Sam Forde is a qualified counsellor and professional poker player based in Auckland, New Zealand. He specializes in heads-up no-limit hold'em, and contributes poker mindset videos on a regular basis for Run It Once. Sam enjoys the stimulation of poker strategy, psychology, and the various areas in which these intersect.
When I started playing poker, my appetite for the game was insatiable, reined in only by all my other loves and responsibilities in life: my partner and young child at home, my teaching work and counselling studies, and my need to maintain a reasonable sleep schedule.
I built a poker table and hosted a regular home game in a shed in my backyard with friends, acquaintances and whoever they brought along. I have fond memories from those poker days, though I do remember my joy of playing being offset by the frustration of not having enough understanding of the game; too much mystery on too many nodes. I enjoyed the social component, the emotional rollercoasters, the competition, the complexity, unending learning, and the texture of it all: chips, cards, felt, whisky. I was also drawn to the way in which poker can teach you a lot about yourself and relationship with others, a lure that has kept me connected to the game to this day on and off the felt.
There is one particular memory from this early period that had a ripple effect in all areas of my life and poker game.
Tyrannical values
It was a summer’s evening. I’d had a day of counseling study, spent the late afternoon with my wife and son and had a poker game lined up for later that night. I sat down on the back steps of our rental property to enjoy a small Cuban cigar in the setting sun. As I looked out at the garden, soaking in this precious moment of solitude, a man came clambering over the fence before landing his 280-pound frame in my backyard. Two others followed; burly blokes flopping over the fence. The trio started meandering across the grass. Then they spotted me. We locked eyes and I gave them 'the eyebrows' (in New Zealand, it’s customary to just raise our eyebrows as a way to say “Hey bro, how’s it going?”). They ignored me and I watched their staunch faces disappear down the driveway.
I have no idea what they were up to. The scene was too absurd at the time for me to have much of an emotional reaction apart from being a bit baffled and amused. But reflecting on it later, something bothered me. It was such an unsubtle metaphor: Some random guys were literally 'crossing my boundary' and what did I do? I gave them the local equivalent of a Ned Flanders 'Hi-diddly-ho!'
I spoke to my own counselor at the time about it, and she shared something which opened up a lot of space in my thinking. She said “What I know is that hospitality is a really important value for you. But… values can be tyrants. I call these ‘tyrannical values,’ because they demand that you be a certain way with all people in all places at all times. In reality, every situation is different. In each individual case you can chart a course and make a choice.”
Rigid self-imposed rules can kill your joy
Her words and the memory of those three units lumbering across the backyard have been a gift for me over the years, in life and in poker. They have helped loosen the grip of rigid self-imposed rules about how to act, from 'You must always accommodate people’s needs' to 'You should always mix in 3bets with ATo from the BB in a heads-up match!' Every situation is negotiable and often just requires a little bit of discomfort. For example, 'Yes, it feels awkward, but It’s OK for me to interrupt this person and say I need to go, otherwise I will be late for my next meeting!' or 'OK, think! How should I adjust my preflop strategy based on this opponent’s tendencies?'
It seems so simple, but requires awareness and adaptability - a willingness to navigate these particular uncharted waters, no matter how much they appear similar to others you’ve traversed.
Restrictive rules about how to act in any given situation can also feel safe, they can be a refuge. This is how they hook me in. I can abdicate responsibility to them. If there’s a rule I have to submit to, I can autopilot - I don’t need to adapt to the opponent in front of me and their particular strategy. I don’t need to focus intently, because the rule is the rule (default strategy) and it’s there to protect me! Life and relationships have similar pitfalls: 'If I react to circumstances and others in my default way, I don’t need to do the painful work of engaging with my feelings or really considering the other person and their pesky needs!'
This is not the same as embracing a simplified strategy. Simplified strategies are extremely useful, for several reasons, e.g. executing well and being less exploitable. Reducing cognitive load in early streets also opens up the possibility of playing with more creativity and presence in parts of the game tree where you need to be sharp and have a bit of work to do.
But rigid rules promote excessive autopilot and default reactions. These can kill your joy and dampen creative possibilities. They can sap your motivation and numb you from the intensity of what life and poker have to offer.
Poker demands something from us which we can also be nurturing in ourselves in everyday life: being present, being willing to engage, and acting out of the values which are meaningful to us in an adaptable way, case by case, street by street.
Learn more from Sam Forde at Run It Once.
