Are you a winner or a loser in the Poker world?  As in the rest of the world we have to decide what it means to be a winner or a loser.  Are you a beginner, just sitting down to your first penny ante game after memorizing a few rules from a book?  Have you been playing pretty well in a recreational sense for a long time?  What is it that makes you a winner or a loser in the world of Poker?  We could talk about this a lot of ways, and yes I believe you are a winner if you are getting better on a daily basis even if you are a net loser.  But this is Poker and the main idea is to take money from others in a rule driven chance assisted game. If we look at that very simple definition of the game the definition of winner versus loser is pretty darn simple. 

If you are a net winner then you are a winner.  It is pretty simple.  Do you have the records to tell you the answer? If you don’t you are a loser, because it will all come back to bite you.  Do you have a plan for getting better every day?  If you don’t, you are a loser.   Do you want to be a winner? Whether you play real poker, online poker or mac poker, dig in, keep the records and play the games. 

What are the things that a Poker winner does?  The winner sits down and creates a set of goals and plan to move along his Poker path.  He has that simple record book.  He can tell you how much he lost in that game two years ago February, not approximately but exactly. He just flips open the book.  He can even tell you the names of the players.

The winner outworks the rest of the players at his level.  Not only does he keep the records and set up the plan, but he takes action on that plan.  Maybe he is a serious amateur and plays two games a week with some buddies.  When he starts out they are better than he and that’s ok, but as his first year of playing passes he gets better and better and the rest of them get fatter. He may bring the chips and beer but he begins to leave with the money.  He read one poker book a month and practices what he learned.  He is planning that visit to Vegas.  He knows how much he can lose on any particular night, because he set up a Poker account and a Poker budget at the beginning.  He is a beginner, but he can do the numbers.  He knows that at his current burn rate he can play for months and months.  But because he has the records he can see that the burn rate is shrinking.  He is beginning to come home a net cash winner some evening.  The burn rate is almost ready to turn into an investment rate.

The winner does the things that the loser won’t do.