Turn Pro Tomorrow

Well tomorrow is my last day of full time work, it's been a long time since I resigned and I am looking forward to the freedom and chance to dedicate myself to poker.

I'm going to be honest I am quite nervous about it, I know I am a proven winning player and know that many of my errors at no limit holdem have been due to playing when I shouldn't be but my confidence at my main game is low and until I have a solid winning month or two under my belt I'm going to be questionning whether I can make this work. I'm not handling downswings particularly well when they happen at the moment and I think this is because I've got most of my finances tied up in the flat I'm buying - I need to win about £10k by January/February to clear that and so I am potentialy going to have cash flow issues.

This shouldn't happen but it is still a possibility and it makes me nervous. There is no way to get over this feeling apart from relaxing into playing and taking results as they come. I'm sure everyone who has made this leap through quitting a well paid full time job has had similar feelings and to be honest I'd be more worried if I wasn't slightly anxious.

I played some holdem yesterday and sucked, wasn't concentrating on it properly and it showed as I dropped $900 through some ill advised plays. I just need to convince myself that my game as I play it is successful and ride the swings and not let it effect me. Ah well it'll all come together I've had plenty of swings in the past and I'll have loads in the future too, it's part of the game but sadly it doesn't make it any easier to deal with.

My plans for the next few weeks include setting myself some kind of schedule and placing rules on my play which should hopefully benefit my game

- Exercise on the rowing machine at least 3-4 times a week
- Play sessions lasting no longer than 2 hours and having a break of at least 30mins between these
- No mixing sites/games/levels as I don't think this benefits my play at all and it is so easy to concentrate on omaha rather than holdem or vice versa to the detriment of some tables
- Play different forms of poker each week and each day - so mixing the omaha and no limit sessions up as I feel like it to avoid boredom/complacency
- NOT PLAYING WHEN TIRED (no excuse for this any more and I shall be mad if I start doing it again)
- Only playing when I WANT to, not because it seems like I should or cos I have nothing better to do


Those will do to be getting on with and hopefully my results will shine like they did in June. One really good month $20k + would be all it takes to ease all worries - it sounds a lot but if I'm playing 5-10 full time it is only 20 buy ins which is more than achievable.

Wish me luck

Steve