I know the holiday season is a busy one for everyone. For my family, after all the shopping, decorating, baking, and sending out of cards, we packed up the Christmas at our house and hit the road to Seattle. My younger one said she felt like the grinch after hauling all the presents out of the house.
Then we drove to Seattle and spent 3 nights at my parent’s house celebrating Christmas. Then we drove over the pass to Cle Elum where Lisa’s Mom lives for two days of Christmas. We will be back in Seattle for a night to see some friends, then we head to a place on Hood Canal for the weekend to celebrate the New Year holiday with my brother and a few friends and some football. Talk about hectic. And this IS our vacation.
So what kind of shape will my poker game be in when I go back to the grind for the new year? I will almost certainly be rusty. I won’t have thought about poker for almost 2 weeks. In some ways, that can be a good thing. I can get out of any of those ruts that my poker game tends to get into. This is a good opportunity to reevaluate how I think about some things. I likely will try to decide if there is a game I haven’t been preforming as well in lately and study it a little bit. Not being in the autopilot mode of playing everyday gives more opportunity for new ideas to sink in.
Poker is a game that is always evolving. People are constantly trying to figure out how to improve their games, either by making less mistakes or figuring out better ways to exploit your opponents’ tendencies. If you aspire to greater things in your poker game, whether that be to have a better hourly rate, feel more comfortable at the table, win your buddies money or just to be better at the game, you need to constantly be trying to improve. Improvement can really come in two ways, either learning stuff you didn’t know, or improving your understanding of things you think you already understand. I know I study a decent bit and still feel like there is so much more I can learn.
Best of luck with your poker game in the New Year! And don’t forget to study…