QA- Larry – Testing the Waters of Poker!
Hello Annie… I’m not sure how to ask my question? I don’t want to make it to general. When you first started playing poker, how did you determine that you could make money playing poker? I would seriously like to test the waters, but I can’t just quit work and start playing and lose everything I own to, just to know if I can play or not. {By the way I would not do that} I think I’m a good hold’em player. I have read books, watched and listened to the pros, but none of them have a good plan to test the waters. You supported you family by playing poker. You must of had some guidelines to follow or you must have felt every confident and didn’t need guide lines. LOL… I feel confident at the poker table. Actually I’m in the black when it comes to playing poker 4 or 5 times a month, and I am learning more about the game all the time.
Hope you get the drift of my question. If you have any advice it would be appreciated.
Annie Fan, Larry
PS… I have been hearing all my life, you can do anything if you want it bad enough…
Wow, Larry, that’s a big question – a life changing one. I’m afraid I can’t give you what you’re looking for, a plan to test the waters, but maybe I can give you some useful thoughts. First, remember that when I started playing poker, I had a great teacher (my brother Howard) and a lot of willing donators to my cause (in those Montana card rooms. I do think I had a gift for the game, because it didn’t take much time at all for me to be a winning player. So let me ask you this hard question: “Do you have the gift?” I know it’s a tough question to answer, but be honest with yourself, and try. If you know you don’t have the gift, then poker’s not the career for you. If you know you do have the gift, then “Go for it!” If you’re not sure (the most likely answer) then you’re just gonna have to find some way to find out. Try this: Start playing as much poker as your free time allows. Keep very careful records of your performance. At the end of six months or a year, divide your profit by the hours you’ve played and see what kind of hourly wage you would have earned. If you find you could’ve made a decent living from your “theoretical” career, maybe you can give the real thing a shot.
I don’t know what kind of family/financial responsibilities you have, but it’s much easier to make a living playing poker when you don’t have a big monthly “nut” to cover, so factor that in. But also factor this in. You only go around once in this life, and if you feel it’s your destiny to be a poker pro, you kinda owe it to yourself to try.
xo
Annie
Dont know if you will find the humor in this but I was searching for information on a research paper about TD Ameritrade and somehow from clicking through several links I stumbled into your blog here. While not at all relevent to what I was searching for, your post was interesting enough for me to not click back right away. Just wanted to comment before leaving to let you know that the internet is a weird place and you are getting visitors from places I’ll bet you never thought possible. Thanks.