustained losses from time to time. These will not be rare, freak occurrences, but something that most players have to put up with regularly.


The Reality of Downswings

- Downswings are not an entity in themselves, but an observed pattern in results.

- A common error is trying to assign downswings properties, such as giving them a fixed size, shape, or frequency.

- Many players try to define downswings in the present or future tense. They are trying to predict future events based on past results, which is impossible.

- Unfortunately, the psychological pressure of running badly for a sustained period of time makes ignoring downswings difficult.

- Managing a large downswing is one of the most difficult things you will have to do as a poker player, and the penatly for failure can be losing your entire bankroll.


Common Bad Responses to downswings

- These are some of the most common bad responses to downswings:

- Losing confidence in your ability and game
- Making radical changes to your play
- Getting obsessed with your losses
- Trying to ride out the downswing
- Moving up a limit to recoup your losses


Dealing with a Downswing

- You cope with downswings the same way you deal with anything else in poker. You make the decisions that will make you the most money in the long term.

- Your decisions away from the table such as what games you play, what limits you play, and how you prepare will all play a crucial part in ensuring you come through tough periods.

- If you are not playing well, then your results will deteriorate, magnifying the effect of the downswing, which in turn makes you even more depressed. This cycle can continue until either:

a) You have a lucky run of cards pulling you out of the downswing; or
b) You go broke.

- Having the correct attitude toward your bankroll and your win rate when you are running well will help you maintain that attitude when things inevitably go bad.


Staying in Control

- There are two things to concentrate your energies on during a downswing: Improving your game and avoiding tilt.

- The relationship between tilt and downswings is a vicious circle, and either can be the trigger.

- Some of the most common traps that can befall a player running badly include:

- Trying to get even
- Damage limitation (playing more defensive, passive)
- Unwillingness to gamble
- Breaking the pain threshold


Downswings and the Poker Mindset

- Preventing tilt when on a downswing is all about attitude. If you play poker in the correct frame of midn, you are less likely to tilt.

- Understanding the seven attitudes of the Poker Mindset is the key to avoiding tilt during a downswing. (I listed those in Part 1)


Improving your game

- Generally speaking, you should remember the following two things when you are on a downswing.

1. It is very unlikely that your downswing is entirely due to bad play.
2. Likewise, it is very unlikely that bad play is not contributing to your downswing at all.

- If you reduce the "poor play element" of a downswing, and improve your win rate, you will recover more quickly.

- While finding and correcting leaks in your game is an end unto itself, it also has fringe benefits helpful in recovering from a downswing:

- By concentrating on improving you game, you are keeping your mind on something other than poor results.

- By proactively improving your game, you can sit at the table with greater confidence.


Downswing and Your Bankroll

- If a downswing is large enough, there is a risk that you are not sufficiently bankrolled to play at your current limit and should move down.

- Unfortunately, players on a downswing are often bad at moving down limits, which can be for a number of reasons:

1. It's a step backwards.
2. It will be harder to win back losses.
3. The player might be in denial.

- If you cheat on your bankroll, you are risking your entire poker career.

- There’s no comfort in the growth zone and there’s no growth in the comfort zone.

- When you get comfortable, you get stale. And when you get stale… Someone else who “gets it” passes you by and leaves you in the dust.

- It can be uncomfortable to grow.

GOOD!

The tingle means it’s working : ) That feeling of being uncomfortable means that you are growing.


- I believe hand reading is a function of your mental / emotional state at the time more than anything else.

(Ever noticed that some days you can put people on hands right and left, other days you´re just fumbling in the dark? They haven´t changed, you haven´t changed, your skills have not diminished. But you are probably not in that same emotional state you were in when playing the first game.)

- The reason you struggle with the more subtle technical aspects is that they usually require a good and clean state of mind whilst playing and analyzing.

- If you are on constant subtle tilt you will never understand your own image, your opponents projected image vs the way they actually play, what your history with a specific opponent really means and CORRECT adjustments (as opposed to a couple of 3 bets and now you´re waiting to shove any 2)

- what all this basically boils down to; hand reading and putting your opponent on accurate ranges, and knowing what to do with those ranges. These qualities will separate a 2 ptbb winner, from a 5 ptbb winner.

- Good idea to review yesterday's hands at the start of a new day, as prep game, and at higher stakes, take notes on specific regulars when not playing to prep.

- Check list on every hand someone calls or raises you, ask yourself his range of hands.

- Common mistake to be "on the ball" first 5 minuts, and then go into Droid mode for the rest of the session.

- Just start out by doing this every time you have any preflop decisions. Then extend to the flop. Then extend to asking yourself about your perceived range (2nd level).

- The absolute most important thing when faced with a big decision, is to first breathe and relax for a couple of seconds.

- The greatest lesson that can be applied to your poker game is the buddhist lesson of being mindful and aware of one´s thoughts and actions at all times.
(Hmm, I should find out more about meditating)

- Optional (Before every session, make a short little goal for that session). To play very tight first 15 minuts, don't spew or go overboard.

Intro

- To become the best player we need to make the best educated guesses. Transform ourself into pseudo superusers.

- To do this we'll use

* Position
* Bet! Sizing
* Combinatorics
* Different lines

To help us define an opponent's range.

- What makes people better is that they can estimate an opponent's range more precisely.



Fundamentals

- The variables you should take into consideration before making a poker decision:

* Hand range: A set of holdings your opponents may have based on their positions and actions in a hand.

* Fold equity: Is the percentage of the time you win the pot without a showdown.

* Expected value (EV): Is the average win or loss on a specific hand.

- Naturally you should continue in hands where your equity is high and typically fold in situations where it is low.

- Equity should be first thing you think about before you decide to check, bet, or fold


Combinatorics

- Combinatorics = Combinations of hands

- In hold'em there are 1326 possible hand combinations:

* Because there's no difference among the six possible combinations of AA or the sixteen of 72o, the number of hand combinations can be reduced to 169


- How to find Combinations


Unpaired hands

Step 1: Find total number of cards

Step 2: Multiply available cards

Step 3: Add each product

Example: How many combinations of AK and AQ are there on A25 flop?

Solution: (3 Aces)(4 Kings) + (3 Aces)(4 Queens) = 12AK + 12AQ = 24 Combinations


Paired hands

Step 1: Find total number of cards

Step 2: Solve C(C-1) / 2

Step 3: Add each quotient

Example: How many combinations of 22 and 55 on an A25 flop?

Solution: 3x2/2 + 3x2/2 = 6


Common Low/Mid - Stakes Leaks

- Most obvious reasons why low to mid-stakes players are worse than high stakes players is that they can't read hands well.

* Less aggressive and don't fight as much for pots.

- As you become better you'll realize no one ever has anything and you should battle for more pots.


Limped pots

- Rarely do players in early position lead out.

* They check and when late position player bets, they fold and move on to other tables.

- 90% of low-stakes players do not fight for limped pots. They check-fold if they don't hit anything.

- Limped pots are the easiest in the world. No one fights for them, no one cares.

- Steal any pot which isn't coordinated or draw heavy. If you get a call and a high card falls on the turn, fire again. (People usually never limp with J,K,Q,A's


Image

- Players don't use image enough

* Especially nits
* Nits should semi bluff more often
* Also two and three barrel more (Since nits never bluff in big pots, when they do, it's hard to call them down.)
* Nits should also fold TT and JJ more often when facing aggression. (When you're a nit, everyone knows you're a nit.)

- Generally, the majority of players should treat JJ like 99 and give both same value.

* Most of the times when we get either of these hands in on the flop, we are either against sets, overpair or a draw that has atleast 40% equity.


Pot Patrole

- Next time you're in a hand and want to check back the turn with top pair, medium kicker or an overpair, BET!

- Good players peel a lot of flops, because they want to steal on later streets. But almost always they have 5-9 outs, therfor you should bet.

- Betting the turn also makes you a tougher player.

- A common thing among low to mid-stakes players is checking behind on the turn after betting the flop on an open ender or flush, because they want to see a free card.

* Like saying "I want to lose 38 out of 47 times"

- When you check behind on the turn after betting a draw heavy flop. Villain will know your range is weak, and can play well vs you.

* With a draw himslf, bet the river to move you off your hand.
* If he has a good pair, check call your bet.


- High stakes players like to bet enough on the turn so that they'll have the correct odds to call if they get check-raised all in.

* In addition, by betting, leaving small amount behind, it shows you're committed and discourages your opponent from making a play at you.

* If he does shove all in (doesn't happen often). You can call and hit your outs and tilt him.


Balancing

- The idea behind balancing is to make yourself a tougher player so people can't accurately put you on a hand.

- No point balancing when people choose to ignore it.

- In short, up to 3/6 against almost everyone, just play.

* Bet when you tihnk an opponent's range is weak (strong) and check (or fold) when you think it is strong.

- Start balancing 5/10 and higher.


Playing Out Of Position

- Poker is a game where you make money by avoiding difficult spots with marginal hands.

- Nevertheless, people still like to play hands out of position.


- The reason it sucks is because we don't have a lot of choices:

* It's hard to manage the size of the pot
* Infinitely more difficult to run a three-barrel bluff oop than in position because villain could be flatting with the nuts 3 streets.
*Harder to extract value
*Can't choose to see a free showdown on the river and we win fewer pots.

- Simple advice: Fold!!


Showdown Value

- On a T28r board we should be more inclined to showdown with AK than A5 because AK dominates more hands if it improves.

* It also has twice as many outs against top pair.

- We should bet A5 because this causes A6+ type hands to fold and we rarely improve.


Leveling

- Players try to out level themselves too much

* If he's a nit, he's got the nuts, 2nd nuts or in rare cases 3rd nuts.


Backdoor Draws

- Players don't value backdoor draws enough

* Often we'd rather have a backdoor flush draw by the turn than a one pair hand.

* The main reason is the equity we have against villain's calling range on the turn.

* Can continue putting pressure if we miss river.

* Also balances your overall game. Players will think you are a crazy aggro maniac when you are just playing your equity.


Equity Equity

- Example: 55 on a 9TT board, your equity is horrible

* KJ on a 9TT our equity is decent, and rarely drawing dead.

- We often see players C-Betting 569 with AT or KJ. You do have overcards, but will need to fire 3 barrels because whatever handscall the flop aren't going to fold the turn very often.


Not All Fishes Are Alike

- Against the overly aggressive fish, you can start to call more with marginal hands or wait for the nuts

- The loose passive are bad at extracting value and genrally play passive.
* When this type of fish bets, fold.
* Since they call a lot, make thin value bets.
* Don't bluff them.

- Against those who never fold preflop, figure out what amount they are willing to put in with rags. (5x,6x,7x,8x etc.) until they fold
* And raise the highest you can with your premium hands

- Be more inclined to bluff the passive fish who are willing to fold when scarecards appear
* Increase your river bluffing freq. vs them.

- Against fish who like to show bluffs, and is doing it again, he will do it over and over. (Don't out level yourself thinking "he showed a few bluffs a few hands ago, to get payed off on this on). They don't think like that.

Everything in here is said by Phil Galfond, except from the questions

- There can be a thing as too much aggression, does something to your range, so you have to fold to raises a lot. Just have it in the back of your head. For balancing purposes too

- Forcing yourself to play is always a bad idea, both financially and emotionally.

- No monetary goals, and try to work out regularly and keep friends in ur life.

- Moving with peopel who play/study/love the game, watching them play, and discuss talk about diffrent lines is something that made me grow sooooo much

- (Quote from a discussion with Durrr on a hand) he had something like weak top pair and was facing a big river bet. He was like, 'I think a call is better than a fold' and I thought to myself, 'yeah I agree' and then he said 'but I would shove' and I exploded. I realized that you should think of every possible option you have in nlhe. You usually have a ton of them.

- If you are near someone who plays poker and is smart, spend as much time around them as you can if you want to improve your game.

- realize that you have more options than you think you do. Thinking outside the box, turning made hands that are good enough to call into bluffraises that turn out to be even more profitable, cbetting 1/3 pot in a rr pot, etc.

* Ephipanies (or how you spell it)

- how to use your style/image and balance your range accordingly. I started out being pretty nitty before realizing that I could use my image to bluff. Then I started to get called down. I got angry, like 'I'm so tight, how can they call!?!' before figuring out what my ranges really consisted of in certain spots.

- every time the action is to you, it's an opportunity for you to make the perfect play. Thinking about poker that way is great for your game.

- I've realized that working out regularly helps your game more than you might think. I highly recommend it.

- I think the three most important areas of intelligence in regards to poker are logic, probability, psychology. They actually are pretty close in order of importance, and change depending on game structure.

- one of my strengths is that I'm self aware.


- Smart to get a coach early on, for a slight boost in your horly win rate is really significant in the long run

- Tommy didn't teach me the things I wanted to learn, but he taught me the things I needed to learn.

- A lot of people don't get the most out of coaching because they ask the wrong questions.


In poker, every player has personal motivations.

* Through watching their play, you can get a general feel for what they want, what they fear or worry about, what they are comfortable/uncomfortable with. Most importantly, you get a feel for what they want, at their core.

* These are generalizations, but are true for most people who play these ways. You can find out more specific details about a player's personality by paying attention.

* a nit is afraid of losing a lot of money with the worst hand. They're uncomfortable in big pots with marginal hands. They often fear coin-flipping for a lot of money.

* The loose passive player usually plays for fun. He wants to see flops and wants to showdown his hand. He wants to see if the cards in his hand can match up with the cards on the board, or if they're good enough to rake in a pot. He wants to see your hand.

* The Bad LAG wants to win THIS POT. RIGHT NOW. Anytime he gives up on a pot it's because he's holding himself back. He likes to gamble, and usually doesn't mind getting his money in without proper odds.

(He often (but not always) has pride issues, meaning he wants to show you how big of a man he is. If he trash talks, you can be especially confident that he has pride issues. This means that he very badly doesn't want to be bluffed off of a pot or miss an opportunity to bluff himself. It also means that if you have any history with him, whether you won a big pot, showed a bluff, got bluffed by him, really anything, he's more likely to bluff you or call you down light.)

* So those are his main character traits. What else does he do differently?

Phil's old Stats:

21/16 preflop, 2.4 total AF

W$WSF 45.45%, Went to SD 28.88% , W$@SD 55.56%

Flop AF 2.6 Turn 2.0 Riv 2.5

Q: Everyone always asks this, but what do you think are the biggest differences between the really good nosebleed players and your average 25/50 regular? Is it just small details?

Phil's A: Intelligence, time (different point in career), Being able to play shorthanded and adjust to players.

A lot of it though is honestly variance and being in the right place at the right time. There are a top players who aren't any better than some 25/50 players. They just ran good at good times, and have the roll and the risk taking ability to play in great games. It's not that rare that a 200/400nl or plo game is softer than a 25/50 game going on at the same time.


Q: Do you agree with the idea that 1 or 2 tabling higher stakes will help your growth as a player better than multi-tabling medium/lower stakes?

Phil's A: Yes, less tables definitely. Especially with another smart player watching you and discussing concepts. And especially HU tables.

Higher stakes, not really. It might make you a bit more interested, and the competition will be a bit tougher, but you might not play your best. You can learn a lot about the game 2 tabling fish hu though.


Q: What dictates your decision to quit/go on with any given session?

Phil's A: The one thing I learned most from Tommy Angelo, is how awesome quitting is.

You should pride yourself in making a good quit. I really mean that. When I'm playing and make the decision to quit, I'm very happy with myself.

The two real reasons to quit are if playing is -EV financially or -EV emotionally. I know the latter isn't a real thing, but I use it all the time.

Basically, if for whatever reason I think I'm not a favorite (or a very small favorite), I'll quit (Ideally).

Or if I'm unhappy or stressed out by playing, or would be much happier doing something else, I quit (Ideally).

Reasons you become -$EV should be obvious, and you should realize when you are unhappy.


- Phil Quotes:
"Think of what your opponent wants you to do, and then do the opposite"
"Saying position is important in poker is like saying distance and direction are important in golf."
"It can never be that wrong to not play"

'Approach every decision as if it were tomorrow and you were looking back upon it'


Phil's thoughts on going through rough downswings; confidence issues, tilt, emotional effects, etc.

* It's easy to play when things are going well. How a player deals with a bad run is what defines him as a poker player.

* The most important thing is the be honest with yourself. Admit when you aren't focused or playing your best. Take breaks all the time. Get outdoors if you can. All the time means every 90 minutes or less.

* If you're afraid of losing your seats, take 3 minutes and walk into another room, do 20 pushups, go to the bathroom/grab some food, and come back.

* Taking time off when on a downswing is always a better idea than you want to admit. Getting away from poker for some reason usually helps you get your confidence back.

* Be willing to quit games when you find yourself tilting at all. Most people tilt by going on autopilot and don't realize they're tilting.

* I think it's probably possible to stop most of your tilting. It's very difficult though. Understanding that you tilt, and being able to identify it and quit is your best bet by far.

* Also don't play tired, unless there's a very big fish in the game.


Q: in playing the highest stakes, aside from the rare and egregrious fish, what are some subtle distinctions between winning/marginal/losing players?

Phil's A: think that a lot of medium-good but not great players probably undervalue betsize/timing tells. Especially against weaker opposition.

Q: Also, do you believe that some inherently winning players (that is, with the skills to win) end up losing longterm, and vice versa?

Phil's A: Some players are smart enough and work hard enough to win, but lose because of 'soft skill' leaks. Things like game selection, BR management and tilt control.

Q: Looking back what are some things you would change or stress for someone looking to get to your level to do or not to do? Any mistakes you made a lot that took you a few times to learn?

A: The best thing I ever did for my poker game was meet other people who played poker. My poker friends and coaches helped me move up 3x faster than I would've on my own.

I'd also recommend trying to eliminate autopiloting. Too many players can't make the jump into bigger games because they don't know how to think for themselves. They just play a TAG cookie cutter style and think it will continue working because they crushed the lower limits with it.


Some rant about goals: I think it is very important to identify your goals as a poker player so that you can act in a way to achieve them.

Do you just want to have fun playing? What’s fun for you? What would keep you from having fun? Do you want to make money? How much? When? In the next two weeks? For the next 10 years of your life? Can the big money wait? Do you want to keep getting better? At what game? Why?

Q: You also mentioned that when players have coaches, they often don't ask the right questions. In your opinion, what are some of the things most players should be focused on but aren't?

A: Along the same lines, a player should go through hands he's played or is playing and say "I (bet $x/called/raised/folded) because _____" Is my logic good?

The coach should ask more questions about what the player is thinking... "why is (bet x) better than (bet y) or c/r?" "What hands that you think he can have are you hoping will call/fold to that bet?" and listen to the players' response. For the first session, the coach shouldn't volunteer what he thinks the correct play is IMO.


Q: How long (hands/time) does it take you to identify fish in the games you typically play in?

A: If I'm paying full attention, not too long. If there's a new player that I don't recognize in a big game, I make sure to watch his play, and go back and look at any hand he showed down. That's where I get the most info.


Q: What are the top 3 or so indicators that first tip you off you are playing a fish? (what are the ones that first surface, as opposed to ones you only figure out over time)

A: If someone is playing a ton of hands, or open limping all the time, you can expect them to play badly elsewhere.

The second fastest is probably bet sizing. Usually regulars keep to a standard bet size style.

Usually what helps the most is seeing a shown down hand, and realizing that whatever logic he was using doesn't make sense. I know thats vague but I don't have an example in mind.


Q: What are the key reads that you find most important to use? or the ones you use most frequently? ie. how he plays draws? how thin he valuebets? timing tells? etc?

A: Flop and turn play are big for me. How light people call flop/raise flop is important. As is how often they fire turns, and with what hands. Are they pot controlling top pair? Are they checking the turn back with 8+ outs sometimes or always firing?


Q: What do you think is the most important game trait a HU player can have to be successful and why? Tilt control, patience, hand reading, aggression, game selection, etc.?

And what do you think was the most profound concept or tool you added to your HU game while developing it?

A: Tilt control is huge. Hand reading is important in all poker, but moreso heads up, because less hands play themselves.

I realize as I'm going down the list, everything is important, heh. You have the right idea. None are really more important than others I would say, and HU poker isn't THAT much different than regular poker.

I think though, understanding and adapting to an opponent is the most important thing I've learned to do for my HU game.


Q: What do you think the number one misconception about poker is? (On 2p2, not the general public consensus that its all about bluffing)

A: Ugh, so many. I basically don't talk to non poker players about poker. They're all so retarded when it comes to poker.

Misconceptions the average person has:
-they understand poker
-it's mostly luck, I'm gonna lose eventually
-tv pros are the best
-it doesn't take intelligence
-poker players are low life degenerates (becoming less and less true. I get personally offended anytime this stereotype is reinforced)


Q: 1) In a lot of your responses you mention the importance of having the right thought processes at the table. Can you please elaborate on what some of the correct thought processes are and what a player should be asking himself or thinking about at the table and during a hand?

A: Your question is a good one, but one that I would answer over 12 hours of coaching or an entire book. In short, you should be asking yourself why you want to make a play, ever play. If you have a good reason for it, better than your reasons for other plays, then you should make it.


Q: can you elaborate further around especially betsizing and timinig tells. Do you have any labels on patterns that you use?
Do you have any suggested reading covering this?

A: Betsize and timing tells are learned with practice.

The best general tip I can give on the subject is, there is always a reason everyone bets the size that they do or at the speed that they do. Often it's because they want you to do something, either consciously or subconsciously. Try to figure out what they want you to do. Then, don't do it.

It will make most sense if it's all put together, the amazing Tommy Angelo spent close to a year making this series and it's probably the best series any poker player can watch through.

Took me around 10+ hours writing the notes about the most important stuff, because when I write notes I do it with a pen while I'm studying, and I write really ugly lol. Here is the whole journey.


Enjoy =]


The Eight Paths To Poker Enlightment


Right View
+ Show Spoiler +

Right Thinking]
+ Show Spoiler +

Mindfulness
+ Show Spoiler +

Reciprocality
+ Show Spoiler +

Quitting
+ Show Spoiler +

Right Speech
+ Show Spoiler +

Right Action
+ Show Spoiler +

Tiltlessness
+ Show Spoiler +

Play to learn
- Forget about earning money, grinding. Learn, consume everything you can, get knowledge and apply it. Question everything, think.

Table Selection
- Table selection is the most important factor seperating winning and losing players.
- Anyone playing 35% or more hands is bad, unless a regular
- Few tables, generally bad
- Not a full stack, usually bad
- Tendencies, often smart to watch a game a few minutes, see if any of the regulars are on tilt etc
- Have the fish on your right, if a reg is being a bitch on your left, just chop off the lowest end of your range, close your eyes and check call him down. Sit yourself top left on the table, fish likes to sit underneath most of the time
- As long as there is 1 fish at the table, it's worth playing
- When a player has a name of an alcoholic beverage or a car, usually recreational over the age of 30. If they have a screen name of a famous player followed by a number, usually bad. If they got a sport team with the team's logo, usually bad.
If they got words like "lunatic", "bluff", "crazy" etc, usually a nit. If words like "monies", "lol" usually a young player, probably aggressive and has read forums etc. If a player has picture of a dog, a baby or something, usually older and always bad.

Bankroll managment
- Implement 30 buy-in rule for whatever stake
- Play 4 tables, so you can focus more on both your own and your opponent's play
- Take notes religiously and try to move up as fast as possible.
- Another reason why is, as you grow older, your willingness to gamble and take risks decrease tremendously. (You worked hard to get where you are, the risk of losing it all is disheartening and at times, scary.)
- Remember, your earnings improve exponentially relatively to your skill level, you should try to be as aggressive as possible with your bankroll
- "If you're too careful, your life can be a fucking grind."
- Taking shots is one of the most important things you can do to improve as a player. You get a reality check, you realize they aren't that good higher up, and you might never look back
- You shouldn't cash out frequently, cut down your expenses and work hard to improve your craft, spend as much money as you can to improve your game, use it for coaching and taking shots. That's your expense.

Math is easy
Hand Combinations
- Some facts:
1. There are 1,326 combinations in No-Limit Holdem
2. A set has 3 combos
3. Two pairs have 9 combos
4. Pocket pairs have 6 combos
5. A pair + kicker has 12 combos
6. Under paired cards have 16 combos
7. Any two specific suited cards have 4 combos
8. Any two specific cards have 1 combo

Hand Ranges
- You estimate a player's hand range based on his image, tendencies, history and position
- A good generalization to keep in mind is that if you think your opponent's range is stronger than your hand, you want to fold more often. And if you think his range is weaker than your hand, you want to call or raise more

Probability and Odds (the proportion of the time that something is likely to occur or has already occurred.)
- Usually expressed as a percantage (e.g., 35%) or a ratio indicating odds (e.g., 4:1). They are one and the same

Pot odds
- Knowing about odds allows us to determine if a call, bet, fold or raise is the most optimal play
- Two main types of odds for poker: Immediate odds and implied odds
Immediate odds
- Normally referred to as simply "odds", how much you stand to win immediately in relation to what you have to risk, and is usually expressed as a ratio.
- Five steps we need to take to determine our pot odds:
1. Determine the original pot size
2. Determine the amount we have to call
3. Add up original size of pot and amount we have to call to get the Total Pot Size
4. Express it as a ratio (Total Pot Size: Amount we have to call)
5. Convert it to a percentage

implied odds
- Reflect how much we expect to win in later streets if we hit our hand

Fold equity
- Based on how often we expect our opponents to fold to a bet or raise. Since poker is all about being aggressive at the right time, it's a good idea to know a little something about fold equity

Estimating your equity on the flop and turn
- Multiples of 2 are generally more accurate than Multiple of 4, but both give good estimates
* Multiples of 4: To approximate the equity you have on the flop, multiply your number of outs by 4 (You have an open-ended draw straight on the flop. That's 8 outs, so 8x4 = 32 percent to win by the river. The actual number is 31.5 percent (This is if you get to see both the turn and river cards.)
* Multiples of 2: To approximate your equity on the turn, multiply your number of outs by 2. (You have an open-ended draw straight on the turn. That's 8 outs, so 8x2 = 16% to win by the river. The actual number is 17%.)

Expected Value
- (EV) is the average amount that we stand to win or lose if we see a certain situation many times.
- To calculate your EV, use this formula:

EV = (% you win)(amount you win) – (% you lose)(amount you lose)

If the sum is over 0, it's + EV


Pre Flop: The Fundementals

The Blinds
- When the decision to fold or call pre-flop is close, folding is better because a small mistake can lead to a bigger one post-flop. In the occasion that you do play and find yourself being out of position, try to keep the pots small so you won't find yourself in many sticky situations.

Raising from the Blinds
- Be very conservative with your raises from the blinds. With limpers in the pot, don't raise unless you've got a good hand like 99+, ATs+. Most people will put you on a premium hand also when you do it, and it's hard to extract value from weaker hands. Good spot to fold if you get re raised with top pair

3-betting from the blinds
- Against a utg raise, the majority of your 3-bets should be for value. Unless you know the UTG is a fish. Your perceived range get so strong.
- Since we are rarely 3-betting a UTG open from the blinds, we should call with the majority, if not all our holdings.
- Against middle position, you should 3-bet more often with JJ+/AK against looser opponents. If your opponent folds to 3-bets a lot, I wouldn't 3-bet with JJ and AK, call to keep them in the pot
- You shouldn't 3-bet non-broadway suited connectors either when they are in MP, since they don't play well in 3-bet pots, and you won't flop enough hands to continue after c-betting. No point c-betting Axs either
- Against CO/BTN you should 3-bet with a wider range, because his stealing range is wider. From this position it's smart to 3-bet with a polarized range. Premium hands JJ+ /AQs + and speculative holdigns such as 74s 56s that can't play profitably post-flop without the initative. And call with marginal hands QJ, AJ. KQ etc.

Squeezing
- Something that will look extremly strong unless you have a history of 3-betting a ton
- At 50nl a squeeze is usually very strong hand, at 600nl ranges are wider, and people can show up with speculative hands
- A good spot to squeeze is when a loose player opens in mp/co and the people behind calls, the reason is, it's a great spot for btn to 3b, so if he only calls, he's usually not that strong
- Smart to keep squeezing until someone gives you a reason to stop
- On Ace high flops, with TT-KK oop, you should bet-fold more often than check-call. (Unless that particular oponent let's you go to showdown easy.)
- Don't Squeeze against nits if they raise from early position, their range is too tight and strong
- Against loose-bad players, don't squeeze loose, better to call their raise preflop and stackw hen you do hit
- Against shortstacks, don't squeeze if you don't want to call his all-in raise. He's not going to fold often, and will jam with any A or any pair. AT+ or 77+ are good hands to use vs them
- Against light 4-better, don't squeeze them
- After a villain calls your squeeze, never bet unless you think he will fold a lot or you are willing to get it in on the turn
Caution: Squeezing a lot will build up adrenaline and you may find yourself playing too aggressively to the point of spazzing out. You will find yourself fighting for pots because they are bigger. Start by 3b bad people, get comfortable and continue from there

Under The Gun (UTG)
- Standard general hand range: 13.1% (To play standard tag 23/18 or so, good to raise 12-14%)
1. All pairs 44 and higher
2. All suited Broadways JTs +
3. AJo and KQo, if players behind are aggressive, fold AJo and KQo as well
4. Medium Suited cards such as 87+ (Stay away from single-gap suited cards like T8s).
Important Note: Avoid playing ATo UTG, because of reverse implied odds
- How tight or loose you want to raise depends on how good/aggressive players are behind you and how good the blinds are

Middle Position (MP)
- Treat it almost the same as UTG, 14,6% (13% - 16%)

Cutoff (CO)
- 24.3% 22+, boardway cards, suited and offsuit AT,KJ,KQ,JT etc, A9o +, a2s+, K9s+, Q9s+, medium suited connectors (j8s+, 97s, 76s, 65s).

Button (BTN)
- 34.5%
- The most profitable position in NLHE, and you should find any excuse to play in this position
- A good hand player can profitably play 50% of his hands from the button
- 3-betting from the button, if people fold a lot to 3b, do it nonstop, if people call, then fold to c-bets a lot, keep doing it.
Important Note: Sometimes you want to deliberatly force yourself to fold pre-flop sometimes, the reason for this is, you don't want an opponent who's folding way too much to recognize he's folding too much. Want to give him the illusion that he's not constantly getting exploited, even though he is
- If people fold to you, and the blinds are tight, keep stealing

Postflop
Why we bet
- When we have the best hand, value and to extract money
- When we rarely have the best hand and need to bluff
- Dead money

Continuation Bet
General guidelines on whether you should bet on certain boards:
1. On your HEM, if it's greater than 70%, you can bet your entire range and still profit
2. You want to have some sort of rquity in the hand
3. Dry flop with one high card (Your percieved range include tons of A and K, and theirs include small pairs and suited connectors.)
4. Wet boards, don't bet, board like 89Ts hits a lot of the Villain's medium-hand range, and will call often, also you have some equity you want to realize.
5. Paired Flops: Avoid betting 552 rainbow with weak hands like 86s or 67s because you have very little equity if he calls, rather check and do delayed C bet if he checks on turn.
6. Way Behind/Way Ahead: Example KK on A82, you're way behind a pair of aces or a set, and you'r way ahead of bottom-and middle pair and random gutshots. You can check behind here some times if it's checked to you
7. Multi-way Pots: You generally want to bet more in a three-way pot on a dry flop because people are less likely to mess around in these spots. But check behind if there's a short stack
8. In position/Out of Position: You should C-bet a lot more often OOP. In position, you can check behind and get a free card. It's a lot harder to get a free card when you're OOP, and you generally want to be aggressive and take down the dead money
9. Against Loose players: You generally want to check behind or check-fold some of the tiem on low-medium boards (876s, 647s, 542r, etc.) Loose players like to call flop bets with all sorts of hands, making c-betting on the flop with random hands less profitable.
10. Against Tags: C-bet all the dry boards versus TAGs, and check behind wet boards if you miss. And adjust if they're attacking you light (etc, check raising you on J52, you got 75s.)
11. Inducing bluffs: Some players will almost always bet if checked to, because they percieve it as weakness. You can check call with AT+ on A83 boards etc, and if flush draw, check raise
12. Polarizing your range: You'll want to polarize your range when you check behind. This means you bet the flop with strong hands and air, but check behind with marginal hands

Paired Flops
- When a player check calls your c-bet on paired flops, he's almost ALWAYS got a pocket pair. Sometimes with A high, so be ready to fire a lot of turns, if he raises the turn bet, it's almost never a bluff, so fold unless you beat trips

3-bet pots
- Villain's calling range is similar to that of single-raised pots. Mostly middle pocket pairs and occasionally AK/AQ that he didn't 4-bet with. Knowing this, we should double-barrel bluff the turn if we pick up some type of dr aw. Most hands will not withstand a second strong barrel.

Monotone Boards
- Be very conservative, people seldom re-raise without a set or better, and if you do want to C-bet A LOT of hands might call you. Be careful with what you shove your stack in with

Villain's perception of your range
- You should generally bluff more and value-bet less if Villain's perception of your range is strong, and bluff less and value-bet more if it's weak

- Polarize You Leading Range: You generally want to lead with strong made hands that can easily call a raise, or with draws (pair + flush draw, flush draw, open-ended, overcards + open-ended, gutshot +open-ended, gutshot).
- Want to avoid leading with JQ on KJ3r, getting raised, not knowing what to do. So don't put yourself in these without a plan

Single-raised multiway pots
- consider leading with middle or bottom pair in single-raised multi-way pot. It'll be too hard to profitably check-call with medium pairs. Leading also puts the player behind you in a difficult situation. Example: 65s on a Q64r flop

Who to lead against
- Straightforward players who are passive:
1. Players who fold too often to leads. A good example is aregular who is playing more than 9 tables. You can also check a pre-flop raiser's stat on your HUD to see if he's folding a lot (75%) to donk bets
2. Players with a high stealing frequency from the CO or BTN. Their ranges will often be wide and weak
3. Weak-tight players. They play straightforward game and will just fold to your flop leads without a strong hand
4. Players who like to check behind for pot control. When you have a strong hand, consider leading into them to extract value since they are going to cehck behind a lot

Who NOT to lead against
- Aggressive players, they like to re-raise donk bets, but consider leading into them with a strong hand
- Do not lead into calling stations. You want to take down the pot on the flop without having to fire numerous barrels

Playing the turn
- Bluff the turn on scare card, or lead if a flush or straight completes

Raising
- There are two reasons why we want to raise-for value or for bluffs. We never raise to "see where we're at" it's too expensive.

Raising for Value
- On boards where we flop a Straight, all connected boards, or all 2 tone flush boards we want to re raise for value, too many cards can come to kill our action.
- Flopping a top pair with JTo on a T56 2 tone board vs someone bad, we always want to raise if donked into, so many marginal hands, or draws they may have

Type of Boards to bluff raise on
- The best boards to bluff-raise are ones where opponents c-bet a lot, such as AK3, KQ8.
- Monotone and low connected boards 456 two tone etc. Monotone boards will slow them down unless they have a set or a flush.
- Stay away from paired boards, may want to throw in a bluff here and there, but it's generally not a good idea to attack those flops. May be good vs some ppl to float on paired boards though.

Floating
- A good tool vs people who c-bet too much (75% or more on the flop). And vs people who play straighforward on the turn.
Factors to consider before floating:
1. If your opponent 2-barrels too often, you shouldn't float the flop because you will have to fold the tun too often.
2. If your opponent plays straightforwardly on the turn and telegraphs the strength of his range either by checking or betting. Some players check whenever they don't have a hand on the turn and bet whenever they do. These are your primary targets.
3. It is credible for you to represent a hand on the turn or river. Example, you've got 78s, flop A46, you've only got a gutshot, but another flushdraw on the flop, if the other flush completes on the turn, your opponent checks, you can easily represent that flush
4. Make sure that when you float, you have some equity in the pot and have soem backdoor draws so you can continue on the turn.

Double-Barreling
- Most low stakes players have problems playing the turn, because they don't plan the streets. No backup plan if they miss the turn and got nothing
- You generally want to fire the turn if either of these conditions exists:
1. Your equity improves
2. A scare card hits
- On boards where a turn puts more draws out there, bet the river as well. The turn creates a lot of draws, Villain is likely to have a made weak hand or a draw. If he had a strong hand, he would've raised the turn to protect it. Therefor a river bluff is profitable.

Scare card
- Best scare cards are high cards, or completed flushes on the turn
- Bad scare cards are low cards and turn pairing the board

The problem of scare cards
- In today's game, many people know what the obvious scare cards are. For this reason your bet is less credible on that particular card, and you need to fire another bullet to take down the pot, Fortunately though, people call on the scare card and fold to a river bet all the time.
- To balance this by betting your medium-strength hands on the turn too
- Also an alternative to check the A turn, and go for river bet or bluff
Implied threat of the river bet
- The threat of losing a stack causes players to err on the side of caution, casuing them to fold their marginal holdings on the turn. This puts their turn range face-up.
- Also a reason why you should incorporate bluffing on the river into your game.




3-betting
- One of the most powerful plays you can have in your arsenal, extremely profitable to 3-bet in position, especially from the button.
Creating an aggressive Image
- 3-betting lightly is an excellent way to create an aggressive image. Players will put you on a wide range of hands and pay you off lighter.
- Will let you control the flow of the game unless they fight back. Allows you to isolate the fish more often, playing pots in pos vs regulars.
- You generally want your first 3-bet to be a semi-bluff (j8s, 86s, 75s etc).
After that, keep 3-betting until people give you a reason to stop- by 4-betting you, calling you down lighter, and/or check-raising the flop more.
- You will end up tilting him and he will be ecstatic to get all-in pre-flop with AQ or 88 etc.
3-bet stats
- Although 3-bet stats are helpful, don't put too much emphasis on them, more reliable if it's heads up.
Polarized range
- Polarize your range when you 3-bet, if it's vs a passiv bad fish, you can throw in 88-jj

3-betting as the aggressor
- Do most of your 3-betting from the CO or BTN.
3-betting against UTG/MP
- Increase your 3-betting range versus UTG, if he starts playing back with calling or 4-betting, slow down. For the most part, he will be playing back with JJ+ and AK. If he starts to call down multi barrels, narrow your range to include more broadway cards and fewer suited connectors.
3-betting against the cutoff
- Most regulars widen their opening range from the cutoff, so you want to 3-bet the cutoff relentlessly from the button.
You'll have tons of fold equity because: 1) his range is weak, and 2) he doesn't want to play against you from out of position.
- The general strat, 3b till he starts 4b light, check raising, or calling down with marginal holdings.
3-betting from the blinds
- Don't 3bet too much from the blinds, it's too tough. Also remember do it with a polarized range, can sometimes if the dynamic and your image is right, do it half the time with 99-JJ and AQ.
3-betting with Deep Stacks
- With stacks 1500B or more, you can 3-bet with many more hands in position. Players play much more straightforward when stacks are deep. Some will call a lot pre-flop, hoping to flop a strong hand, and will check fold once they miss, some fold preflop all the time.
- If you're in the blinds, tighten up your 3-betting range a lot, not profitable vs regs when they have position.
3-betting with AQ
- Most of the time, it's not profitable to 4b or call with AQ, but when the situation is right. You and another guy who's been 3-betting a lot, and you raise, he 3bets again, you can now call. If any A hit, you can call his bets, if any K hits, you fold, if not, check raise him big, this will get them to fold their pairs.

Playing the flop
your perceived Range
- People will usually put you on AK, high cards, small suited connectors that can't profitably call a pre-flop raise, or high pokcet pairs when you 3-bet before the flop.
- On a flop like AT3, if we bet, they will fold a large percentage of the time because the board texture hits our perceived range.
Had the flop come 789 it probably wouldn't hit our range much, so it's best to check-fold with a hand like AK.
Paired boards
When a villain calls a c-bet on a paired board, he will have a pocket pair most of the time, sometimes it might be a float with A-high. Knowing this you want to apply serious pressure.
A player calls your c-bet on 772
If and A,K, or Q hits, bet hard again (and fold to a shove). and if you have 89s, turn is T, you can still bet strong and commit yourself.
Only do this vs peopel who are generally tight, who can make folds, not passive bad fishes and stuff.
Monotone boards
- Players generally play two pairs, sets or small flushes very fast on these boards. If you c-bet, he calls, you can safely rule out those hands. Knowing that, you want to be shoving your stack on the turn if you have the nut-flush draw.
A93-type boards
- You want to c-bet almost 100% of your 3-betting range here, even if you have TT-KK.
Counter
Ace-high flops are great spots to float in position in 3-bet pots. The reason is explained above-villain will c-bet almost 100 percent of his 3-betting range on this flop.
If he checks, check with him, if he bets the flop, then call.
If he bets the turn, he probably has an ace, so just fold. When villain checks the turn, check behind to represent something like a5s going for pot control. When he checks again on the river, he rarely has an ace, go for 2/3 - 3/4 of the pot.

Countering 3-bets
From a defensive point of view. You raise from MP and the BTN 3-bets you for the 3rd time. How to deal with that?
Tight strategy
- You generally want to be calling 3-bets in position. If at all possible, avoid doing it OOP.
If you're OOP against a good, aggressive player, the best strategy is to simply fold his 3-bets and tighten up your opening range. Fight back when you have JJ+
Playing Fit-Or-Fold
- If you decide to call with a hand like 77, you can't just fold to his c-bet everytime you don't hit a set, need to play back. Otherwise it's not profitable.
Calling 3-bets with Pocket Pairs
- Even with position, you should fold pocket pairs worse than 99 when stacks are less than 150BB.
CO vs BTN
- You can actually call with a wider range of hands here versus a button 3-bet because he will have hands like ATs, KTs, and QTs. For this reason, you can call with AQ, AJ, KQ, KJs, hands that play post flop.
Late position vs. 3-bet from blinds
- If Villain has a very narrow 3-betting range, then I want to 4-bet to give him a chance to stack off with a range of JJ+/AK, which AA/KK dominates. (By calling, he may slow down, and we won't stack him).
- If an opponent is 3-betting with a wide range, I will call with premium hands, because I want to balance the time I have marginal holdings. Against someone who is really aggressive, I will slow-play and then call down all three streets, even if the board gets scarier, because aggressive players bluffing frequencies increase as the board gets scarier.
- I would shove over villain's bet on wet flops like T83s because that's what I would do with my semi-bluffs on this board. If villain 3-bets a lot and c-bets at a high percentage, then semi-bluffing the flop is insanely profitable since he will bet-fold very often.
Don't jam the flop
Don't always just get it in on the flop agsinst 3-better's c-bet. Almost always call more with sets and two pairs.
Bluffing the flop
- Players who 3bets too much, also c-bets too much. Good boards to bluff-raise on are connected boards, and sometimes Kxx or Qxx. A high is usually best to call and represent.
Inducing a Bluff
- Some players never belive you when you raise a fairly dry flop, by raising you represent such a narrow range of hands for value taht a thinking villain will not give you credit for it.
- As you move up in stakes, you will realize that there's more value to fast-playing your hands than slow-playing. As players get better, it's more difficult to trap them. However, a lot of players want to make hero calls so if you're playing your strong hands aggressively, you will get called more often than you think.
4-betting
- You generally want to 4-bet a hand that either cannot profitable call a 3-bet (a3o KJo) or that you want to go all-in with pre-flop (QQ+ / AK).
Having an ace or king in your hand is great because of hand elimination. There is less chance that Villain holds AA,KK, or AK.
- Don't 4bet with T7o, you want to least have decent equity in the pot if he does call, choose T7s instead.
- Also important that you don't 4-bet with hands such as 55-88 or T9s. (Assuming the stacks are 150BB), it's better to just call his 3-bet with these hands because of the implied.
- You can also widen your 4-betting range when stacks are deep (150BB +), tough to counter it because stacks are so deep, people rarely ever 5b bluff, so it gets taken down a lot.

4-betting
- A player who has been 3-betting a lot, or folding to 4-bets a lot are prime targets. The standard of today's game is 4-bet to 2.1 - 2.5 times the 3-bet size.
- You never want to put in more than 30BB of your stack pre-flop because you do not want to commit to the pot with a weak hand. If you 4-bet to 40BB and he shoves, you would need to call 60BB to win 140BB, roughly 2.3 odds. This means you will have to call a shove with a hand as weak as A2s, or 56s against a shoving range of QQ + / AK
Playing TT and JJ
- you lose a lot of value by 4-betting these hands small, rather shove or 4-bet big so he knows you're commited, or call his 3-bet, might get to showdown then.
- Against passive opponenets who don't barrel enough, calling is optimal because you have more chances of showdowns, if a nits 3-bets you, should fold to his re-raises when you open from UTG or UTG+1.
- People will save a lot of money if they treat TT and JJ like 99.
Playing AK
- It's a mistake to push this hand too hard. AK falls into the same category as TT and JJ because it's a marginal hand to 4-bet and get all-in with.
- The idea behind calling the pre-flop 3-bet instead of 4-betting is to call all of his flop c-bets and bet then turn when he checks to you. A half pot bet will be sufficient.
- You also likely to stack any Ax from villain, lastly, Villain will be barreling with a high frequency on any turn A or K to represent AK.
Playing AQ and 99
- We rarely want to 4-bet with these hands and get it in preflop without history.
The majority of the time, however, the best play is to call a 3-bet with them when stacks are deeper than 125BB.

Adjusting against different players
- In this example you have ATo, flop is 862. In a vacuum, you should bet try and take it down, you have initative and 6 outs.
Against a loose-passive player: Check behind, he's going to call with any piece, and he probably won't lead the turn, you have showdown value as well
Against a Nit: 17/12 or tighter, you shuold bet, nits often play fir-or-fold game. You may also have to barrel the turn, because their range include a lot of pairs, if the turn is a high card, fire again.
Against a Decent TAG: You want to bet as well, for the most they will stay in the pot if they have something and get out of the way if they don't, an occational check-raise. Be ready to fire second barrel on all overcards, if he calls, you can still fire the river, they know you will probably fire on the scare cards. Fire on a scare card higher than 8 or 9.
Against a Good, Aggressive Player: It's okay to mix it up, it's okay to check since he's good at balancing his range. Pick your spot to bluff the river if you decide to.

Balancing your range
- No need to balance vs. bad players. They either don't know what you are representing or don't care. But against good hand readers, having a well balanced range will earn you more money and make you difficult to play against.

- Example, A good aggressive player raises to 3$ from the Button and you call from the SB with ATs, the flop is A62, you check- call his pot bet. The turn is a 7 and you check. He checks behind. the river is a Q, you bet 2/3-pot for value, and he folds.
In this scenario you rarely have a bluff, so you should check the river the majority of the time.
This has three purposes:
1) It induces him to bluff with air so that you can call him down.
2) It induces him to make a thin value bet with worse hands.
3) It balances your range so that he will be less likely to valu-bet light or bluff you in the future, thus allowing you to see a cheap sowndown with your medium/small pairs.

A guideline to balancing your range
* Any time you find yourself in a situation where your perceived range is strong (good top pair or better), then value-bet less and bluff more.
* Any time you find yourself in a situation where your perceived range is weak (mid-pair or worse), then value-bet more and bluff less.

Strong percieved range
- You should value-bet less because your perceived range is too strong. When your betting range on the river is almost exclusively for value and never a bluff, Villain will fold worse hands and call or raise with better hands. If you check instead, it may insude a good thinking player to value bet light or bluff.
- With a strong perceived range, you also want to bluff more if you have a hand that can't win at showdown.
- If you have air, c-bet and it goes check call, check check on turn and he checks the river, and you can't win any other way, often smart to bluff if the board allows it.

Weak perceived range
- If youre perceived range is weak, then you need to value-bet more often because Villain is less likely to belive you. You also want to bluff less because you can't credibly represent a strong hand most of the time.

Multi-way Pots
- Proceed With Caution!
- Can be good to raise with gutshot + backdoor f draw type hands, if Co bets, mp calls. But use with caution when the timing is right
- if Co calls, check the turn, if you hit tons of equity, pot if MP calls
- do not make the move on a flush board

- There are good spots fo bluff raise in multi way pots as well. You have A2s, mp and btn calls, flop is J7r with one of your suit. Mp bets, btn folds, you check raise, insanely strong line, usually folds out hands as strong as qj, if you hit ur f-draw on turn, pot and commit.
- The general concept is, always have something, some backdoor, gutshot, some rope in case they call.
WARNING: Don't pull these stunts if you don't have a general idea of how villain plays, and at lower limits people really can't think that well. Some ppl at 100nl won't fold QJ. This is for motivation to think outside the norm.

Scare cards
- Your hand QTs, flop 983, one of your suit. Villain checks, and you check, turn is an A.
Great spot to raise, because villains usually fire scare cards, and if they call, a big bet on the river usually takes it down. But once again, know your villain.

- When scare cards come, it dramaticly increases a villains bluffing frequency, on the turn and on the river.

Timing tells

Quick call:
Usually an attempt to appear strong and to slow down the aggressor on the next street. With a strong hand, a player would take more time thinking about his option.
Sometimes we have no option besides check-calling, so we often act way too fast.
Example: QT, Btn raises, we call from the SB, flop is T57r, we check to villain, he bets, we insta-call.
- Another reliable tell is when fish check-calls really afst on boards where flush draws are possible. (Vs them, if you don't have anything, if all draws miss, a half pot on the river is enough to make them fold a high card that might beat you).

Slow Call:
They almost always have a strong hand.
(To find out which players genuinely like to tank long, you can just try bluffing some rivers to find out.)
Example: You raise K9s from the BTN, sb calls and the flop is QT3 with another F-draw, one of your suit. He checks, you bet, the turn is a 7 of your suit, he checks, you bet 22$. The tanks for a while, and finally calls. The river is a nonsuit 6.
- On such a draw-heavy board, once he cehck- calls the turn, the strongest hand that he can show up with is QJ. Any better hand probably check,shoves the turn to avoid playing the river. So when he tanks the turn, usually figuring out whether he is getting odds to call a turn bet. Usually a pair with flush draw, or flush + straight, something similar.
Correct play is to shove river. (If you are the type of player who will bet this turn put don't follow up on the river, you should check.

Final Words
Remeber that everyting is hard before it becomes easy. Keep working at it and there's no stopping you.

Galaxies

- 200 billion known Galaxies in the known universe.

- Our Galaxiy, The Milky Way, 12 billion years old.(Huge disc with giant spiral arms, and a bulge in the middle)


Born in nebulas, born in clouds of dust and gass.

* Pillars of creation.
* Around many of them are planets and moons.

(We humans thought for a very long time the milky way was the only one until 1924, until Hubble found out otherwise).

He found fuzzy blobs of lights, far far away, whole cities of stars, galaxies, way beyond The Milky Way.


Random Facts

- M87, a giant elyptical galaxy, one of the oldest in the Universe, and the stars all glow gold!

- Sombrero Galaxy, has a huge glowing core, with a ring of gass and dust all around it.(Baal Galaxy?)

- Galaxies are big, really really big.


Some distances and perspective

On earth we meassure distance in kilometers, in space astronomers use lightyears. The distance light travels in a year, which is just under 9,5 trillion kilometers.

- Our Galaxy is 100.000 lightyears across, which is just a small spec in the universe.

- Our nearest neighboer, Andromeda is nearly 200.000 lightyears across, twice the size.

- M87 is much much bigger than Adromeda, nearly 5 times as big.

- But all of these are tiny compared to IC 1011, biggest galaxy ever found. 60 times larger than our Milky way.

- The first stars formed 200 million years after the Big Bang ( 13,8 billion years ago).

- Then gravity pulled them together, building the first Galaxies.


Mankind's incredible tenacity and creativity

Whatever we see in telescopes today are things that has happened millions or more years ago, because it has taken the light as long to get to us. The feint smudges, formed 1 billion years after the big bang is the furthest back Hubble can see.

Until recently, humankind made Act, a 500 meter tall telescope, and the largest in the world. Act doesn't detect visible light, it detects cosmic microwaves, from the time the Universe was a few hundred thousands year old.

It doesn't just detect early Galaxies, it can see how they grew. The footprints of all the growth, from a few hundred thousand years till now.

Letting Astronomers see how they form and evolve: Stars form cluster, forms to galaxies, which builds into clusters of galaxies which builds into super clusters of Galaxies.

- In the beginning Galaxies looked like poo, random and bulgy, now they look awesome and perfect. Gravity, gravity shapes and molds Galaxies


Unimaginable Power

- There's an unimaginable powerful and incredible destructive source of gravity at the heart of most Galaxies. And there's one at the deep center of our own milky way.


- For years scientists wondered what could be powerful enough to change how a Galaxy behave, and then they found out.... A black hole, not just any kind, a super massive black hole.

* It eats gass and stars, but sometimes black holes consumes too quickly, and what they are consuming are dispatched back into space in beams of pure energy.

* This is called Quasar, when they find one, they know the center has a Super massive black hole.


- The black hole in the center out of Galaxy is gigantic, 24 million kilometers across.

* Even though, Earth is in absolute no danger, since Earth is 25.000 lightyears away (trillions of kilometers). So the earth is safe... For now....


Dark Matter

Super massive black holes may be the source of huge amounts of gravity, but they don't have enough power to hold a galaxy together, according to the laws of physic, a galaxy should fly apart. Why don't they?

Because there's something out even more powerful than a super massive black hole. It can't be seen, and virtually impossible to detect, but it's there. And it's called dark matter, and it's everywhere.

- Scientist are discovering that dark matter doesn't just hold em together, might have sparked them into life as well.

- They think dark matter was created into the Big Bang, and that dark matter became the seed of the Galaxy, even though they have no idea what it really is and no idea what it's made of.

- They think that dark matter weight for weight make up for x6 as much as all other matter in the Universe.


Recently it's been detected in deep space, it bends it, in a process called gravitational lensing. Allows us to detect the pressence of dark matter. As a beam of light is travelling towards us, if it passes by dark matter, it gets deflected around it by the gravitational pull.

Triggers the birth of galaxies, and keeps them together, scientists call it, the master of the Universe.


Unfathomable vastness

Scientist have come so far, they've built almost the whole Universe in a super Computer. Here you can't see individual Galaxies, can't even see clusters. But what you can see is Super Clusters, linked together in filaments, in a vast cosmic web. One finds a cosmic web which lights up all of the Universe, making the Universe looks like a gigantic spunge.

Each of the filaments is home to millions of Galaxy clusters, all bound together by dark matter. In the simulation, the dark matter glows along the filaments.

Dark matter effects where in the Universe Galaxies will form, holds together the whole superstructure of the Universe, binds them in clusters, and clusters in super clusters. All are locked in a web of filaments, and without it, the whole structure of the Universe will fall apart. This is the big picture of our Universe.

It's a giant cosmic web, and hidden deep within one of these filaments are our Milky way.


Dark Energy

In recent times, the last decade scientists found something new, kinda scary. Dark Energy, far more mysterious than dark matter, since we don't have the slightest idea what it is or what it's doing. Like space has little springs in it, make things repell eachother and pushes things apart.

If Dark Energy wins vs Dark matter, it make Galaxies spread apart and push things away from eachother. But that's not going to happen for a very very long time (trillions of lightyears).


Fantastic time to live in

We're extremely fortunate, life has only evolved on earth because our tiny solar system was born in the right part of the Galaxy, any closer to the center, we wouldn't be here. Since life there is extremely lively, radioactive.

To far away from the center would be just as bad, ain't as many stars, we might not exist at all. We're not to far, not too close, perfect distance.

Endless questions to ask, and mysteries to solve. More and more scentists are focusing on Galaxies, it's amazing time to live in, where we're making the most extraordinary discoveries imaginable


ps,
+ Show Spoiler +

pps,
+ Show Spoiler +

- The plateau can be a form of purgatory. It triggers disowned emotions. It flushes out hidden motivations.

- We sometimes choose a course of action that brings the illusion of accomplishment, the shadow of satisfaction. And sometimes knowing little or nothing about the process that leads to mastery.


Varieties of intelligence

* Linguistics
* Musical
* Logical / Mathematical
* Spatial
* Bodily / Kinesthetic
* 2 types of Personal, Intra/Inter

- We are born geniuses of thougt and feeling, + geniuses in potentia of the body.


The Mastery Curve

(Ok, this I drew, so not 100% sure how I can draw it here. I'll just do my best explaining what it looks like.)
Starts out flat, then it starts going in an upward hill, to a beak, then it declines and goes down a little, then it stays flat for a bit (the plateu), and the process repeats.

- Practice diligently
- Strive to hone your skills
- Attain new levels of competence

- Be willing to spend most of your time on a plateau, to keep practicing when you seem to be getting nowhere.

- Habitual behaviour system operates at a level deeper than concious thought.
* Involved the reflex circuit in the spinal cord as well as in various parts of the brain to which it is connected

Cognitive system: When learning a new skill, you need to make an effort to replace old patterns of sensing, movements and cognition with the new

The cognitive and the effort system become subsets of the habitual system long enough to modify it. To teach it a new behaviour. When the job is done, they withdraw. Then you don't have to stop and think.


How do you move toward mastery?
= You practice diligently (without getting frustrated on the plateau)


The 3 types of persona: Dabbler, Obsessive, Hacker

- Commericals just show endless climaxes, no plateau.
- Why people lean toward drugs
(I don't care how you win, just win, about effortless learning, instant celebrities, instant millionaires)

Same in medicine/pharmacy "fast relif"



Research studies show that most illnesses are caused by environmental factors or way of life

- 10 min at the Dr. isn't enough to get to know the patient, or write a prescription.

The nr.1 cause of death can be reversed by a long-term regime of diet, moderate exercise, yoga, meditation and group support.(Most Dr. in the us claim this is to drastic, and suggest $30k open chest surgery instead).



The joy of regular practice

- We as humans often go against what's best for us, and waste an evening distracting ourselves.

- People who love the plateau have very vivid and satisfying lifes.

People who go into something for the money, the fame or the medal, can't be effective.

Mastery's true face is relaxed and serene, somtiems faintly smiling.


Goals and contingencies = important, BUT exists in the future and the past, beyond the pale of the sensory realm

Practice, the path of mastery, exists only in the present. You can see it, smell it, feel it.

To love the plateau is to love the eternal now, to enjoy the inevitable spurts of progress and the fruits of accomplishment.

Man is a learning animal.




Key One

Instruction


- The self thought person is on a chancey path (can work, like Edison, but most have kept on re-inventing the wheel.)

For mastering most skills, there's nothing better than being in the hands of a master teacher.

Either one to one, or in a small group. Also good options: Books, films, computer learning programs, group instructions, classroom, knowledgable friends, counselors, associates, "the street".

- When you learn to easy, you're tempted not to work hard, not to prenetrate to the marrow of practice.

The worst can be the best, for it perseveres, it will have learned whatever it is practicing all the way to the marrow of it's bones

- Make sure your teacher is paying attention to the slowest student on the math


When irreconciabable differences do occur, remember that the better part of wisdom is knowing when to say goodbye.

"Do not think that
This is all there is.
More and more
wonderful teachings exist -
The Sword is unfathomable"


Key 2

Practice


Practice is the path upon which you travel. Not in order to gain something else, but for it's own sake.

An old saying: The master is the one who stays on the math five minuts longer every day than anybody else.

- The master of any game is generally the master of practice

- Practice is the path to mastery. Mastery is staying on the path.



Key 3

Surrender


- The courage of a master is meassured by his or her willingness to surrender.

- The beginner who stands on his or her dignity becomes rigid, armored, the learning can't get through.

- The essence of boredom is to be found in the obsessive search for novelty. Satisfaction lies in mindful repetition, the discovery of endless richness in subtle variations of familiar themes.

For the master, surrender means there are no experts. There are only learners.


Key 4

Intentionality


Nicklaus quote: A successful shot was 50% visualization, 40% setup and 10% swing

*Relaxation
*Confidence
*Mental rehearsal
*Imagining
*Relaxation exercises

Intentionality fuels the master's journey. Every master is a master of vision.


Key 5

The Edge


(I like this phrasing)
Masters are Zealots of practice, connoisseurs of the small, incremental step.

(looked up that word, connoisseur, someone who has a great deal of knowledge about the fine arts.)


Julie Moss

Share her stupid desire, heroism, to use yourself to the limit, to finish at all cost, to attain the unattainable.
But before playing this edge, there must be years of instruction, practice, surrender, and intentionality.

Being on the never ending path.

(Was a wonderful story about her, I found a youtub clip of it).




Tools for Mastery

Intro: How can you avoid backsliding? Where will you find the energy for your journey? What pitfalls will you encounter on the path? How can you apply mastery to the commonplace things of life? What should you back for the journey?


Why resolutions fail - and what to do about it.

- Every one of us resists significant change, no matter whether it's for the worse or for the better.

Our body, brain and behaviour have a built-in tendency to stay with the same within rather narrow limits, and to snap back when changed

- Equilibrium, called homeostasis

- Homeostasis doesn't distinguish between what you would call change for the better and change for the worse. It resists all change

- The resistance here is proportionate to the size and speed of the change

When you begind to pursue mastery, homeostasis will happen. Might come in any of these forms:

* Alarms in form of physical or psychological symptons
* Might unknowingly sabotage your own best efforts
* Might get resistance from family, friends and co-workers


Here are 5 guidelines to help you on your way if you do decide to go on the path.

1. Be aware of the way homeostasis works
(When the alarmbell rings, it doesn't mean you're sick or crazy or lazy or that you've made a bad decision.)

Instead take these signals as if you're life is about to change

- Don't panic and give up at the first sign of trouble

- Don't be surprised if some of the people you love start coverty and overtly undermining your self-improvement.
(It's not that they wish you harm, it's just homeostasis at work.)


2. Be willing to negotiate with your resistance to change

The willingness to take 2 steps forward and one step backwards

- To keep pushing, but not without awareness

Stay alert prepare for serious negotiations.


3. Develop a support system

* You can do it alone, but it helps a great deal to have other people with you.


4. Follow a regular practice.

Practice is a habit, and any regular practice provides a sort of underlying homeostasis, a stable base during the instability of change.


5. Dedicate yourself to lifelong learning.

* To learn is to change. Education, whether it involves books, body, or behaviour, is a process that changes the learner.

* The best learning of all involves learning to learn



Getting Energy for Mastery

* A human being is the kind of machine that wears out from lack of use. (There are limits)

* Often the best remedy for physical weariness is 30 min exercise.

* mental and spiritual lassitude is oftne cured by decisive action or the clear intention to act.


Here's how you get started:

1. Maintain physical fitness.

* Physical fitness contributes enormously to energy in every aspect of our lives.

* People who feel good about themselves, who are in touch with nature and their own bodies, are more likely to use their energy for good.


2. Acknowledge the negative and accentuate the positive

* Value a positive attitude and the effectiveness of praise and other forms of positive feedback.

* It seems you can hardly overdo it

- Acknowledging the negative doesn't mean sniveling; it means facing the truth and then moving on.

- Avoid teachers and supervisors who are highly critical in a negative sense.
(Telling people what they're doing wrong while ignoring what they are doing right reduces their energy).

"Here's what I like about what you're doing, and here's how you might improve it".


3. Try telling the truth

* Lies and secrets are poison

* Truth-telling works best when it involves revealing your own feelings, not when used to insult others and to get on your way.

* It has a lot going for it, risk, challenge, excitement and the release of all that energy


4. Honor but don't indulge your dark side.

- Stop putting so much of ourselves into that invisible bag.

- Use the blazing energy that flows from that which has been called dark.


5. Set your priorities.

- Before you can use your potential energy, you have to decide what you're going to do with it.

And in making any choice you face a monstrous fact: To move in one direction, you must forgo all others.

To choose one goal is to forsake a very large number of other possible goals.

(Television makes it even more complicated. By offering endless possibilities, it temps you to choose none, to sit staring in endless wonder, to become comatose. Indecision leads to inaction, which leads to low energy, depression and despair).

Liberation comes through the acceptance of your limits. You can't do everything, but you can do one thing, then another, and then another.

- In terms of energy, it's better to make a wrong choice than none at all.

- Start modestly, list your priorities, for the day, tomorrow. Try to do the same thing long term, use A,B,C. Priorities shift, and you can change them any time.

- Simply getting them down in black and white (if you use that color and paper) adds clarity to your life, and clarity creates energy.


6. Make commitments. Take action.

- Set your own deadlines

- Can give surge of clarity and energy

- You have to take it seriously
(One way is to make it public.)

- The firmer the deadline, the harder it is to break, and the more energy it confers.

- Above all else, move and keep moving.

- Take time for wise planning, but don't take forever


7. Get on path of mastery and stay on it.

- Adequate rest is cool, but unaccompanied by positive action, rest may only depress you

- People whose energy is flowing don't need to take a drug, commit a crime or "go to war" in order to feel alive.



Pitfalls along the way

It's easy to get on the path. The real challenge lies in staying on it.

1. Conflicting way of life


2. Obsessive goal orientation.

- The desire for quick, sure, and highly visible results is perhaps the deadliest enemy of mastery.

- When climbing, don't keep looking at the peak, keep your eyes on the path.


3. Poor instruction

* Surrender
* Don't bounce around from one teacher to another.
* But don't stick to a situation that's not working.


4. Lack of competitiveness.

* Competition provides spice
* Can provide motivation
* Winning graciously and losing with equal grace are the mark of a master


5. Overcompetetiveness.


6. Laziness

"Disinclined to action or extertion; averse to labor, indolent, idle, slothful."

The bad nres is that laziness will knock you off the path. The good news is that the path is the best possible cure for laziness. Courage!!! (Not suppose to be !'s there, but I added them for dramatic effect).


7. Injuries.

- The best way of achieving a goal is to be fully present.


8. Drugs.

Can give the illusion of getting the immediate success this culture is always promosing you.


9. Prizes and Medals.

Exessive use of external motivation can slow and even stop your journey to mastery.


10. Vanity.

To learn something new of any significance, you have to be willing to look foolish.

- If you're always thinking about apperances, you can never attain the state of concentration that's necessary for effective learning and top preformance.


11. Dead seriousness.

Without laughter, the rough and rocky places on the path might be too painful to bear. Humor not only lightens your load, it also broadens perspective. To be deadly serious is to suffer tunnelvision. To be able to laugh at yourself clears the vision. When choosing fellow voyagers, beware of grimness, self-importance, and the solemn eye.


12. Inconsistency.

- Consistency of practice is the mark of the master

- Value in repeating favourite rituals before, during and after practice.

- Inconsistency not only loses you practice time, but makes everything more difficult when you do get around to practicing.


13. Perfectionism.

We fail to realize mastery is not about perfection. It's about a process, a journey. The master is the one who stays on the path day after day, year after year. The master is the one who is willing to try, and fail, and try again, for as long as he or she lives.


Mastering the Commonplace

- Most of life is "in between"

- Building a stone wall or washing dishes is essentially no different from formal meditation


Household Rhythm:
- Whatever you do, do it awesomely (I made that word up)
- Stay wholly focused on the moment
- Above all, don't hurry

- Life is filled with opportunities for practicing the inexorable, unhurried rhythm of mastery.

Focus on the process rather than the product

This takes practice....


The challenge of Relationships

- If you have to work at a sport to achieve mastery, you also have to work, and generally work even more diligently, to achieve mastery in relationships.

- The most important learning and development takes place during your time on the plateau

* Instruction
* Practice
* Surrender
(The stronger you are the more you can give of yourself. The more you give of yourself, the stronger you can be.)
* Intentionality
(Cultivate a positive attitude)
* The Edge

The path to mastery is built on unrelenting practice, but it's also a place of adventure.

Couples with a willingness to play new games, dances, intimacy, willingness to strip layers, to live entierly in the moment, revealing everything and epecting nothing in return.

Ultimately, nothing in this life is "commonplace," nothing is "in between". The threads that join your every act, your every thought, are infinite. All paths of mastery eventually merge.


Packing for the Journey

Maybe an old skill or obsession you've been dabbling in, or hacking at for months or years. Maybe vowed to treat your entire life to the best of your ability, as a process to mastery.

Start with the checklist.

The Five Master Keys

* Key 1: Instruction
* Key 2: Practice
* Key 3: Surrender
* Key 4: Intengionality
* Key 5: The Edge

Dealing with change and Homeostasis

* Be aware of how homeostasis work
* Be willing to negotiate with your resistance to change
* Develop a support system
* Follow a regular practice
* Dedicate yourself to lifelong learning

Getting Energy for Mastery

* Maintain physical fitness
* Acknowledge the negative and accentuate the positive
* Try telling the truth
* Honor but don't indulge in your dark side
* Set priorities
* Make commitments. Take action
* Get on the path of mastery and stay on it


Pitfalls along the Path

* Conflicting way of life
* Obsessive goal orientation
* Poor instruction
* Lack of competitiveness
* Overcompetetiveness
* Laziness
* Injuries
* Drugs
* Prizes and medals
* Vanity
* Inconsistency
* Perfectionism


Parting Gifts

Balancing and centering
(oh crap)

Returning to the center

- Basicly, learn about meditaiton, breathing exercises. When you get knocked off, find your center.


Getting Energy from unexpected blows

- When things go shit, losing a friend, loved one. Don't struggle blindly, don't deny youself the pain.

- Have a partner grab your wrist, and spill your guts.

- When done, feel your center, focus on the clarity and use all that energy. Consider the possibility that any misfortune that befalls you during your journey can be converted to positive energy.


Introduction to ki

ki in japanese
ch'i in Chinese
Pneuma in Greek
Prana in Sanskrit
"the force" in Star Wars lol

In the ancient tradition, the word comes from the notion of breath

* Considered the fundemantel energy of the Universe that connects all things and undergirds all creative action.

- The idea of ki can offer the untrained person an effective way of gaining a sensation of increased power along with relaxation, especially during times of fatigute and stress, and thus is a useful item to pack for your journey.

Relaxing for power:
Power; to be able

Visualize with exagerrated images, make your muscles relaxed (not rigid and tense) to increase their power.


Interessting facts:

- Human DNA contains more information than all of the libraries in the world.

- In potentia, humans are the most formidable all-around athlete who has ever roamed the planet.

- The unaided human eye can detect a single quantum of light and discern more than ten million colors. (I'm pretty sure i'm stuck at like 9).

- The human brain is the most complex entity in the known universe.

- What you are made of is mostly unused potential.

- It is our evolutionary destiny to use what is unused, to learn and keep learning for as long as we live

To choose this destinty, to walk the path of mastery, isn't always easy, but it's the ultimate human adventure.


Closing words

To be a learner, you've got to be willing to be a fool.

- How many times have you failed to try something new out of fear of being thought silly?

- How often have you censored your spontaneity out of fear of being thougt childish?

Second naivete = childlike quality, often found in people with an unusually high degree of their potential


"Are you willing to wear your white belt?"