Hey everyone,
So to start my weekly blog: If u do not know who i am, i'd like to reffer you to my post on the introduce yourself section. I have made a quick introduction to myself with the basic knowledge about me.
So Hey!
My name is Sebastiaan, a semi-proffesional poker player in my early 20's.
I play poker for about 4-5 years now, and knew i loved the game from the first hand i played. There is something about poker that grabbed a hold on me. I couldn't tell you wether it's the degenerate part in me, The fact that we can actually be better then our opponents, or all the strategy that makes us ok-good or great players. One thing i know for sure is, i am competitive as hell. All our money comes from the worse players, but i love me a good old reg v reg battle.
Through the years i came to the conclussion that i like the money, but winning a title gives me much more satisfaction then 1K$ does. And yes 1K$ is still a lot of money to me.
To make some things clear, I am a low stakes grinder at the moment. Now some, if not all of you, may say: U call yourself a proffesional at lowstakes? and franckly enough i understand these thoughts. If u think about proffesional players, u think about guys like ivey, matteos, isildur. All guys that play the high stakes nosebleed games.
To give you my opinion on it: I think the word proffesional is often enough a missunderstood word. Being a proffesional means that you to something for a living. Do i already make enough to live off it? i would say no. but don't get me wrong, That's why i work a parttime job next to it.
I think becoming a proffesional is a long journey, and just as we do when we are babies, we have to start at the beginning. And i am obviously fine with that, i have made my peace with that. I'm honest enough to tell you that, if u put me in a mid-high stakes game, i am deffinetly a losing player. I have made cashes in 215's, but deffinetly don't have what it takes to take it down, yet.
I do think that, that is one of my stronger points as a player and person. I know what i'm capable of, and know what to do to get there.
So, after my first 2 years of playing recreational, i decided i wanted to put more effort into becoming a better player. I started with watching learning material online (as most of us do) and then had a big breakthrough.
I stumbled upon a learning video on youtube by accident, and in the description there was an email adress with the following statement: i want to help new players get better, u can contact me at ..@...com.
The video was 2 years old, so i didn't think writing an email to that adress would still work. However, with it being a very longshot, i still decided to give it a go, since we have nothing to lose.
And you know what, within a week or 2 i got a reply. The message was to add his skype, and so i did.
After we met on skype, and got to know each other a bit better. We decided to start working on my game. Back then, i did not have programs like PT4 or flopzilla etc. So what we did was: i recorded myself playing a session (2tabling back then, hilarious if i think about it now) I send the video to him, and he recorded himself reviewing it. The luck i had was that he was a wiz mastermind, the look he had on the game was something i never experienced before. Hell, I had never talked to someone that actually knows sh*t about poker 
So we started to do that, and i want to state that i had never actually won an mtt online, or for that matter, never final tabled a tournament. except for the 180 man sngs.
And what do you know, within the 2nd month of working with him, i final tabled my first tournament. I can recall this like it was yesterday, a 0.82$ turbo mtt. I think all of us do remember their first final table, or first win.
So with all the new information that i had i was ready to start this final table, and managed to outright ship it. Man i don't remember the last time i was so happy i achieved something. What i also remember is that the next day, i started to question myself wether it was all luck. I mean after all, we are still playing a gambling game.
After that month it became clear to me that this wasn't all luck, because that next month after my first ship, and won the same tournament again. Bang, we got this on lock.
After working some more time with him, my game was getting better and better, and was able to better explain what i was doing, my though processing, and actually being able to read the story that villain is telling me. I was beginning to play better and better, and got a much better understanding of the game, as well as getting better results consistently.
I remember being so gratefull that somebody who didnt know me, was willing to put the time into me to become a better player. Obviously it was also because he realised that i was for real, and really wanted to put the work in that's needed to become a winning player. Because playing a poker game is easy, but playing REAL POKER isn't easy at all.
I mean everyone can call with top pair top kicker on a board were it's obvious u got it. But not everyone can make that big call, or big bluff in a spot were it doesn't seem likely it's going to work. It will (in certain spots) but most people won't realise that, because they simply don't understand range's enough to make it work effectively.
No with that all being said, If i look at my game today. I can not say that i am a great player that knows it all. I am far from that as a matter of fact. I am no where near where i want to be, and still have loads and loads of hours i need to put into my game, and me as a player, to achieve where i want to be. I think knowing that is giving me a realistic view on life as a poker player and life in general.
So back to the point where i was playing recreational, and have started working with now a good friend mine, but back then my coach. I started to get better and better, and realised i wanted to pursue being a poker player for a living. But that was said easier then done, obviously.
I was already living on my own back then, so it wasn't that easy to make the decision to do so. I have bills to pay, and can not assume that i'm going to be rich in 1 month LOL. So to actually make the decision i took a good look at my life, and asked myself wether im happy with how it was back then. And to be honest with you, I wasn't. I had good jobs that paid decent money, that's not something you want to throw away for becoming a Poker player (gambler). But i did know that i didn't want to work a 9/5 for a boss the rest of my life. just a big NO. but yeah, I mean who does, and with that being said, i always wanted to start my own business, or being my own boss). so even though i did very much realise that we're picking a job, that does not pay you for your hours worked, it might not pay you for several months, years. I still decided to go for it.
I think, and please correct me if you think i'm wrong, this is something that a lot of people just can't handle. The amount of stress you can be under is insane. That feeling you have when you are playing great poker (or bad), day after day, losing x amount of money, is just terrible. I mean, it's something i think i can handle very well, but i 'm not going to lie to you and say that it ofcourse affects me mentally too. Losing money isn't a nice feeling, losing money when you are playing great is even worse.
But it's that moment, when u ship that big one after all that work you put in, that makes being a tournament player the greatest feeling i ever had.
But let's be real, like i said, This is something that is not meant for everyone. My friends quite often ask me how i'm able to handle the swings of losing money. And this is what i tell them, when i made the decision to go (semi)pro. I accepted the fact, that it could be this way. It is all up to me, if i don't work hard enough to get better. It will be months of losing money. But if i give it all that i've got, i can be better then my opponents and win. It is honestly as simple as that. Even you can be a great poker player that makes money and wins tournaments. Really you can, But it's all up to you, wether you are strong enough to put in the sh*tload of time and work that is needed in order to become a succesfull player.
So after 3 years of playing recreational, i lost my job due to my employer going bankrupt -.- Welcome to the future where economy's are great, and work is guaranteed. NOT.
At this point i had worked for a decent amount of years, and build up a few months of wages to collect. Yes, in The netherlands that is possible fortunatly enough.
So during that time, i decided i wanted to give it a shot, play fulltime for 3 months to see if i like being a fulltime player, and wether i didn't lose the love for the game. I sure didn't, but it sure wasn't paying enough to make a living. As costs of living are quite high here.
So yeah, being a proffesional probably wasn't for me, at least, not in europe. (where my thoughts at that time)
I still wanted to make this work very badly, so i started to talk with my friend/coach about the different options there are, and to be honest. There aren't that many. You either go pro, or stay at your fulltime job and play recreational. At least, that is what my thoughts were at that time.
Then he suggested the option of trying to join a backing site, which seemed unrealistic to me because i simply didn't meet the requirements that most backing stables ask. So i applied to a few stables, got rejected a few times, and decided to give it one more shot. and what do you know, i got offered a contract. At this point i was about a breakeven player, but was up in lifetime profit.
This is were it all started, my journey to becomming a proffesional. Tbh with you, i didn't really know what to expect, as this whole concept was very new to me. And i didn't really feel like i was truly good enough to be able to compete with many great (upcomming) players.
So This is were i will end the first blog i made on pokerstrategy. I am fairly new to writing blogs, So i hope it was interesting enough to get you back to read my blog next week.
I realise that the storyline i wrote now might not be chronilogicly perfect. But aye, I need to get better at writing blogs too. Maybe you guys can give me some tips on how to to it better, or how to make it more interesting. Or if you would like to know more about me as a person, or as a player, feel free to ask me 
Next week I will write about how friends and family think about me pursueing poker as a proffesion, and how this affects me. Because deffinetly not everyone had good opinion on it, also i will write about my first experiences after joining a stable, and all that it brings with it. Believe me, Being a proffesional means much more then just playing poker
So good luck to all you grinders at the tables, Let's ship something, and tell me about it next week!
Im out, Peace!
" Stay Humble, Stay Hungry " 
will follow.
