He just read trough your blog and wanted to give you some advice as i reached the last post of yours ..exactly what i wanted to write ..
Stop leveling yourself into bad calls etc..always remember at Micro Stakes:
Dont try to bluff catch..yes you will get bluffed sometimes but not even close to often enough to worry about it.
I
Very interessant Blog. In my opinion you are doing too much things per week. I think u could increase your hourly by slowing down and relaxing a little bit more. π A Long time ago i was also grinding 20k hands per week. It was always a huge challenge and i couldnt play My A-Game every Time...
Thanks @obamarama and @bjoernshw for stopping by and hope you enjoy the newest graph 
Mid-week update
Overall graph
Fish on a heater
So since my revelation I have been pretty much crushing it. For the whole graph I am running at 6bb/100, but that is brought down massively by the first 20,000 hands. For the section in the yellow box (after my revelation) I am running at 22bb/100. Would have been higher if it wasn't for the slight miss hap in the red box. Which is pretty impressive I think for a sample of 11,000 hands, and looking at my previous graphs 
Blinded by the AA
So everyone knows that feeling, you look down at AA;
My only problem is that after having several AA get a walk I get over excited when people do decide to play back at me. So once the flop hits I get blinded and just want to get all my chips in the middle regardless of what the flop was or what the villain has done. This rarely ends well as shown in the red box when I had AA 4 times run into a low set that hit on the flop. Which meant even after turning it around for the last part of the graph the last 8,000 hands my hole cards look like this;
Not ideal. At least I have identified the problem. The loses also lead me back to some of my other bad habits such as callign too light or not believing people's bets. Luckily tilt breaker kicked in, I took the 1 hour locked down break cleared my head and came back to it. With success.
Goals
Goals this week have been non existent other then playing. I am not too unhappy with that due to my current win rate at NL2 the main priority is grinding up enough bankroll to take a shot at NL5. Obviously I don't expect it to be the same when I get there and I will have to start adding studying back into my game, but for now I plan to just keep grinding,
Hi
nice looking graph there..good to see u improving your game..
As for AA just remember the basic Micro strategy.
Value bet big until they raise. They just have it most of the time..just overfold dont valueown yourself..
Look at the Board : are their obv. drawas that got there and they start betting big they just have it ..
Check your settings
So thought that I would take a cheeky shot at NL5 seeing as I was doing so well at NL2. All was going pretty well slowly chipping up, then got KK in v AA and lost. Shit happens. However I hadn't changed tilt breaker settings, so that loss actually triggered a full day lock out because I was sitting deep;
Which is actually more tilting then losing KK to AA 
Ah well, will just use the time to review my old hands and prepare for the next time I take a shot at NL5, think might go back to my original BRM plan as $100 seems pretty light for NL5. Was just getting a little disheartened about how I was playing well but still only slowly progressing. Must remember that patience is the key.
My NL5 shot - back to NL2 with this fish
So my NL5 shot can be summed up with one picture;
Dunno if used all my luck up in NL2 but got my ass handed to me two days in a row at NL5. Some if it is down to just not being ready for the extreme change in aggression compared to NL2, nearly every open gets 3bet. But then I have also ran into ridiculous bad run outs and coolers. Get a boat, the guy has quad AA. I also seem to be getting riverstared a lot, there seems to be a lot more floating/betting out with junk which gets lucky and catches something on the river. Over time I am sure this will balance out and the junk bets will be a good source of income in the times when they don't get lucky on the river, but I think for now I don't have the BR for it, so going to go back down to NL2 to build it back up and further. NL5 just seems to be a lot more swingy.
Another problem is some pretty strange play. So far I have encountered about 6 occasions where people have either limped or flat called with AA/KK. I just haven't know how to expect this so am usually pretty happy with my top pair. They never manage to get me all in, it is more just a medium pot, but I just don't get how limping/flat call with AA can be a good play?
Graphs
So the graph looks like pretty much a car crash when in $ mode, however when switch to bb it isn't actually that terrible.
As mentioned above I think if I had a larger bankroll I could stay at NL5 and just ride out the starting bumps. However as I tried to go up early, because of the good winrate at NL2, I just don't have the bankroll to deal with it right now. I think the smaller number of BI also effected my play, if the same run of play had happened at NL2 I don't think I would have been bothered.
So back to NL2 with a couple of scares, but not broken.
Edit: Seems riverstars followed me back down to NL2, so many people call/betting out with trash only to win on the river, then ran into 3 quads in 300 hands. This game really can be f**king soul destroying sometimes.
Week 5 - 12/02/2017
Start date: 11/01/2017
Start BR: $187 ($100 week 1 + $37 week 3 + $ $50 week 4)
Last BR: $40.31
Current BR:$58.62
Weekly profit/loss:$18.62 ($10 from stars coins)
Net position: -$115.50
Hands this week:24,728
Total hands:41,605
Graph
This week
Overall
Pretty disappointed with the end of the week result, considering at one point my bankroll was over $100. The early shot at NL5 seems to have taken its toll both on my bankroll and my mental game. Even after moving back down to NL2 it couldn't seem to get back to how I was playing before taking the shot. I could blame it on the run bad and riverstars (and I currently am) but that isn't true and no one wants to read yet another bad beat blog. I am still up for the week, and if I can get back to the 22bb/100 that I was at before then I shall be able to get the bankroll moving again.
Hopefully do a longer post later in the week, as well as start studying again as did none at all this week. Didn't even review any sessions. However feeling really salty right now after running into more quads then I have seen in two days then I have across the whole time of playing.
Good skill at the tables, and f**k luck.
Thoughts on the week so far
Tilt
So still pretty much a massive tilt monkey and been venting in a "Why do I always lose thread" to try and keep the blog tidy. As I said in that thread usually it is just for the instantaneous anger from tilt that means I end up posting, but after a while the goes away and I can look at the situation properly. Thankfully tiltbreaker has kept me right and meant that no tilt session has been bad enough to ruin me, it has had serveral days where it has kicked me out for the full day. Unfortunately the free trail ran out, but it has save me so much money I decided to buy the full version.
Rather than just tilting I have also been trying to identify the types of tilt that set me off, using "The mental game of poker". My main types are;
Injustice tilt/entitlement tilt.
This is sort of my initial reaction tilt when I get beaten by a river card, or a player has called with junk and gotten lucky along the way. I "feel" that I am a better player as I have a game plan, I have done studying, and I therefore should win ever time. Obviously that is a pretty silly view, but that is how I feel at the time. For the most part I am trying to remind myself, that if I am a better player that I will win eventually. These players calling with trash and getting lucky will eventually be just donating money to me. The is also the injustice side of being ahead for an all in only to lose. The old saying of "How to win at pokerstars, get all in when behind". Even though this does feel true at times, it is just statistics really. The odds of winning the lottery are about 1 in 14 million, but it has been won loads of times. If you are play correctly that you only ever get it in when a head, then you are always going to experience badbeats/suckouts. But that doesn't mean you should stop trying to get in all in when you are ahead, over time it will just be printing money. I think a good bank roll management comes into that as the losses don't seem as great.
Mistake tilt
A lot of my venting has been about me having the 2nd nuts only to lose to an unlikely 1st nut. Such as a board with AAx, with me holding KK then get anger when I lose to someone holding an A. Now initially I chalked this up to injustice tilt, "How can he have an Ace?", when really it is more that I was anger that I had played the hand wrong. Villain had played very aggressive, and true he could also be thinking that two A meant that it was less likely that I held one and was betting his 2nd pair, however I shouldn't have been trying to get all in. I think this happens a lot in cases when I will say it was a cooler or a badbeat, but really it was me playing the hand wrong and getting anger that I know how I should have played it. I think this ties into me getting married to strong hands.
With both of these I am trying to inject logic and keep an eye out for my play style changing due to the effects of tilt so that I am cut it off before it takes over, or if that doesn't work I can just stop paying for a bit.
Still recovering from NL5
Even after the runbad/tilt monkey phase in NL2 since moving back down, I am still positive.
The NL5 looks worse because I still struggle to think of it in terms of buy ins. Hopefully my next shot I will have a larger bankroll so that each loss wont hurt as much. I am interested to see that I played a lot tighter at NL5, and I think this would because of the saying "scared money". As I was under rolled I was more scared of losing my money, which negatively effected my play. I still think I am playing tighter then I would have expected at NL2 as well, but I don't plan on trying to change my opening ranges that significantly yet as they seem to be working, and keep me out of trouble with some more marginal hands preflop.
And remember to enjoy playing poker, else trying to improve will feel like torture;
Extra - Donknaments
Not sure why considering my hatred for losing all ins when ahead, but played a few "donknaments" this week on my tablet whilst watching tv. This was a mixture of MTT, Bounty, Spin&Go. I had thought that this had gone ok, got some bounties, did ok at spin&gos, didn't cash at MTT. However just requested my tournament history turns out I put about $14 into tournaments and only cashed for $6. It was also just as frustrating for me as I should have expected. Never really got to play a great deal of "standard" poker due to the shorter stacks, and got sucked out on loads. So gonna take them out of my play again as it isn't overly enjoyable and just lost money. 
Hello Catonthemat,
Really enjoyed reading your journey so far and look forward to reading future posts and humorous pictures/gifs
Good luck at the tables.
Regards
Matt
Paired boards - Scary?
So initially this was going to be a post about how paired boards had been running me over recently.
I was starting to feel that every time the board was paired they just had it and I was pretty much just throwing money down a black hole. My solution was thinking that I should just believe that they were holding the 3rd card or even sometimes 3rd and 4th and just fold. However I have had a look across my full sample (50k hands) and this is the results;
This shows how handy it is keeping a database. There has been several times when my instincts about past hands has been miles off from the reality. And I think this ties into another bit is was reading in the mental game of poker;
"The negativity bias, also known as the negativity effect, refers to the notion that, even when of equal intensity, things of a more negative nature (e.g. unpleasant thoughts, emotions, or social interactions; harmful/traumatic events) have a greater effect on one's psychological state and processes than do neutral or positive things."
I think this would apply to a lot of people, and it is definitely something that everyone should try and keep in the front of the mind when playing.
Edit
And as if to renforce this, my first few hands back after posting this;
then
But you can guess which I had more of a reaction too...
Week 6 - 19/02/2017
Start date: 11/01/2017
Start BR: $187 ($100 week 1 + $37 week 3 + $ $50 week 4)
Last BR: $58.62
Current BR:$49.52
Weekly profit/loss:-$9.20 ($10 from stars coins + $15.40 from $1.10 PKO)
Net position: -$124.70
Hands this week: 21,140
Total hands: 62,745
Graph
MTT
So played a MTT on my phone whilst watching tv. It is was the $1.10 progressive KO. I found it pretty bun whilst playing and quiet enjoyed it. This could be because things were going my way. I was chipping up nicely and landing quiet a few bounties. It was running pretty late and I was getting tired. Then standard stupid play came out and I pushed all in with 3 to a flush on the board, and all I as holding was 99. Got snap called by nut flush. What made it worse was that I placed 14th and 4 of the players only had about 4bb or less left and I thought it was a clever to try and bluff the biggest stack. Anyway got some nice winnings, $16.50.
Hidden danger
So this week I have been finding that I run into a lot of sets. My main problem is I don't see them coming. Part of this is probably down to the randomness of play styles at NL2. Some people a raise on flop means set, others just means junk. But playing Zoom means it is hard to find out who is who. So what should I do? Something I am gong to be considering in the coming week.
Enjoyment
Playing poker is really starting to feel like I am stuck in groundhog day. I try to get better, it works for a little. The cards then turn on me or I get sucked out on and then I just start playing worse and worse. I then try to learn more and put it into practice, that then fails as the learning assumes NL2 is actually playing poker, which it isnt really. And I just go round and round in circles. My good play makes minimal amounts then a mistake can wipe out an hour of grinding. I am just not finding it enjoyable. And for me poker is meant to be about the enjoyment. The $50 starting bankroll is roughly 2 hours wage, yet I'll spend hours trying and getting pissed off by losing $5.
So what is the plan? I think slow down, do more studying (as I find some of the studying fun), then sort of take it from there. I am going to also try and pick my weekly goals up again as I haven't bothered with them in the last 2 weeks.
Goals
Thoughts on the week so far
Goals
Haven't really been doing any of it, been really busy from work and just not really be bothered. Not the right attitude, but as I have no aspirations of being anymore than a hobby player not going to be hard on myself.
Same old same old
So a few post back I mentioned that it was easier for me to blame coolers and suck outs for my graph coming down than it was to identify the real problem.... me.
Back when me graph was going positive and my winrate was about 24bb/100 I was warming up with Snowie and reviewing all sessions as well as doing plenty of studying. I then thought I was a god and slowly but surely everything that wasn't playing poker dropped off. Whilst playing I thought that I was playing just the same and it was just a down swing. However after yet another bad session I played vs PokerSnowie just to see how I was performing.
Snowie when I was getting my good win rate:
Room for improvement but pretty reasonable.
This is Snowie after playing last night, thinking I was playing just as well....
So yea not playing the same poker at all. Shouldn't be surprised that I am losing money with a score like that. So back to the study and Snowie for me. I am aiming to complete 4,000+ Snowie hands by Sunday. I would also like to complete the hands with a score of 14 or below.
So remember if things are going bad, pointing a finger a something else has 3 pointing back at you;
Progress
My progress can be summed up in one picture;
Life has been getting any the way of poker. Hopefully things settle down a bit soon and i'll be able to start the climb properly again soon. Until then I am just reading what I can and trying to forget all the bad habits I picked up during my two weeks of no study
Week 6 - 19/02/2017
Start date: 11/01/2017
Start BR: $187 ($100 week 1 + $37 week 3 + $ $50 week 4)
Last BR: $49.52
Current BR:$40.06
Weekly profit/loss:-$9.46
Net position: -$134.16
Hands this week: 619
Total hands: 63,364
Graph - This week
What now?
I think it is time I go back to basics. The NL5 shot seems to have completely drestroyed my mental game foundations, and this has had a knock on effect on my actual game play as well. I seem to preform best with structure, so tomorrow I shall be posting a plan of attack again. I will climb out of the swamp of NL2. I am going to set my goals which are tied to rewards to help motivate me. It is no longer about the money, but about beating the game. Will it work? Let's hope so.
Hey there buddy, I will for sure be quoting your blog tonight
in
https://forums.pokerstrategy.com/forum/thread.php?threadid=402979
keep up the good work!
I give up
For now at least, not doing me any good can't seem to get out of this funk and it is just bringing me down. Maybe I shall return later. Still sitting on $300 of tools so would like not to waste them.
All money has been withdrawn. Let's see what the rest of the world holds...
What? You can't give up on me now man ♦
I'll be mentioning you as a hard worker about 40 mins into tonight coaching at
https://www.twitch.tv/pokerstrategydotcom
Originally posted by LemOn36
What? You can't give up on me now man ♦
I'll be mentioning you as a hard worker about 40 mins into tonight coaching at
https://www.twitch.tv/pokerstrategydotcom/blockquote >I'll be watching.
(And don't worry I have quit loads of times
)
