The Stop-Loss Mentality

Playing poker with a stop-loss approach is where you tell yourself that you'll stop playing as soon as you hit X amount of cash or chips. It takes many forms but essentially it's a strategy to limit or minimalise any losses that may be incurred. A stop-loss limit may be brought in after a big winning session or sessions (to "bank" those hard-earned chips) or it can be put in place to stop losses spiralling out of control or getting any worse than they are already.

I have to say that I've certainly been a proponent of this mentality in the past and have often written about my self-imposed stop-loss amounts. However, I'm now starting to understand that controlling things in this way is really just a short-term plan that has no real positive impact on the long-term scheme of things. In fact, if anything, I think that imposing these types of limits is restrictive and stunts that part of us that should just loosen up and play free A-game poker.

I remember sitting in The Empire one day and looking down at £825 in chips after having spun that up from a starting stack of £400. Nothing had significantly changed at the table but I remember looking down and telling myself that I was not going to let this stack go below £800. (Doubling-up your starting stack just sounds so nice doesn't it?) The consequence? I just threw away decent hands, in position, that I really should have played - and for the stupid reason that I'd fall below £800 if I called big raises or raised myself!! Needless to say, I just limped and called small raises for a few hands before leaving when I hit exactly 800. Stupid.

In future, as soon as I find myself even slightly thinking along those lines, I'll either get up and go for a walk - or I'll be scooping up my chips and just getting right outta there. (In the above case it woulda saved me £25!)

Conversely, imposing a stop-loss limit to curtail loses is just as daft when you come to think about it. Why? Because it just encourages negative thinking. Rather than just playing A-game poker and trying to win money (as you should do), metaphorically speaking you just end up looking over your shoulder (or downward) at the trap door or safety net. You play, almost expecting to fall because you've put the safety net there for your protection and "it's not going to hurt" very much. A totally rubbish way of thinking.

So this post is really about convincing myself to take the shackles off and to look up towards the light rather than down at the dark. I mention this because I could have stopped playing the online game as soon as I hit £440 this month and banked a nice profit for June and been happy at breaking-even for the year. Then again, do I really want to enforce a self-imposed ban on myself of a game I'm currently enjoying? Ah, no, not really.

So, yeh, having dipped yesterday, I'm up only £380 for this month and now looking at a £60 deficit for the year. Should I let this bother me and put up some kind of stop-loss limit to smooth things over? No!

Let's play poker!!