How to stop letting variance cloud your judgement

Whether you take too many risks or not enough, you are probably thinking about variance wrong, says Dara O'Kearney.

One thing you notice when you coach a lot of students is they can have very different reactions to variance. Some hate it, some love it, but almost everybody thinks about variance the wrong way. 

I know a player who says, for him, the greatest thing in poker is when he is all-in for a big pot and sweating which cards will come next. I personally couldn't think of anything worse, because you have no control over that part of poker. 

On the flip side, I have students who pass clearly profitable spots because they hate the variance. 

Both attitudes are wrong, you can be too eager to embrace variance or too avoidant of it. 

Wish fulfilment

The problem with poker is we get dishonest feedback distorted by variance. We see other players prosper by winning flip after flip and we reason we should do the same. Or we lose three flips in a row, conclude we are cursed, and avoid them altogether. 

Extremes in either direction are an attempt at wish fulfilment. The Gambler really wishes he had a big stack, the Nit really does not want to bust. Building a strategy around your wishes is not good, and can also lead to mental game issues. 

It's a platitude at this point, but you have to get your mindset into a frame where you care about whether you made the right decision, rather than whether you got what you wanted/avoided what you didn't want. 

This is one of the great benefits of the solver era, we can get answers to how we played our hand. In the modern game, this is how we avoid letting variance get to us. 

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