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Bad Beat -- Poker as Life

Tuesday Sep 28, 2004

If life is simply a game of poker then I need to remember to trust my instincts and know that if a given hand (“scenario”) goes sour I can get out and live to play another day. Some would say I wasn’t dealt the greatest two hole cards. Since I was born into a decent financial situation with a loving family (albeit a divorced one) we can say that my hole cards were A-6 unsuited. Yes tons of hands beat this but its not awful either. My life’s “flop” didn’t exactly bring me the goods, but I bluffed at it. After all in poker and in life you play the man, not the cards. So you could say for most of my life I’ve learned to run without the ball. Too many metaphors?

Point being – Lately I’ve had instincts to fold pre-flop but perhaps was on the blind or the button and attempted to get lucky. Consider my latest relationship. My first instincts were ones of warning which I promptly ignored. Truth is if you’re lucky enough to get a gut feeling on anything you should follow it all the way because not only is this a deeper insight to a situation but it will effect how you play the scenario later in the hand. Lets say this hand was 6-7 off suit (note – this is all a metaphor). Not a powerful hand at all. But the flop brought 5-6-6. I flopped the set! My instinct had been to run off, but now I was betting all the way assuming that I was ‘secure’ with the best hand. The turn was an A which I was glad to see because I expected that some of my opponents were sitting with A-K, or A-x, and they would now have top pair, easily beaten by my set. Three opponents remained into the river. 9 came on fifth street. I still hoped my opponents had Aces or perhaps two pairs Aces up. I checked to pretend I was on a straight draw with a 7-8 and away they went betting and raising. I then reraised and was quickly called. A turned over my set. The next to act quickly mucked his cards. The final player flipped A-A. A full house. My set was crushed. I had lost the hand and a lot of my chips – devastating me and my game.

The point of this story is simple. Go with your gut from the very first moments of any scenario in your life. If you believe you should not be in a situation—get the hell out!! Otherwise you’ll find false confidence and take a Bad Beat!