If there is one universal truth, it is this: All good things will eventually come to an end.

This seems to doubly apply to poker.

Anyone who has played for awhile can tell you of long barren stretches of ice cold cards, stabbing turns, demolishing rivers and degree all-in moments that – upon their conclusion – have you waving goodbye to everyone at the table as you slump off to some corner to weep like a baby. Jesus, is there anything worse than standing up from a table empty handed?

I realized I have a disaster readiness kit at home. You never know when that asteroid is going to hit. As I was looking at it, I was thinking that it might be a good idea to prepare a similar kit for when an asteroid strikes my poker play as it seems to happen with frightening regularity.

Disaster Preparedness

The first step to being prepared for a disaster is to write up a list of the things you’ll need that fit the common needs of most types of disasters. Since we’re talking meta here, what we need to do is to come up with a list of ideas and limits to execute on when the bottom falls out. To that end, I’ve assembled the following list of things to ponder when you’re heading for that god awful gutter:

• Accept It
• Relax
• Slow down
• Limit Buy-ins
• Set Time/Stack Limits
• Plan Your Game

Like anything, it’s easier to take it in small chunks.

Accept It

Everyone surfs the gutter. It’s part of the cycle. I figure I can limit my time in the gutter by improving my game through reading, talking, anything but playing. And I can never pretend I’m not going to visit in the future, because I most certainly am going to end back there sometime. So when I find my foot stuck in the muck, the first thing I need to do is accept it for what it is and believe that there is sunshine on the other end of it. It makes it easier to do when I consider that everyone else will get there at some point. The difference is what you chose to do once you’ve arrived.

Relax

When people get in car accidents, the instinct is to brace and tighten up. Unfortunately, that’s the wrong response. A lot of injury could be avoided if you relaxed instead of grabbing the dashboard and stiffening in your seat. You’re still going to get fucked up, no doubt about it, but you’re in a better position to absorb the impact and retranslate that energy somewhere else. Cats can be dropped from 32 stories and live to tell the tale for two reasons: they have the ability to right themselves for the landing and they relax their muscles to redistribute that energy of the landing. (Technically, three reasons, they also don’t fall as fast as humans due to air resistance).

When I sense a tilt coming on, I need to excuse myself from the table. Catch a smoke. Take a walk. Do anything else as to take my mind off the cause of the tilt. If I can’t seem to do that, I need to call it a game because I’ve then let someone taint my thought process which is just going to continue my bad run in the most pathetic way.

Slow Down

Half the game is figuring out how stupid you play and using that knowledge so that you play less stupid the next time around. When I get sucker punched in a pot, the very first thing I do – which I’m assuming everyone else does – is figure out where I went wrong. Until I have an assessment I’m pleased with, my play tightens. If I’m in a bad run that is more than several days old, and stupid plays are coming aplenty, I need to just get up and call it a game. At the next session, I need to extend my warm-up period from about an hour to maybe two hours. Aim for the small pots to rebuild confidence. Get the hell out if I can’t even do that.

Limit Buy-Ins

2 buy-ins max. After that I’m only chasing the dream of breaking even. Worst yet, dipping more than twice makes me out as a total donkey. I don’t want to be a donkey. Better to suck it up, walk away and regroup before taking another stab at it.

Set Time/Stack Limits

I can’t stress how important this is. Setting a time limit for myself gives me a framework with a definite start and end. I can gauge my success by how far along I am within that timeline versus how many chips are in front of me. In addition to setting a time limit, I also set a goal for a target stack size. This is the size of the stack that would allow me to close the session out ahead of schedule. Typically I shoot for 3x my buy-in, but this figure gets adjusted as I work through my time. If, at 4 hours in on an 8 hour session with a $300 buy-in, I’m at $1200, I’ll slide the goal up $200 more dollars. If I go $200 the other way, I close the session.

At the start of the post I wondered if there was anything worse than getting up from a table empty handed. Getting up from the table empty handed after hitting your goal at the halfway point is a way worse feeling. It’s the kind of feeling that can put your game out for months on end. When I use the sliding rule and stick with it, I can avoid that.

Plan Your Game

The last session I had in Vegas, I was – to be honest – tired of playing poker. So before I jumped in, I sat at the cafe and thought about how I’d play. I think if I was in a shitty down turn I would do the same exact thing. I knew that being tired, it was going to be very hard to work up a table image off socializing. I decided I was also too tired to sit like a stone and project strength off the bat which I’m convinced I can do fairly well. But, again, that was going to take some work. So I thought I’d try out being as inconspicuous as possible. To do that I’d have to take the semi-bluffs and bluffs out of my arsenal, or use them only when absolutely obvious (to me). Since those are tools I use fairly regularly, I was going to have to plot my style of play beforehand.

I decided to extend the initial sit, listen, learn phase from 45 minutes to an hour and a half. As I’ve said elsewhere, I use this time to learn the table, observe how people play hands, how people react to bets. If I’m looking at hands during this period I’m having to do two things at once. Since it’s more important to me to be able to read my table, I can only assume it’s time well spent. Obviously, I’ll play premium hands, but during this part I have no qualms folding AK to any raise pre-flop. I’m not saying that I do that every time, but only when the situation is highly favorable would I jump in with such a crackable hand.

I planned that the following hour – or whenever I felt comfortable at and with the table – I’d open up play and broaden the spectrum of hands I’d be playing. After that, I’d let the game and my stack influence hand value.

Now I didn’t end up sticking to the plan, which is ok. You need to be adaptable to circumstances, but at least I had another framework to work within to get me started and give me direction. That’s worth more than the few pots you missed.