Poker is really no different than many other activities. Pianists warm up before performing. Baseball players take batting, infield, and outfield practice. Warming up before playing is important and it assumes that we stay healthy in general. Let’s take a closer look.
Filter Unnecessary Thoughts
There are two very unnecessary thoughts that may go through a player’s mind during a game at Juicy Stakes Poker. The first is worrying about the poker rake. Here is a link to the page that explains the rake and shows you the rake calculator. Keep in mind that the rake is always topped off at no more than $3.
The second thought that is not only unnecessary but quite negative and damaging to good poker thoughts is over-thinking a bad beat. There will be plenty of time later to go over the hands in the game. During the game, if you are sure that you made the right decisions and still got beaten by sheer luck on the part of your opponent, then the healthy response is to chalk it up to the vicissitudes of poker and nothing more.
Poker Demands Deep Concentration
This is far from a big revelation! What is interesting is that there are ways to warm up your brain so that you can concentrate better.
- Do a short breathing exercise.
- Spend a few minutes meditating.
- Eat a very small meal of foods that you know you digest easily.
- Drink some water and have water available throughout the game.
- Spend a few minutes on an adult coloring page.
- Take a short walk.
- Look into a nature scene and “see” images.
- Listen to music that soothes you.
- Close your eyes.
Breathing Correctly Improves Health in Many Ways
We now know that most people breathe too shallowly. It is important to get as much oxygen into your lungs per breath as possible. The few people who have mastered deep breathing as the normal way they breathe speak glowingly about the benefits of deep breathing.
Poker players can benefit from a few minutes of deep breathing.
Meditation is Quiet Contemplation that Prepares the Mind for the Onslaught Ahead
Poker is anything but quiet. Even if everyone is whispering the “game” itself is boisterous! A few minutes of meditation allows players to filter out extraneous thoughts and makes room for exclusively poker thoughts.
Eating is a Lot More than Putting Food in, Chewing, and Swallowing!
We are not here talking about going on a lettuce-only diet! There is plenty of time for chorizos, cheeseburgers, and churros but before playing a demanding game like poker, we suggest that eating a small meal that your body takes care of easily is best.
There are two areas of emphasis here: the meal should be small and it has to be digestible without difficulty. If you need to snack during the game, the same two ideas apply. As a snack, a frozen juicy date is a lot better than a bag of chips.
Water should be obvious but we can add that a few silos of water every few minutes are much better than gulping down a quart or liter of water when you finally realize how thirsty you are.
Why is Coloring Good for You?
There are two reasons. The first is that coloring pages intended for adults are very intricate. They require deep concentration so, if you are getting ready to play a game that requires deep concentration, adult coloring pages are perfect as a preparatory tool.
The second reason is that coloring books remind us all of our childhoods when we played “all the time”. It puts us in the mood for “a game”.
Walking as a Way to Prepare for Poker
Here we are not talking about power walking. Instead, we mean slow, gentle walking that gives the player the chance to clear his or her mind for the challenges ahead. Walking is the opposite of meditation in this regard so, if meditation works better for you, do that and if walking is better do that.
Many poker players find that a combination of meditation and walking works best!
Looking at Trees or Rocks or Clouds
The great novelist, Carson McCullers, published one of the best American short stories called “A Tree, a Rock, a Cloud”. The point of the story is that we can find spirituality in the simplest natural things.
How often do you look at a tree and see in the branches and leaves images? How often do you see images in the clouds? We suspect that you are like most people and the answer is “pretty often”.
We suggest doing this as a way to get ready for poker! It will calm the nerves and excite the brain!
Music can also calm the nerves. We suggest soothing but not banal music. Slow, emotional music may be best for this purpose. We suggest music along the lines of “Shenandoah” or “Amazing Grace”.
Closing One’s Eyes May be Better than Sleep
How often do you just need to close your eyes for a few minutes to get rejuvenated even if you don’t sleep? This is very common even though far too few people actually take advantage of this wonderful technique.
Close your eyes and contemplate nothing. It will help you direct your thoughts to the many “somethings” you have to pay attention to in poker!
Make a Comprehensive To-do List for after Poker
We will end by adding this odd suggestion. If you are playing poker online here at Juicy Stakes Poker, you will have plenty of time after the poker to do things. Some of the things will be fun activities like getting together at the pub with buds.
There are many things we all do that we enjoy as much as winning at poker!
There are also responsibilities that we have to attend to.
In both cases—the fun stuff we look forward to and the not so fun stuff we think about regularly—by simply writing them down, we enable ourselves to put them out of mind. We wrote the down so there’s no way we will forget! That leaves our minds free to “think poker”.
Join Juicy Stakes
We feel that the best place to think poker is online at Juicy Stakes. We offer many ring games, tournaments, and stakes levels. So, JOIN JUICY STAkES ONLINE POKER NOW!
