When I tell people how I make money, I get one of four responses:

1 - Yeah sure, you probably only tell people about your wins. Nobody wins at gambling.
2 - Oh my God, that is the coolest thing ever. It must be so glamorous. I would love to be able to do that.
3 - I have no idea what that is. I have tuned out of this conversation. I am literally falling asleep with every word you utter.
4 - My brother has a gambling problem. People like you disgust me. I have no respect for people who contribute nothing to the world and prey on the stupid, drunk and/or chronically addicted.

My answer to these people uniformly go as follows:

1 - I assure you I don't. When I say what I won last week I'm telling u the net sum. But okay, whatever. I don't need to justify myself to you beyond that.
2 - Yeah, its really glamorous! I lie in bed in my robe and underpants with my laptop on my belly, pushing buttons really quickly.
3 - Fair enough! Lets change the subject to what you do, you probably fascinating human being.
4 - Hand-on-heart, I struggle with that stuff. I am aware of how I do not contribute to society and that is why I am very focused on maintaining a balance between poker and writing.

I don't expect people to take an interest in what I do but sometimes people are curious and probe me for details. What's it like being an online poker player? Is it significantly different to a 'regular job'? Is it easy to lose touch with reality? What's the day-to-day grind of it like? Do you have an average day? How consistently do you make money?

Playing poker is tough psychologically. The swings can mess with your head. My girlfriend suffered a recent bad run which I believed pushed her to the limits of her tolerance for the cruelty and unfairness of the game. She's a quality player and she dug herself out. As they say in sport; "form is temporary, class is permanent". But it made me realise how poker has the ability to rock you to your core. It can fuck with your equilibrium, erode your confidence, force you to stare at the abyss. Inner-strength and self-belief have to be maintained through significant droughts and you must of course be sufficiently open-minded to recognise when perhaps the fault of a bad run lies with your game. You must have the humility to acknowledge the leaks and plug them before they ruin you.

Poker is different to most other lines of work but is similar to some. The analogy I constantly use is that of a cafe-owner. Your poker business is your coffee-shop. You rely on your business acumen to survive in a competitive industry. You live and die on your wits. Your shop has profitable days, break-even days and days where you make a loss. By the end of each month, however, you must finish with a net profit or else you will struggle. Several down months in a row and you're out of business. Several good months in a row and you can expand your operation.

It can be easy to lose touch with reality. In essence, I play a video-game and as fans of 'World of Warcraft', 'Halo 3' and 'Tetris' (my own personal fave!) can testify, it is easy to get lost in that world. The main difference is that poker has an obvious reference point back into reality - the money. A dollar earned online translates back to a dollar that I can spend in the real world.

To offer a glimpse into the day-to-day grind of online poker, I kept a brief daily summary - a financial diary, if you will - of the past 10 days. In my next blog entry, I will publish that summary and as you will see, there is no 'average day' and over such a short period, my results are pretty damn inconsistent.

 


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