How to avoid tilt when bad players win

Dara O' Kearney would like to remind you that the weak players need to win occasionally for poker to be profitable long term.

Nobody is immune to tilt in poker, even well established Pros.

I have a version of Entitlement Tilt that occasionally manifests itself, I don’t think it ever affects my decisions in game, but I do feel extremely frustrated when players play bad get lucky against me, and I have to keep reminding myself not to let it affect my decisions.

I have also noticed that I am often very tilted after busting a small buy-in tournament with weak opponents, whereas I never have this feeling after bigger buy-ins against tougher players.

I think a lot of serious players feel this, they work hard at their game and then a gambler takes all their chips.

Work even harder on your game

Different things work for different people. Personally I find that breathing exercises help prevent my frustration at the table affect my decisions, or just standing up and stretching can help as a sort of circuit breaker.

When weak players do well against me, the chess comparison is the one I fall back on (as a former chess player).

The variance in poker is the crucial ingredient that ensures weaker players will play stronger ones for money. If the strongest player always won the weaker one would quit. That’s what I force myself to remember every time some guy busts me with a hand that should have been folded on every street.

Finally, there is no greater antidote to tilt than to simply work harder on your poker study. Knowing the right way to play your hand takes a lot of stress away when it goes wrong, and also makes it harder for you to make a sub optimal play when you are angry.

You can get Dara's free book on effective poker study by joining his mailing list.