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Going on Tilt and How to Avoid It

You just lost your whole bank roll on one hand. You had, what you thought would be unbeatable: four of a kind 4's, but you lost to a man who had four of a kind 5's. Although you played the hand perfectly and in almost every situation that you would have that hand you would win, you lost. After this occurs, most players become psychologically weak and flustered.


Players start to play hands they shouldn't and are senseless when it comes to putting their money in on the rights hands. The term for this situation is tilt, and when it happens to you, you could be in a lot of trouble. Yet, if you try to follow the suggestions I have written in this article, you might be able to get yourself off tilt and back in the game.


It’s All Mental
From personal experience, bad beats and going on tilt are by far the worst part of poker. Every experienced player knows how it when you had all your money in a pot, and your opponent turned over the bigger hand. However, poker is a game of luck, and their will always be occasions where you will be beaten with a great hand even if you played it “the right way.” From past experience most of my friends knew that when I used to have a bad beat I would go on tilt. I have learned over time how to control my emotions when playing poker, and if I can do it so can you.


The largest part of poker is the mental aspect of the game. It is this factor that makes the game very interesting to play and watch, and is a contributing reason why a lot of the great poker players are very intelligent people. Your emotional state while playing the game changes after you win a pot, after you bluff someone, after you are bluffed, after a bad beat, and so on. The key here is to be able to sustain a positive and stable mental outlook on the game in all of these situations so that it doesn't affect your play. This can be very hard to do at times but if you remember a few things it will be easier for you to stay off tilt.


How to Avoid It
The only way that a player starts to be reckless and go on tilt is after a bad beat. Many times a player will constantly keep thinking about that one had, and they will be distracted from the current play. On the other hand, if you were to have won that big hand you wouldn't have been so flustered about it and your game play would have changed for the better. You would have felt more confident and would have kept a positive outlook on the game. You would be more cautious and smart on how you used your money, and you would have stayed away from future errors that could have occurred.


Knowing this information, the best way that I have found to avoid going on tilt is to trick yourself into thinking that you won the hand. Doing this is actually a lot harder then it sounds and if you for one second you question your actions on the hand, you will probably put yourself on tilt. If this strategy doesn't work for you because you can't convince yourself you won the hand, then take a break from playing to clear your mind. Get up and walk around and try to take your mind of the game and that hand. The more you think of how horrible the beat was, the more your going to go on tilt.


Don't do what many people do, and that is to keep playing and try to win the money back as soon as you can. This will most likely result in you playing poor hands, or making bad calls, and you just losing more money. The last thing that usually helps in the game is to not count your money. Even though this sounds strange, if you are too caught up in how much money you are losing on each bet then you are most likely to make the wrong moves. Don't think about the individual bets, and how much “real” money they were worth, the key is to keep playing the game as if you had won the hand.


Afterthoughts
After reading this article, I truly hope that you have some new knowledge on tilt and how you can keep yourself from doing it. Playing poker in the best mind set possible is very important and when going on tilt you can't accomplish that. To give you a slightly exaggerated analogy, tilt is similar to driving under the influence. If you drive sober, you are driving at the best of your ability, but when you start to drink you impair that ability to make the right decisions. This situation is the same with cards and going on tilt. You want to make sure you are always in a good mood before placing your money on the line. Remember, poker is about having fun and making money, and once you're on tilt, you won't do either. So good luck, and may the experience be rare that you come upon that unlucky bad beat.