This story is probably going to be out of order. I'm trying to keep it chronological, but really I'm just writing off the top.If you don't care to hear about my life story then don't read nor reply. I'm by myself and reflecting on my life. I don't care to read hateful responses.I read alot of life stories on 2p2, and learned alot from their outlook or things that have happened to them.I'm 18 years old. When I was in grade 9, I started playing poker casually, winning at 25NL. I read some books, stuff like that. A robusto from freerolls at pokerchamps.com culminated in me winning a small field, large buyin MTT for $3k. I cashed alot out and started playing SNGs on party. I got real good and made alot of money. I also started to play on stars ocassionally, but mainly partypoker (actually empire w/ rb). Also I started playing live poker, at 200NL and moving to 400NL live. Here I also did reasonably well.I went robusto, had a bunch of money, and started playing less and spending more. I entered alot of donkaments and other high stakes games as a huge fish. (games I had just learned the rules prior to playing) I started to party hard and being really degenerate. I entered exclusively high stakes games and lost a ton of money. I did stupid stuff with the rest of the money. I travelled the world and went alot of places. I played alot of $1kNL live, and won alot and then tilted away stuff. Here is a picture of me between a particularily long session taken by a friend. By the way, that shirt in the picture cost me $200 and it looks godawful, I am really embarassed I bought it because I don't even like that shirt, but that is a different story altogether. I look really [censored] dirty in this picture and I've been on and off with looking really goddamn bad and really good and polished with my hair cut and nice clothes, because of my degrading-then-robusto-then-degrading type of lifestyle.http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/5892/prockp9.jpgThe only thing I remember about this downward spiral is when ZBTHorton saw me at 5/10 limit and said I was 'playing well.' Lol, but he was probably wrong. Oh, I also remember having $1200 in front of me at $200NL Live, and then dumping $1kbecause I wanted to "break" the table. Soon I was almost busto. I bought a bunch of designer clothes with the rest of my money. I had about $400 left.At the same time, I'd been doing okay at math contests and was pretty interested in various stuff (besides poker: math, a bit of chess/go, a bit into girls, art, starcraft(ums)/warcraft3(dota), magic the gathering, various theory like political theory, stuff like that. I like dance and dance music. Noone on BBV likes my rhymes apparently.) I was interested alot in social theory and spent alot of time in it (That's another story.) and would wonder about various stuff [like, "why do girls zigzag when they walk? and guys in a straight line? suppose the problem of people walking towards each other in a 2 lane sidewalk, if both people change lanes, they lose, if they crash they lose, if one person moves they lose EV, what is the optimal solution, and is this a teleolgical explanation for 'alpha/beta' in some sense?" ] I learned some python which helps me ocassionally (example: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat...mp;Main=8006000 ) but I get no love when I help people on this forum, usually. I went to university on a 19k/4yrs scholarship. Combined with govt money, I would be in the clear.My parents are pretty poor so they wouldn't be able to support any part of me even if they could. I know they love me and want me to do well in school though. When I was in gr10/11, during the summer I went to a 5wk mathcamp (on a full scholarship), and learned alot of stuff besides math that helped me. I also found that there were girls who were beautiful and liked math (which I didn't think existed.) I'm friends with some of these girls today and it helped me expand my horizons and see other places.I also played a brickton of live, and learned alot of live tells n stuff. Also, in america (I'm from canada), generally rich kids are afforded better schooling and stuff, and in that camp there were mainly richer people, so that was my first glimpse of how rich people think.In HS I never went to school, but did enough to get some marks. I never accepted any responsibility. I went out alot to pickup girls 'n stuff like that. I was real akward, and one of the reasons was my clothes. I was wearing like $2 clothes from goodwill (like salvation army) because noone had any money. [i found these really sick pair of lime green pants that turned yellow from all the washing because I was wearing them almost all the time, and later they became too small for me ]. The other reason I was akward was because I never made any friends throughout school from kindergarten throughout grade 8. I read all the books we had in the house, including the textbooks, and when they were done I just reread them. I'm disappointed I never visited the library when I was real younger, instead choosing to sit on my ***. (Another thing, I didn't exercise enough, and I never made friends nor had a childhood. My best friend was a computer which I sat infront of (with food) almost 24/7 all the way up to grade 10.)Anyways, so I went to univ, where I met timex, and found out that he wasnt degenerate and made alot of money through solid play. At first I was real jealous, but after busto'ing lots I realized that all these great players who are making big money make money because of solid work, and not through luck, and they truly grind it out and never play over their head. I realized also (connecting stuff) that rich people are really tight with their money, thats because they protect their bankroll, and I should protect my bankroll more. Oh, and also, there was one move I remember, where like, him and some people he met were playing a $5 live sng, and I wanted to play, and like .. iono there was like say,.. 100 chips in the sng, and the blinds were probably like 1/2 (this is really hazy in my mind), so anyways I am like, can I get in, and he's like "no", so I'm like okay I'll take 98 chips just let me play. Anyways, he talks me down to 80 chips, or something ultra-ridiculous. Anyways I still won that sng, but like, I thought about this for a long time, like, rich people, they never give ANYTHING up, like I would have given 100 chips immediately even if I knew he was much better than me, because its just for fun anyways. (I know that he was just probably [censored] around like he was just trying to see 'how low i would go', but the common theme that rich people do not give anything up remains.) BTW I also beat timex in 3 straight HU's out of the 3 we have played. Interested in playing some more HUs with him as I am a bad HU player.So, during frosh week, I started meeting more girls n stuff like that. I got back into DDR. I also learned this game para para paradise, which is a really [censored] game, but I can play some songs backwards, which is pretty impressive, and I like when I know the song so well that I can freestyle, and just like "dance" for real (my dance style is like, modern dance.. maybe some elements of like.. michael jackson.) Timex's friend stakeamented me for $16 sngs, and I had a 40BI downswing or something ridiculous like that. Where before I had a 20% roi at $30ish sngs over a ridic sample, now I was ITM'ing like 1 table out of my 16 set. (And no, 4 tabling as opposed to 16 tabling didnt help, obviously I would play slower as I was losing.) So I was down like $500. At this time, and also through experimentation with nano-buyin sngs/cashgames, I decided I was probably (currently) an unprofitable player online. At this time in my life, I thought poker was just badbeats and that I was a pretty good player. (I think at this point I was a winning player, but I had an incorrect view about the nature of poker.) I remember playing the $162 stuper a long time ago, and this hand came up:*** HOLE CARDS ***Dealt to AlphaWice [Ks Kc]fumanchu: raises 2000 to 3000chick446: raises 1930 to 4930 and is all-incool0813: foldsPaul Robot: foldsAlphaWice: raises 20956 to 25886 and is all-iniceman2222: foldslarrygold: foldsdangdokodang: calls 963 and is all-infumanchu: calls 7608 and is all-in*** FLOP *** [6c 9s 3h]*** TURN *** [6c 9s 3h] [Qs]*** RIVER *** [6c 9s 3h Qs] [Qc]*** SHOW DOWN ***fumanchu: shows [Kh Qd] (three of a kind, Queens)AlphaWice: shows [Ks Kc] (two pair, Kings and Queens)fumanchu collected 11356 from side pot-2chick446: shows [As Qh] (three of a kind, Queens - Ace kicker)chick446 collected 8901 from side pot-1dangdokodang: shows [4d 4s] (two pair, Queens and Fours)larrygold said, "wow"chick446 collected 8752 from main potThe player fumanchu just one outed me on the river for the 11k sidepot. That hand made me feel sick. Later I busted very deep with this hand:Dealt to AlphaWice [Qc Qd] , blinds 750/1500Sooners: raises 2700 to 4200Castor: foldsfumanchu: foldspokerkid888: foldsRoKaFeLa: foldsGoosewit: foldsiceman2222: calls 4200AlphaWice: raises 8513 to 12713 and is all-inpianolegs: foldsSooners: calls 8513iceman2222: calls 8513*** FLOP *** [Jh 2c 8s]Sooners: checksiceman2222: bets 43777 and is all-inSooners: folds*** TURN *** [Jh 2c 8s] [3c]*** RIVER *** [Jh 2c 8s 3c] [Th]*** SHOW DOWN ***AlphaWice: shows [Qc Qd] (a pair of Queens)iceman2222: shows [2d 2h] (three of a kind, Deuces)iceman2222 collected 40314 from pot(Sooners says he folded TT in chat, I believe.)That finish in the stuper made me feel sick for a very long long time [call with 22? LOL], and similar thoughts made me play bad very deep in the $100 deep stack, where danomano kept 3 betting me all in, and I kept folding AJish hands. Those were the only MTTs where I went significantly deep, and I didn't robusto in either of them (I didn't play very many MTTs though, maybe like 15 big buyin MTTs before university where I was broke entering univ. anyways.)DDR was the only thing keeping me healthy. I started to eat more and gain a bit of weight. I remember my friend was in the cafe and I was with him and I ate like 3 philly cheese steaks, which was so bad, and like the attendant was bitching me out on that when I was buying the food, like "another one?" and also my friend was joking about a propbet where I'd have to eat 7 of them in a limited time, but I backed out (because honestly thats way too much food), and also we were joking like:: him: "and after your done, I will buy you a free one, like 'hey alex, here is another philly, for your pleasure' " lawl. That was some good times.Anyways, I got pretty anti social. In university I never went to class but I did decently. I remember a real close call where I came back from Toronto to Waterloo (I go to univ. of waterloo) and it was like, the 10th or something, and I read on my computer science class webpage that the midterm was the 10th, and it was like 4pm, and I was freaking out for like 10 mins trying to figure out how I could weasel my way out of it(thats the other thing, I always try to weasel my way out of stuff, like when I was in grade 7 or something, my friend gave me this note that fell out of some girl's bag, it was like a letter from some guy she was seeing about like her having sex n stuff like that, and he joked that I should extort her, and sadly I did, and I feel so stupid about it later, and instead of admitting responsibility and being expelled [the punishment according to the policy], instead I sat in a chair for 9 hours without admitting anything, and they couldn't pin me. I usually knew how the system worked and spent alot of my free time reviewing the laws/policies of the state/school so that I could get away with all sorts of [censored], instead of being responsible like everyone else. I did alot of stupid [censored] when I was younger that I am real sorry about.)so anyways yeah anyways I found out the midterm is like 7pm, lawl.Yeah, so now in the term, already met a few girls I liked from parties n stuff. I'm walking around the library and I meet this girl, approaches me for help with math. (This is common and I often help people with math, and have been since grade 10 - because I like it.) So anyways I guess I was dressed nicely because she asked me for like my email, so like okay. Blah blah she invites me to some cafe for breakfast on her, so I take that. We went to my place and I felt real comfortable around her, because she told me about her past about being a street kid n stuff like that and I related alot. There was something about her that made me unsettled though.Fast foward, she asks me if I'm going to 'ask her out', and I do, so I guess we were in some sort of relationship. But really we weren't, and she was just probably trying to 'use me' for help with math (I never really did help her.) I put up with alot of BS which was one of the first times that I did with any girl. And before, I looked at women as very nice, and beautiful, and honestly I was too naive to think that a girl could be a [censored] or a whore, like for real. I always thought those words were hurtful. But there are some girls with the 'stripper mentality' of thinking all men are suckers that can be taken advantage of, and there are some girls that have sex with ~50 guys when they are like 18 years old, without using protection n [censored] like that. So that opened my eyes. So basically, it was a good decision to stop talking to her, but it was hard because it was one of the first times I got emotionally close to anyone (I had been with other girls in the past, but I didn't think of most them as equals because I was too arrogant, but this time I felt for a while that we were on the same level, when really we weren't:she wasn't going to do anything in her life, but I was.) Nowadays, I feel I can relate very well to alot of girls. (Also, girls love my math-Tshirts for some reason, I still don't know why. Maybe its because I feel good wearing my "invertibles" tee.)At the same time, seeing her too often degraded my regular life and I had stopped talking to many people nor doing math. School sneaked up on me and scared the bejesus out of me. I studied a bit more. At the same time, I was using Magic the Gathering (a card game) to get my life on track (giving me something to do besides girls.) I felt really unattractive because I didn't think anyone liked me anymore. I tried to be pro at MTG but I failed because I didn't learn fast enough. I basically wasted $150 in this spurt of trying to learn MTG drafts over some 3 weeks. That $400 shrivelled to $150 through various stuff, this MTG thing included.I entered the secret santaments thing in the MTTC because I wanted my reputation to be better in the community. I thought that if I participated in some of these events, I would get to know more people, or something like that. My mom suggested I send a dvd or scarf, but I didn't want to send a $2 gift, so I sent this thing I bought in thailand a while ago that I thought was really nice. Also because of conflicts with school, I paid like $30 for shipping. This was not a good idea because my networth was about $50 now. (I haven't had any roll on the internet because I haven't been playing online poker for 3 months now basically.) I got (IMO) a crappy gift, so I felt dumb. I won't say who gave me the gift because it's disrespectful, but I was not happy with it at all. Even a nice pillow I would have been happy with.I don't have many posessions. When I was moving to univ, the move-helpers commented it was the first person they've ever seen that moved all their stuff to the room in one carry. I've got a portrait of myself on my wall that is done with pencils by an amazing girl I never really bothered to meet throughout my life. (I'd known her since grade 3? Forgot.) My bed sucks and I got some nutri-grain bars which don't taste very good. I've got clothes and paper. A $3 phone I got from camp a long time ago and brought back with me that barely works. [it's the same phone that you see on the TV show "Married With Children."] That's about it.[forgive the light in the center, I turned around and snapped it without changing the settings on the camera.]http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/9853/meeesa7.jpgAnyways, OSAP reevaluated how much they would give me, and it is significantly less than they quoted earlier (just enough to pay school and timex's friend, which I am really sorry for lending money off him that I couldn't pay quickly, and I don't think anyone understands that I really don't want to owe any money nor be slow paying back [normally I pay back the second I get money, but sadly I have no money to payback.])Also, my house sucks. My parents are pretty poor and fight over money alot. They also make alot of heavily -EV decisions and don't think level-headed at all. We don't have the furnace on to save like $100/yr, which makes it REALLY cold in the house. I wear socks and the floor is still damn cold. When its really cold or you are really hungry you can't think straight. The house is falling apart and its no good. I remember thinking: "there's nothing left for me in toronto." There really isn't. (I had crumbled all my ties with people in Toronto, which is another thing people don't understand - they ask "how can you know so many people yet have so little friends?" the reason is because I never updated my friends and like, stopped talking to alot of people, or with some girls just didnt see them for a while and they forgot about me)I was supposed to go home and come back, and my parents said they'd give me the money to do that, but I hate accepting money from them because I know its credit. I remember when I was robusto I bought my dad (actually the family, but like I was using it probably 2% of the time. My dad bought a flickr account and he used to post alot to that.) a camera, 8.1 megapixels, was very good back then, and I know he likes cameras. So anyways I took the camera to univ to use one time because he said he wouldn't mind, but then he bought another camera anyways, and I felt so stupid, like, I didn't even care about the camera (I never ended up using it anyways.), and worse, the purchase was on credit. That made me feel so sick inside, like, wtf did I buy a camera for (it was like 98% for him), but maybe it was my fault that I didn't know that he was a camera-addict or something.So anyways, I've been staying at the university for the past 2 wks or so, and for the past 2 weeks I havent had my keys (left them in toronto accidentally), so I've been taking tape from notices and ducttaping the hallway door and leaving my room door unlocked so I can move around. Also for the past 5 days I ran out of food money and ramen noodles (which are like .20c a package if you buy them from chinatown in toronto and drag them around, the good MAMA ones, I like those) so I've been leeching food off the lounge and eating like REALLY light and fasting alot and drinking alot of water and generally just sleeping in my bed or practicing stuff i like (dance, dota, etc.) and in general just staying in my room.Over the term, I think that besides the MTG spending, which was kind of dumb (though, might of been helpful for me mentally), I penny pinched real good. I didn't buy any textbooks/course notes. That saved me alot of money. I pretty much saved every penny I could. I'm proud of that.So like, over the past 2 weeks, my life has degraded ALOT. Like, I haven't basically been talking to anyone face to face, and just living in a cubicle. I'm kinda crazy now. I think I'm gonna get a job or something, and then get my food money on track, then $500 and then play very overrolled nano-stakes (not sure what game yet), to get my confidence back [i used to be a winning player, now I am not so sure, and also I realized I should be playing on 100% my own.]I think my greatest strengths is my capacity to learn and process information. Like, its weird, but in the university, it is a really small world. Sometimes I just like to sit down in the cafe in the center alone and listen to all the conversations at once, and its like a sea of conversations, but I can listen to most of them all at once, which is pretty neat. The neatest thing is being able to extrapolate though. I used to study social stuff intensively too, so I feel like, I have the greatest understanding with the least knowledge, which makes me feel proud. Like, I can meet a girl, and like, already know stuff on her, because I've heard all the gossip about her, and like extrapolate and know what kind of person she is, based on what people say, even though I haven't met her nor her friends. That's pretty neat. I also like to listen to conversations when I am on the bus and just listen to girls talk and understand how they think, I am amazed by it. Also, I have 30/20 vision (optometry test) and can pick out stuff real well. I'm a bit color blind though. Oh, and I am thinking almost ALL the time. Like, I never stop thinking. I consider myself to be an experienced thinker. I've always been thinking.I think my greatest weakness is that I don't have self discipline. There was some rare times where, say I was playing .. $200NL Live, and there is a REALLY fishy guy on the table, I can't walk away, I buyin max ($200), lose, then I buyin max ($200), lose, etc. until I lost like $1k. That particular time, the guy got AA 7 times in that session. After losing, I realize the game was probably actually fixed for real and I should have walked away. (I'm not one of those people that ever think that a game is fixed.) Usually I am watching the dealer very closely and can tell because I studied all the various moves, but this was a very very skilled asian girl dealer so maybe she mezmerized me or something. Also, there's alot of times where I should have done something but didn't do it because I was lazy. Let's not forget the time I bolt out of algebra class because I realize I wasn't enrolled in the course because I forgot to pay the university.I feel like, academically I am doing very well and opportunities are going to come at me as I progress throughout the years. I think my biggest goal (or obstacle) is that I need a strong income like alot of the ballers on this forum have. I know that I am really smart and can learn very fast. Really, I would want someone to coach me (and/or stake me), but I don't know if that is possible, especially because people don't really know me, so how will they want to spend their time/money on me anyways. I understand now that poker is really alot of skill instead of luck, and there are alot of people that have very steady, unshaking profit graphs. I want to be like this and make money steadily, and I know it takes alot of actual work, and I feel like I am ready to start working and making money slowly. Also, I recognize that there's alot of learning that needs to be done in poker, and I still need to learn alot. I was playing .10/.20 limit using Sklansky's "Small Stakes Holdem" that Igot from the FPP store, and there was alot of skilled play and I walked away a loser. I felt bad, like I thought I was playing really good but I wasnt.Like, there was one hand (10handed), someone limped UTG+1, I had ATo on the btn and raised, the BB and UTG+1 call, and then I lose on the ace flop to AJs. After I saw that he just limp/called AJs UTG+1, I felt like the skill of the table in these micro stakes games was alot higher than what I thought. I often see ridiculous, boneheaded plays at $200NL or even higher ("newhizzle" playing $1k, $2kNL), but also I see some real decent play at microstakes, which makes me re-evaluate how much of a winner I think I am at $50NL or $100NL online (I used to think alot, but now I think they are reasonably hard games.)I did alot of studying with the S-C chart and various playing with ICM/sngpt (I don't have SNGPT because I'm poor, but I have a computer and programming skills.) On the whole I feel like I am a really good player. In live poker, I feel like I am an amazing player, because I have alot of knowledge of live hand reading and alot of play in that environment for my age. This is why I feel I am +EV at 5/10 NL Live easily, even though I haven't put in enough hands, but not sure of my EV at 1/2 NL online [also, obviously live 1/2 NL is much much easier than 1/2 NL online]Finally, I have alot of free time because school is mega-easy for me. So I've had alot of time to persue stuff and I'm thankful about that. Also, I like teaching and I've done alot of teaching in alot of different areas. I'm sure that my money problems will fade soon, especially as my work term approaches in 4 months. What I would really like to do is become very very good at poker. I've read most of the posts in the forums that deal with strategy, but sometimes I think poker is very difficult and I don't feel I am playing well. I haven't been playing poker seriously in the longest time, but I would hate to give up because I think my personality is suited for poker, and I am very smart and can learn all the games. Really, sometimes I wonder if I am doing the best thing in my life and maybe trying to start on poker now is a stupid idea. But when I see people making lots and lots of money, I want to make that money too. I know alot of rich people that don't know what it's like to want money so bad you are hurting for it. They have good discipline and build their roll steadily. Their biggest fear in life is to lose what they have steadily built. I know what can be done with money and how it feels to hurt for money, whether you are very rich or very poor. I know what its like to skip on food sometimes because you are hurting so bad for money. You feel real weak when you are fasting because you can't [censored] eat and you need some goddamn money. And I know what its like when you need to help your friend or family with $100 so that they can make it through the worst even though you only have $100 yourself. And alot of times the people you know, including yourself, made alot of bad decisions to put themselves in the hole, but you still help them out because you help out your [censored] family and close friends.On the other side of the same coin, I know how it feels when you see that ultrafish sitting with 10 buyins deep in an uncapped NL game and you don't have the roll to shark him and you gotta walk away. It hurts bad. You want money bad, you want to win so badly. You would 30 table for over 12 hours straight just to get enough goddamn money to sit down with that fish who just LEAKS money. Fish who call 30BB preflop with 85o. You'd cut your own [censored] hand off for a shot at that *****. Or maybe you are just hurting for money so bad to make that free $1k bet on MANSION. Those sort of things helped me understand that protecting my roll was important so that I would have enough to ride downswings and take advantage of hugely +EV situations as they came up.In conclusion, my parents are poor. My childhood is non-existant. I am really smart and learn stuff for fun. I learn fast. I was robusto at poker and spent all my money. I've got two money problems, the immediate one that will go away soon, and the larger one that I need to support my family (that's the chinese way, I'm 1/4th chinese and my mom identifies with that culture a bit.) My life, though good throughout summer and the beginning of university, degraded significantly when I stopped doing anything interesting. I haven't been talking to anyone at all for a while, just living in a box. I haven't been playing poker seriously for a very long while, and need to learn how to get back into the game. I would like a coach. I would like to be crushing $2k NL in a year. I never want to play a game underrolled again. Tell me how to get my life on track. Tell me about meta-poker strategies, like how to protect your roll or practice good game selection, which I don't know enough about. Ask me about stuff you want to know more about - I actually know alot. Ask me questions, especially about my life. Give me your advice. Discuss.cliffs notes: My life could be better, but isn't because I lack self discipline, which is a shame because I have extremely ridiculous potential. I need to get on track. Also, being alone and thinking most of my life has provided alot of insight on various topics. Ask me questions and I will provide answers. Tell me answers and I will provide questions.--Finally, is there anything that you do / have done that has helped you become better at life?
Hi! Newbie Here, My Life Story...
in General Poker Forum
Posted
This story is probably going to be out of order. I'm trying to keep it chronological, but really I'm just writing off the top.If you don't care to hear about my life story then don't read nor reply. I'm by myself and reflecting on my life. I don't care to read hateful responses.I read alot of life stories on 2p2, and learned alot from their outlook or things that have happened to them.I'm 18 years old. When I was in grade 9, I started playing poker casually, winning at 25NL. I read some books, stuff like that. A robusto from freerolls at pokerchamps.com culminated in me winning a small field, large buyin MTT for $3k. I cashed alot out and started playing SNGs on party. I got real good and made alot of money. I also started to play on stars ocassionally, but mainly partypoker (actually empire w/ rb). Also I started playing live poker, at 200NL and moving to 400NL live. Here I also did reasonably well.I went robusto, had a bunch of money, and started playing less and spending more. I entered alot of donkaments and other high stakes games as a huge fish. (games I had just learned the rules prior to playing) I started to party hard and being really degenerate. I entered exclusively high stakes games and lost a ton of money. I did stupid stuff with the rest of the money. I travelled the world and went alot of places. I played alot of $1kNL live, and won alot and then tilted away stuff. Here is a picture of me between a particularily long session taken by a friend. By the way, that shirt in the picture cost me $200 and it looks godawful, I am really embarassed I bought it because I don't even like that shirt, but that is a different story altogether. I look really [censored] dirty in this picture and I've been on and off with looking really goddamn bad and really good and polished with my hair cut and nice clothes, because of my degrading-then-robusto-then-degrading type of lifestyle.http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/5892/prockp9.jpgThe only thing I remember about this downward spiral is when ZBTHorton saw me at 5/10 limit and said I was 'playing well.' Lol, but he was probably wrong. Oh, I also remember having $1200 in front of me at $200NL Live, and then dumping $1kbecause I wanted to "break" the table. Soon I was almost busto. I bought a bunch of designer clothes with the rest of my money. I had about $400 left.At the same time, I'd been doing okay at math contests and was pretty interested in various stuff (besides poker: math, a bit of chess/go, a bit into girls, art, starcraft(ums)/warcraft3(dota), magic the gathering, various theory like political theory, stuff like that. I like dance and dance music. Noone on BBV likes my rhymes apparently.) I was interested alot in social theory and spent alot of time in it (That's another story.) and would wonder about various stuff [like, "why do girls zigzag when they walk? and guys in a straight line? suppose the problem of people walking towards each other in a 2 lane sidewalk, if both people change lanes, they lose, if they crash they lose, if one person moves they lose EV, what is the optimal solution, and is this a teleolgical explanation for 'alpha/beta' in some sense?" ] I learned some python which helps me ocassionally (example: http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat...mp;Main=8006000 ) but I get no love when I help people on this forum, usually. I went to university on a 19k/4yrs scholarship. Combined with govt money, I would be in the clear.My parents are pretty poor so they wouldn't be able to support any part of me even if they could. I know they love me and want me to do well in school though. When I was in gr10/11, during the summer I went to a 5wk mathcamp (on a full scholarship), and learned alot of stuff besides math that helped me. I also found that there were girls who were beautiful and liked math (which I didn't think existed.) I'm friends with some of these girls today and it helped me expand my horizons and see other places.I also played a brickton of live, and learned alot of live tells n stuff. Also, in america (I'm from canada), generally rich kids are afforded better schooling and stuff, and in that camp there were mainly richer people, so that was my first glimpse of how rich people think.In HS I never went to school, but did enough to get some marks. I never accepted any responsibility. I went out alot to pickup girls 'n stuff like that. I was real akward, and one of the reasons was my clothes. I was wearing like $2 clothes from goodwill (like salvation army) because noone had any money. [i found these really sick pair of lime green pants that turned yellow from all the washing because I was wearing them almost all the time, and later they became too small for me ]. The other reason I was akward was because I never made any friends throughout school from kindergarten throughout grade 8. I read all the books we had in the house, including the textbooks, and when they were done I just reread them. I'm disappointed I never visited the library when I was real younger, instead choosing to sit on my ***. (Another thing, I didn't exercise enough, and I never made friends nor had a childhood. My best friend was a computer which I sat infront of (with food) almost 24/7 all the way up to grade 10.)Anyways, so I went to univ, where I met timex, and found out that he wasnt degenerate and made alot of money through solid play. At first I was real jealous, but after busto'ing lots I realized that all these great players who are making big money make money because of solid work, and not through luck, and they truly grind it out and never play over their head. I realized also (connecting stuff) that rich people are really tight with their money, thats because they protect their bankroll, and I should protect my bankroll more. Oh, and also, there was one move I remember, where like, him and some people he met were playing a $5 live sng, and I wanted to play, and like .. iono there was like say,.. 100 chips in the sng, and the blinds were probably like 1/2 (this is really hazy in my mind), so anyways I am like, can I get in, and he's like "no", so I'm like okay I'll take 98 chips just let me play. Anyways, he talks me down to 80 chips, or something ultra-ridiculous. Anyways I still won that sng, but like, I thought about this for a long time, like, rich people, they never give ANYTHING up, like I would have given 100 chips immediately even if I knew he was much better than me, because its just for fun anyways. (I know that he was just probably [censored] around like he was just trying to see 'how low i would go', but the common theme that rich people do not give anything up remains.) BTW I also beat timex in 3 straight HU's out of the 3 we have played. Interested in playing some more HUs with him as I am a bad HU player.So, during frosh week, I started meeting more girls n stuff like that. I got back into DDR. I also learned this game para para paradise, which is a really [censored] game, but I can play some songs backwards, which is pretty impressive, and I like when I know the song so well that I can freestyle, and just like "dance" for real (my dance style is like, modern dance.. maybe some elements of like.. michael jackson.) Timex's friend stakeamented me for $16 sngs, and I had a 40BI downswing or something ridiculous like that. Where before I had a 20% roi at $30ish sngs over a ridic sample, now I was ITM'ing like 1 table out of my 16 set. (And no, 4 tabling as opposed to 16 tabling didnt help, obviously I would play slower as I was losing.) So I was down like $500. At this time, and also through experimentation with nano-buyin sngs/cashgames, I decided I was probably (currently) an unprofitable player online. At this time in my life, I thought poker was just badbeats and that I was a pretty good player. (I think at this point I was a winning player, but I had an incorrect view about the nature of poker.) I remember playing the $162 stuper a long time ago, and this hand came up:*** HOLE CARDS ***Dealt to AlphaWice [Ks Kc]fumanchu: raises 2000 to 3000chick446: raises 1930 to 4930 and is all-incool0813: foldsPaul Robot: foldsAlphaWice: raises 20956 to 25886 and is all-iniceman2222: foldslarrygold: foldsdangdokodang: calls 963 and is all-infumanchu: calls 7608 and is all-in*** FLOP *** [6c 9s 3h]*** TURN *** [6c 9s 3h] [Qs]*** RIVER *** [6c 9s 3h Qs] [Qc]*** SHOW DOWN ***fumanchu: shows [Kh Qd] (three of a kind, Queens)AlphaWice: shows [Ks Kc] (two pair, Kings and Queens)fumanchu collected 11356 from side pot-2chick446: shows [As Qh] (three of a kind, Queens - Ace kicker)chick446 collected 8901 from side pot-1dangdokodang: shows [4d 4s] (two pair, Queens and Fours)larrygold said, "wow"chick446 collected 8752 from main potThe player fumanchu just one outed me on the river for the 11k sidepot. That hand made me feel sick. Later I busted very deep with this hand:Dealt to AlphaWice [Qc Qd] , blinds 750/1500Sooners: raises 2700 to 4200Castor: foldsfumanchu: foldspokerkid888: foldsRoKaFeLa: foldsGoosewit: foldsiceman2222: calls 4200AlphaWice: raises 8513 to 12713 and is all-inpianolegs: foldsSooners: calls 8513iceman2222: calls 8513*** FLOP *** [Jh 2c 8s]Sooners: checksiceman2222: bets 43777 and is all-inSooners: folds*** TURN *** [Jh 2c 8s] [3c]*** RIVER *** [Jh 2c 8s 3c] [Th]*** SHOW DOWN ***AlphaWice: shows [Qc Qd] (a pair of Queens)iceman2222: shows [2d 2h] (three of a kind, Deuces)iceman2222 collected 40314 from pot(Sooners says he folded TT in chat, I believe.)That finish in the stuper made me feel sick for a very long long time [call with 22? LOL], and similar thoughts made me play bad very deep in the $100 deep stack, where danomano kept 3 betting me all in, and I kept folding AJish hands. Those were the only MTTs where I went significantly deep, and I didn't robusto in either of them (I didn't play very many MTTs though, maybe like 15 big buyin MTTs before university where I was broke entering univ. anyways.)DDR was the only thing keeping me healthy. I started to eat more and gain a bit of weight. I remember my friend was in the cafe and I was with him and I ate like 3 philly cheese steaks, which was so bad, and like the attendant was bitching me out on that when I was buying the food, like "another one?" and also my friend was joking about a propbet where I'd have to eat 7 of them in a limited time, but I backed out (because honestly thats way too much food), and also we were joking like:: him: "and after your done, I will buy you a free one, like 'hey alex, here is another philly, for your pleasure' " lawl. That was some good times.Anyways, I got pretty anti social. In university I never went to class but I did decently. I remember a real close call where I came back from Toronto to Waterloo (I go to univ. of waterloo) and it was like, the 10th or something, and I read on my computer science class webpage that the midterm was the 10th, and it was like 4pm, and I was freaking out for like 10 mins trying to figure out how I could weasel my way out of it(thats the other thing, I always try to weasel my way out of stuff, like when I was in grade 7 or something, my friend gave me this note that fell out of some girl's bag, it was like a letter from some guy she was seeing about like her having sex n stuff like that, and he joked that I should extort her, and sadly I did, and I feel so stupid about it later, and instead of admitting responsibility and being expelled [the punishment according to the policy], instead I sat in a chair for 9 hours without admitting anything, and they couldn't pin me. I usually knew how the system worked and spent alot of my free time reviewing the laws/policies of the state/school so that I could get away with all sorts of [censored], instead of being responsible like everyone else. I did alot of stupid [censored] when I was younger that I am real sorry about.)so anyways yeah anyways I found out the midterm is like 7pm, lawl.Yeah, so now in the term, already met a few girls I liked from parties n stuff. I'm walking around the library and I meet this girl, approaches me for help with math. (This is common and I often help people with math, and have been since grade 10 - because I like it.) So anyways I guess I was dressed nicely because she asked me for like my email, so like okay. Blah blah she invites me to some cafe for breakfast on her, so I take that. We went to my place and I felt real comfortable around her, because she told me about her past about being a street kid n stuff like that and I related alot. There was something about her that made me unsettled though.Fast foward, she asks me if I'm going to 'ask her out', and I do, so I guess we were in some sort of relationship. But really we weren't, and she was just probably trying to 'use me' for help with math (I never really did help her.) I put up with alot of BS which was one of the first times that I did with any girl. And before, I looked at women as very nice, and beautiful, and honestly I was too naive to think that a girl could be a [censored] or a whore, like for real. I always thought those words were hurtful. But there are some girls with the 'stripper mentality' of thinking all men are suckers that can be taken advantage of, and there are some girls that have sex with ~50 guys when they are like 18 years old, without using protection n [censored] like that. So that opened my eyes. So basically, it was a good decision to stop talking to her, but it was hard because it was one of the first times I got emotionally close to anyone (I had been with other girls in the past, but I didn't think of most them as equals because I was too arrogant, but this time I felt for a while that we were on the same level, when really we weren't:she wasn't going to do anything in her life, but I was.) Nowadays, I feel I can relate very well to alot of girls. (Also, girls love my math-Tshirts for some reason, I still don't know why. Maybe its because I feel good wearing my "invertibles" tee.)At the same time, seeing her too often degraded my regular life and I had stopped talking to many people nor doing math. School sneaked up on me and scared the bejesus out of me. I studied a bit more. At the same time, I was using Magic the Gathering (a card game) to get my life on track (giving me something to do besides girls.) I felt really unattractive because I didn't think anyone liked me anymore. I tried to be pro at MTG but I failed because I didn't learn fast enough. I basically wasted $150 in this spurt of trying to learn MTG drafts over some 3 weeks. That $400 shrivelled to $150 through various stuff, this MTG thing included.I entered the secret santaments thing in the MTTC because I wanted my reputation to be better in the community. I thought that if I participated in some of these events, I would get to know more people, or something like that. My mom suggested I send a dvd or scarf, but I didn't want to send a $2 gift, so I sent this thing I bought in thailand a while ago that I thought was really nice. Also because of conflicts with school, I paid like $30 for shipping. This was not a good idea because my networth was about $50 now. (I haven't had any roll on the internet because I haven't been playing online poker for 3 months now basically.) I got (IMO) a crappy gift, so I felt dumb. I won't say who gave me the gift because it's disrespectful, but I was not happy with it at all. Even a nice pillow I would have been happy with.I don't have many posessions. When I was moving to univ, the move-helpers commented it was the first person they've ever seen that moved all their stuff to the room in one carry. I've got a portrait of myself on my wall that is done with pencils by an amazing girl I never really bothered to meet throughout my life. (I'd known her since grade 3? Forgot.) My bed sucks and I got some nutri-grain bars which don't taste very good. I've got clothes and paper. A $3 phone I got from camp a long time ago and brought back with me that barely works. [it's the same phone that you see on the TV show "Married With Children."] That's about it.[forgive the light in the center, I turned around and snapped it without changing the settings on the camera.]http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/9853/meeesa7.jpgAnyways, OSAP reevaluated how much they would give me, and it is significantly less than they quoted earlier (just enough to pay school and timex's friend, which I am really sorry for lending money off him that I couldn't pay quickly, and I don't think anyone understands that I really don't want to owe any money nor be slow paying back [normally I pay back the second I get money, but sadly I have no money to payback.])Also, my house sucks. My parents are pretty poor and fight over money alot. They also make alot of heavily -EV decisions and don't think level-headed at all. We don't have the furnace on to save like $100/yr, which makes it REALLY cold in the house. I wear socks and the floor is still damn cold. When its really cold or you are really hungry you can't think straight. The house is falling apart and its no good. I remember thinking: "there's nothing left for me in toronto." There really isn't. (I had crumbled all my ties with people in Toronto, which is another thing people don't understand - they ask "how can you know so many people yet have so little friends?" the reason is because I never updated my friends and like, stopped talking to alot of people, or with some girls just didnt see them for a while and they forgot about me)I was supposed to go home and come back, and my parents said they'd give me the money to do that, but I hate accepting money from them because I know its credit. I remember when I was robusto I bought my dad (actually the family, but like I was using it probably 2% of the time. My dad bought a flickr account and he used to post alot to that.) a camera, 8.1 megapixels, was very good back then, and I know he likes cameras. So anyways I took the camera to univ to use one time because he said he wouldn't mind, but then he bought another camera anyways, and I felt so stupid, like, I didn't even care about the camera (I never ended up using it anyways.), and worse, the purchase was on credit. That made me feel so sick inside, like, wtf did I buy a camera for (it was like 98% for him), but maybe it was my fault that I didn't know that he was a camera-addict or something.So anyways, I've been staying at the university for the past 2 wks or so, and for the past 2 weeks I havent had my keys (left them in toronto accidentally), so I've been taking tape from notices and ducttaping the hallway door and leaving my room door unlocked so I can move around. Also for the past 5 days I ran out of food money and ramen noodles (which are like .20c a package if you buy them from chinatown in toronto and drag them around, the good MAMA ones, I like those) so I've been leeching food off the lounge and eating like REALLY light and fasting alot and drinking alot of water and generally just sleeping in my bed or practicing stuff i like (dance, dota, etc.) and in general just staying in my room.Over the term, I think that besides the MTG spending, which was kind of dumb (though, might of been helpful for me mentally), I penny pinched real good. I didn't buy any textbooks/course notes. That saved me alot of money. I pretty much saved every penny I could. I'm proud of that.So like, over the past 2 weeks, my life has degraded ALOT. Like, I haven't basically been talking to anyone face to face, and just living in a cubicle. I'm kinda crazy now. I think I'm gonna get a job or something, and then get my food money on track, then $500 and then play very overrolled nano-stakes (not sure what game yet), to get my confidence back [i used to be a winning player, now I am not so sure, and also I realized I should be playing on 100% my own.]I think my greatest strengths is my capacity to learn and process information. Like, its weird, but in the university, it is a really small world. Sometimes I just like to sit down in the cafe in the center alone and listen to all the conversations at once, and its like a sea of conversations, but I can listen to most of them all at once, which is pretty neat. The neatest thing is being able to extrapolate though. I used to study social stuff intensively too, so I feel like, I have the greatest understanding with the least knowledge, which makes me feel proud. Like, I can meet a girl, and like, already know stuff on her, because I've heard all the gossip about her, and like extrapolate and know what kind of person she is, based on what people say, even though I haven't met her nor her friends. That's pretty neat. I also like to listen to conversations when I am on the bus and just listen to girls talk and understand how they think, I am amazed by it. Also, I have 30/20 vision (optometry test) and can pick out stuff real well. I'm a bit color blind though. Oh, and I am thinking almost ALL the time. Like, I never stop thinking. I consider myself to be an experienced thinker. I've always been thinking.I think my greatest weakness is that I don't have self discipline. There was some rare times where, say I was playing .. $200NL Live, and there is a REALLY fishy guy on the table, I can't walk away, I buyin max ($200), lose, then I buyin max ($200), lose, etc. until I lost like $1k. That particular time, the guy got AA 7 times in that session. After losing, I realize the game was probably actually fixed for real and I should have walked away. (I'm not one of those people that ever think that a game is fixed.) Usually I am watching the dealer very closely and can tell because I studied all the various moves, but this was a very very skilled asian girl dealer so maybe she mezmerized me or something. Also, there's alot of times where I should have done something but didn't do it because I was lazy. Let's not forget the time I bolt out of algebra class because I realize I wasn't enrolled in the course because I forgot to pay the university.I feel like, academically I am doing very well and opportunities are going to come at me as I progress throughout the years. I think my biggest goal (or obstacle) is that I need a strong income like alot of the ballers on this forum have. I know that I am really smart and can learn very fast. Really, I would want someone to coach me (and/or stake me), but I don't know if that is possible, especially because people don't really know me, so how will they want to spend their time/money on me anyways. I understand now that poker is really alot of skill instead of luck, and there are alot of people that have very steady, unshaking profit graphs. I want to be like this and make money steadily, and I know it takes alot of actual work, and I feel like I am ready to start working and making money slowly. Also, I recognize that there's alot of learning that needs to be done in poker, and I still need to learn alot. I was playing .10/.20 limit using Sklansky's "Small Stakes Holdem" that Igot from the FPP store, and there was alot of skilled play and I walked away a loser. I felt bad, like I thought I was playing really good but I wasnt.Like, there was one hand (10handed), someone limped UTG+1, I had ATo on the btn and raised, the BB and UTG+1 call, and then I lose on the ace flop to AJs. After I saw that he just limp/called AJs UTG+1, I felt like the skill of the table in these micro stakes games was alot higher than what I thought. I often see ridiculous, boneheaded plays at $200NL or even higher ("newhizzle" playing $1k, $2kNL), but also I see some real decent play at microstakes, which makes me re-evaluate how much of a winner I think I am at $50NL or $100NL online (I used to think alot, but now I think they are reasonably hard games.)I did alot of studying with the S-C chart and various playing with ICM/sngpt (I don't have SNGPT because I'm poor, but I have a computer and programming skills.) On the whole I feel like I am a really good player. In live poker, I feel like I am an amazing player, because I have alot of knowledge of live hand reading and alot of play in that environment for my age. This is why I feel I am +EV at 5/10 NL Live easily, even though I haven't put in enough hands, but not sure of my EV at 1/2 NL online [also, obviously live 1/2 NL is much much easier than 1/2 NL online]Finally, I have alot of free time because school is mega-easy for me. So I've had alot of time to persue stuff and I'm thankful about that. Also, I like teaching and I've done alot of teaching in alot of different areas. I'm sure that my money problems will fade soon, especially as my work term approaches in 4 months. What I would really like to do is become very very good at poker. I've read most of the posts in the forums that deal with strategy, but sometimes I think poker is very difficult and I don't feel I am playing well. I haven't been playing poker seriously in the longest time, but I would hate to give up because I think my personality is suited for poker, and I am very smart and can learn all the games. Really, sometimes I wonder if I am doing the best thing in my life and maybe trying to start on poker now is a stupid idea. But when I see people making lots and lots of money, I want to make that money too. I know alot of rich people that don't know what it's like to want money so bad you are hurting for it. They have good discipline and build their roll steadily. Their biggest fear in life is to lose what they have steadily built. I know what can be done with money and how it feels to hurt for money, whether you are very rich or very poor. I know what its like to skip on food sometimes because you are hurting so bad for money. You feel real weak when you are fasting because you can't [censored] eat and you need some goddamn money. And I know what its like when you need to help your friend or family with $100 so that they can make it through the worst even though you only have $100 yourself. And alot of times the people you know, including yourself, made alot of bad decisions to put themselves in the hole, but you still help them out because you help out your [censored] family and close friends.On the other side of the same coin, I know how it feels when you see that ultrafish sitting with 10 buyins deep in an uncapped NL game and you don't have the roll to shark him and you gotta walk away. It hurts bad. You want money bad, you want to win so badly. You would 30 table for over 12 hours straight just to get enough goddamn money to sit down with that fish who just LEAKS money. Fish who call 30BB preflop with 85o. You'd cut your own [censored] hand off for a shot at that *****. Or maybe you are just hurting for money so bad to make that free $1k bet on MANSION. Those sort of things helped me understand that protecting my roll was important so that I would have enough to ride downswings and take advantage of hugely +EV situations as they came up.In conclusion, my parents are poor. My childhood is non-existant. I am really smart and learn stuff for fun. I learn fast. I was robusto at poker and spent all my money. I've got two money problems, the immediate one that will go away soon, and the larger one that I need to support my family (that's the chinese way, I'm 1/4th chinese and my mom identifies with that culture a bit.) My life, though good throughout summer and the beginning of university, degraded significantly when I stopped doing anything interesting. I haven't been talking to anyone at all for a while, just living in a box. I haven't been playing poker seriously for a very long while, and need to learn how to get back into the game. I would like a coach. I would like to be crushing $2k NL in a year. I never want to play a game underrolled again. Tell me how to get my life on track. Tell me about meta-poker strategies, like how to protect your roll or practice good game selection, which I don't know enough about. Ask me about stuff you want to know more about - I actually know alot. Ask me questions, especially about my life. Give me your advice. Discuss.cliffs notes: My life could be better, but isn't because I lack self discipline, which is a shame because I have extremely ridiculous potential. I need to get on track. Also, being alone and thinking most of my life has provided alot of insight on various topics. Ask me questions and I will provide answers. Tell me answers and I will provide questions.--Finally, is there anything that you do / have done that has helped you become better at life?