The Zen of Winning Money at Online Poker - Finding Your Own Happy Place

I am not going to tell you how to win it all at the world tournaments. I am not going to tell you how to beat the "world champions" of poker. I will show you some reasonable tactics to use to increase your odds and find your personal "happy place" for playing online poker.

The object behind playing poker is winning the money. This card game is based on mathematics, skill, some luck and your personality. A decision to either play at online poker or make money needs to be made. Here is why. Your personality is the key that makes or breaks you on your future cash balance. Your poker playing skills need to be developed to increase the odds of winning. You need these newly developed skills to recognize such factors such as "random luck", the pitfalls to avoid, when to make the value bets; all to increase the odds of your winning.

The problem with having emotion and "playing at poker" is that it will cost you a lot of money. The same emotions that started you panicking and betting are the same emotions that will not let you chill out and change tactics to survive and be in the money. Another key to playing good online poker is finding the type and style of poker that works for you. This is an absolute necessity.

I personally like special poker games; I like the 4 seat blowouts as a personal favorite, meaning you must knockout all players at your original table before advancing to another table. The main advantage is that when you advance after knocking the other three out you discover that hundreds have been knocked out across all the tables playing. Usually this is how it breaks down: the other night there were 787 of us players entered at 197 starting tables, we played and had 197 players left and then we are assigned tables and play poker again on 50 tables. If this tourney pays 64 places then a few of the extras that were knocked out got some money. (The secret is in working towards the goal of placing in the top 64 spots paid. Start by looking for the nuts playing... they are erratic and will bet almost anything they probably will be gone before long ... watch for the player "blowing up" after loosing a big hand and tossing extra money around, give careful notice how you opponents bet and what their hole cards were. *Use the "Card History" button to constantly scroll down and see the loser's hole cards. Learn as much about you opponents as you can) Your job is to watch, learn and keep your ego in check... your patience and understanding are the "keys" to your survival.This type of game yields about 10 to 12 dollars for the bottom winning places and makes for about an hour of fun playing. This specialty style of game sure beats the grind of regular tourneys where the goal is knocking out thousands of players and playing for days only to be out of the money.

I like "Sit and Go" single table games. Picture this: you are sitting in at a small online "Sit and Go" tourney at a virtual card table with 8 others, everyone started with 1500 chips and now you are down to 1250 chips and it has been 16 hands and have not won a single chip and you just can't stand it anymore so you start raising with marginal hands like K-6 off suit from any position on the table and without seeing any flop. And suddenly you win 2 hands and you are up about 300 chips. You are happy aren't you? But what you may not realize is that it is almost over for you. You have exposed your weakness to the other players. You get frustrated; you get scared that with only 1250 chips you are becoming weak so you loose your patience because you need to win at any cost. Patience is the best tactic to develop for winning at poker. Skill to use your patience is the second best. It is not easy to sit at a poker table and continue to dole out the large and small blinds while waiting for your opponents to shoot it out around you. Sometimes you have to fold really great starting hands (AK, AQ, KK, QQ) because your table opponents on each side of you are pushing each other by escalating the ante moneys in an attempt to piss the other player off. They loose site of the end goal and only see their opponent as a must "take down" not the generalized end goal of being in the money. They "blow up" at each other. So what is the best thing to do at this point? Fold your good hand and sit back and watch. Have patience.

I have played many single table cash games that started with 9 players and I usually come in around second most times because the players all got emotional and did the "gunslinger thing" or the "fear thing" till they were all gone. And since the single table cash game on Poker Stars pays 3 places with the third breaking even on your entry fee it all works out pretty well. (That doesn't mean that I don't jump in when I can and take some chips for myself. It means I do not let it get to me if I get low on chips and I keep my emotions off the playing table.) I do use strategies like value betting when it is appropriate. And yes, playing the "game of poker" like this isn't very exciting but I happen to like the moneys more. A number of times I have been down to around 3-400 chips and managed to come back to place second and double my entry fee and for me that's true satisfaction. Sometimes I do bust out but generally in any average month; I make some real money because I keep the "excitement" and "emotion" out of my online poker playing.

Every person playing online poker is an individual. We all have comfort zones and unique personalities that should control your approach to the type of poker and the player you need to be to actually win. Some people may be more comfortable only playing the free games or large cheap entry tournaments; some may find their niche at medium level cash games, etc. but it is about what wins for you not what is most personally satisfying to play at. Personal honestly is the key to finding your level to play at. (I love the thrill of winning a two hundred dollar big cash pot at the 2 and 4 dollar cash No limit Texas Holdem tables but I do not play them well because I am too afraid of loosing hundreds of dollars to actually play it consistently very well. So I never play these tables anymore only watch them.)

I speak from experience. I have found my "happy place"; the price range and game types that I am good at. I like micro cash single table "Sit and Go" Texas Holdem poker for entry fees of one dollar to ten dollars each. I also play the specialty games of four seat blowout cash Holdem tournaments for two or three dollars in entry fees and the micro cash HORSE tables for antes of 25/50 cents. I do not play the fancy "big" tournaments or the games where I have very poor odds of doing well. (I personally judge the potential field by the total number of entered players, I want the highest number of places paid out in proportion or I do not play, I like a certain type of game - HORSE, Texas Holdem No Limit single table, etc..., I look for the turbo speed type and I prefer to play late night.)

Here are my results in the last few days: 5 cash specialty games entered: total cash paid out for them 12 dollars. I came in 2nd and got 306.00 for one; got 12.00 for an 59^th place for a 2 dollar entry with another, collected 10.50 for a 62 place again and busted out 2 other times. My total winnings for these games were 322.50 dollars. Played HORSE for 4 hours originally started with 3 bucks and now have 11.25 for net winnings of 8 dollars. Played 8 "Sit and Go" single tables with a combined entry fees totaling 10 dollars, busted out four times and made a total of 28.25 making it a net winnings of 18.25 from them. This totals net 354.75. It was a good couple of games. My average is around approximately 50 dollars for this kind of action so picking up 354.75 made it a great time. And this kind of money many not pay for a luxury vacation trip but it does pay for a few small household bills and keeps me in consistent entry money to pay poker online.

That's all for now, my second article will be on how to recognize luck and use it, watching your opponents and the play at the tables before sitting down and playing them and more particulars on finding your own "happy place" for playing good poker consistently.