Customer Reviews

The Poker Mindset: Essential Attitudes for Poker Success

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

At first glimpse, this book appears to be not much different from a lot of other 'poker psychology' books on the market. However, after delving in and devouring the book, it offered much more than I expected. This is not a book that talks about reading opponents or taking advantage of their weaknesses, rather it takes the opposite approach: It tells you how to read yourself and avoid allowing your opponents to take advantage of you.

There are a number of concepts in this book that every poker player thinks they understand, such as tilt, bad beats, and downswings, but you quickly realize how little understood these concepts are when they are so well articulated as in this book. Everyone who reads this will find at least one chapter where they realize that they have made the exact mistake mentioned in the chapter but have not been able to put their finger on it. I personally have made nearly every mindset mistake mentioned in this book at one point or another, and I recognized each with each successive chapter. It feels all too familiar. We all know the gaps in our game, but this helps us really understand the gaps in our game and offers strategies to eliminate them.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has ever tilted off money, has ever stayed at a table too long, or has ever gone broke at limits too high for them. This book bears re-reading because these concepts are crucially important to being a winning player.

If you play poker for fun OR if you think you're good enough to turn pro, this book is a "Must Read!" It's not another "how-to." There are plenty of those. And, if you're like me, you know that poker playing skill is all relative. If you already know about "pot odds", probablities, "premium hands", betting after the flop, and all the other technical stuff, then read this book before you play another hand. Sure, you will already know some of this stuff intuitively. But even if you do, this book is good reinforcement!
I knew some of the things that Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger point out. But I'm one of those guys that are so competetive, I let my emotions take over. But the next time I find myself in a "downswing" OR an "upswing", I will concentrate on what I learned in the Poker Mindset to try and improve my situation. "Just try to take my chips, baby!"

There are quite a few good books out there about the mechanics of poker play (I recommend any of Dan Harrington's books) -- where you can read about pot odds and late-position versus early-position play and all that -- and there are also good books out there about the psychology of poker play. I have read only two books devoted to the mental aspect of the game, but "The Poker Mindset" ranks among the best treatises about the psychological mindset poker players need to develop to improve their game.

What makes this book different than other texts written by players or psychologists? This book doesn't profess to tell you how to win on a regular basis per se. You WILL experience downswings which could last for long stretches, whether you are a solid player or not. Instead, the authors emphasize that how one deals with the invariable ups and downs of the game will determine whether one succeeds over the long haul.

This book takes a detailed, clinical and statistical approach to the realities of the game -- how odds figure into results in the near versus long term, how luck gives way to skill over time, how players limit their development by mis-associating certain results with unrelated causes (I lost this hand because I'm just running bad right now) -- and how understanding the bigger (mathematical) picture of poker reality is at the heart of anyone developing into a successful player.

The authors don't deconstruct hands, they deconstruct the mental process as events unfold at tables, and then they provide details about how to avoid common traps poker players fall into. They examine the many forms of tilt (not just players blowing up at the table, which is only one form of tilt) and how players need to confront their own mental and emotional weaknesses to overcome it.

The authors thorough examination of tilt (they define tilt as anything that prevents you from playing your best poker) will help the player focus on the subtle slips that further damage his/her results. This book is full of well-articulated ideas (and not too much mathematics) that help players take a 500-foot view of their game so that they can leave behind their superstitions and woolly misconceptions about suck outs, bad beats and downswings and improve their overall game. I highly recommend it, especially for those of you who have hit a "wall" and can't figure out why your game seems to be devolving.

The authors claim in the Introduction that this is the 2nd most important poker book you'll read - with the 1st being a book on the fundamentals of sound poker play - and I totally agree.

Poker Mindset does a great job of explaining why we think the way we do when we play, and often, why this is wrong. For example:
- it's better to be the "receiver" of bad beats rather than the "giver",
- downswings are a myth,
- upswings and rushes are myths,
- berating poor play (or weak players) can only hurt you,
- tilt is not a line that is crossed, but a spectrum of poor plays waiting to be made,
- focusing on the $$ is not better than focusing on making the correct plays,
- etc.

Mindset is well-written and well-paced with helpful Action Points and chapter summaries to drive the lessons home.

I've read it and re-read it within the past 8 months and can definitely say that it's helped me maintain my composure in some pretty bad situations (times where I'm sure I would have exhibited very poor table behavior without this information at my mind's forefront).

If you are a beginner or intermediate player, then this is an excellent read. It outlines some of the most critical aspects of poker that separate the winners from the break-even/losing players. For me, I have been playing seriously for about 10 years, professionally for more than 5 years, I didn't find any new or very much useful information in the book. The reason I bought this book was because I was having the worst month I have had in a long time and I thought reading something like this might help put me back in the right frame of mind but the information is far more basic than I expected. I was expecting to learn more about myself and other people like WHY our egos sometimes get in our ways and WHY do we tilt from short-term results. The book gives answers to some of those types of questions but not as personal and in-depth as I was looking for.

I highly recommend this book to any new or intermediate player. I wish this book was around when I started playing. Things that took me years and years to learn are printed in black and white right there in this book.

I have read countless strategy guides and spent thousands of hours at the tables and have become quite a skilled player over the years. I feel I have a deep understanding of the game and can read players extremely well. However, after all my study and efforts, was only slightly better than marginally profitable. I was beginning to doubt whether, with all the bad plays gone good, it was possible to make a real profit at poker. Could all the so called "Pro's" be media creations? I knew the biggest leak in my game was my emotional control, but had no idea how to plug it. I read "The Psychology of Poker" and "My Worst Poker Enemy" and found them very helpful, but still struggled. This book was like shining a light into a dark room. The authors intoduce concepts that should have been obvious, but somehow eluded me. The indepth analysis of "tilt" and discussions on long term success and bankroll strategies were amazing. I saw immediate results in my attitude at the table, even before finishing the book. A bad beat that normally would send me into a tailspin no longer bothers me. One of my regular opponents noticed and remarked "how are we going to beat you if we can't put you on tilt anymore?" In the four weeks since recieving the book I have increased my bankroll by over $4000, playing 1/2 NLHE! (no BS) Its not that I haven't had losing sessions, I just seem to lose less when I lose and win more when I win! I highly reccommend this book for anyone who has a good grip on the skills and strategies of the game but can't seem to get "over the hump". Just be careful who you tell, it may be like "knocking on the glass" and waking up the fish!

I'll start this by saying something a little contradictory. In poker, the inner game within the game is both overrated and underrated. I think people put too much stock in reading people and psychoanalyzing the play. Meanwhile, the crucial aspects of mentally preparing yourself to play are often overlooked. I don't know if this is because they seem obvious, or if it's just because they're not particularly sexy.

Whatever the case, The Poker Mindset does an admirable job of taking on this seemingly basic aspect of the game and making you realize it's not as basic as you thought. As much as we all talk about tilt, bankroll, and preparing yourself to play, I'm sure most of us haven't considered the true ramifications of that and how that could be affecting our long-term prospects for profit.

As some people have said on here, this book feels elementary. In fact, it is written in a way that is a little repetitive and even simple. That does not mean that what it says should be glossed over. The simplicity is part of its brilliance. It raises important points and practical suggestions in language that is easy to understand and use in your own game. I felt like I was hearing for the first time things that I had always been thinking. This book make have been able to have been written in 50 pages rather than 274, but since we don't buy books by the page, that's not really a concern, is it?

My one argument with the book is the section on bankroll management. It specifically acknowledges that other books do a better job of outlining bankroll management, but then still goes on to give some pretty specific recommendations that perpetuate some of the same over-simplified thinking that gets a lot of people into bankroll trouble. I would recommend Mark Blade's Professional Poker as a helpful companion to this so you have a more sophisticated view of bankroll management. Still, all things considered, this book is a must have if you plan on playing poker at any significant level of stakes.

I have read many poker books and magazines and played thousands of hours at the game. After all that, this book has been the single most important component in my approach to the game. It was nothing short of revolutionary to my perepective. It is on a similar vein to Zen and the Art of Poker, but it was, at least for me, a much better book. I heartily recommend it to anyone who plays poker.

So you may as well buy it. I'm an online pro poker player and have been for about 2 years now and I can say with 100% certainty that this book has increased my profits. I've read it about 3.5 times. If you have already mastered your tilt you may not need this, but it has lots of good information about different types of tilt you may not be familiar with. It also gives convincing points about BR management. Give it to your always busto friends.

But most likely you need it. When people ask me which book helped my poker game most out of my collection this is currently the one I point to.

I'm the type of player who doesn't get angry or aggressive after a series of ridiculous bad beats, but who gets tighter and weaker. According to this book this is also a form of tilt. I always thought I was a fairly non-emotional player and I would secretly smirk with a sense of superiority at those who had berserk meltdowns (and then consequently losing all their chips). But after reading this I can see that I do have my costly flaws to work on as well. I wouldn't say this is the greatest poker book ever written, but it does offer some interesting advice for a poker players who have already have a solid grasph on the technical side of poker and who wish to control their tilt tendencies a bit better.