Hey guys/girls,

I'll quickly introduce myself. I'm a 27 year old Canadian guy looking to get serious about poker. I have played quite a fair bit over the last 4 years, but have never made it to that next level. This is my 2nd attempt at a poker blog. I created one in December, but I don't even know where to find it.

I feel the main reason I haven't been able to improve and succeed as much as I'd like to is due to lack of focus and goals. My first year of playing online I was really into it. I only made strategy posts on 2p2, I read tons of books, and I really tried at the tables.

Now I feel like I'm just going through the motions. I don't make any strategy posts, I don't read any books, and I don't focus at the tables. I usually 6-8 table while browsing the internet.

I haven't set any goals yet, and right now I have terrible bankroll management. This all needs to change ASAP.

In terms of bankroll management I feel one problem is that at the level I'm capable of beating right now, 50NL, the value of money seems completely worthless. I often find myself sticking in a full buy-in stack because I don't really care about $50.

On Saturday night I got extremely drunk and decided it was a good idea to bet $500 on Federer to win the Aussie Open. Of course he didn't. I've never bet more than $100 on a sporting match before, and $10 is my 'usual' bet. I say usual, but I don't usually bet on sports. The worst part about it was for the 1st and 2nd set it was the best thing I'd ever seen. My adrenaline was pumping, and I was absolutely loving it. Then I passed out. I couldn't stay up any longer. I'd already been awake about 24 hours, had a long day of snowboarding, was ****faced, and just couldn't do it. So I woke up the next day, vaguely remembered making this bet, and disgustingly realized I lost. Oops. My friends thought I was total degen. I gladly would have lost $100 if I stayed up and watched it, but losing $500 to pass out in the 2nd set is beyond stupid.

Back to poker. At this point in my career I think I have a pretty good grasp of 1st level thinking. Playing my own cards. I can do that fairly well. I may make some out of line bluffs once in a while, but nothing too terrible. The majority of my stats are in line with solid winners according the HEM's Plugging the Leaks, however I'm not winning as much as I could.

This is because: 1) I'm not developing good reads on players; 2) I'm not adapting well and using these reads to make correct plays.

I'm just not focused enough at the tables. I also haven't been studying nearly enough, if at all. And I haven't felt all that healthy. So I've created this blog to write down my goals, and follow my progress. Also by coming here to do my blog, I'll also be able to read other blogs to give me motivation to succeed. I don't really want to do anything else right now. I love the lifestyle that being a poker player offers, and I know I can succeed given enough work.

A lot of my goals are just simple life goals. I've been extremely lazy in the couple months, and feel just having a better mindset altogether will drastically improve my poker game.

TOMORROW - I probably won't be doing much poker stuff tomorrow because I have other things to take care of and I volunteer from 7-10pm.

1) Wake up by noon.
2) Have a good breakfast
3) Work out
4) Get a haircut and sort out driver's license renewal
5) Get some groceries+protein powder
6) Get birthday present for Dad
7) Speak with friend in Australia
8) Complete profile on dating site - I feel like going out on date's with girls again, and am sick of trying to meet people at the bar. I've been meaning to try this internet dating thing out for a while, but have never got around to making a profile
9) Watch one poker video
10) Update this blog at the end of the day to track progress

That is a pretty easy list for tomorrow. I was going to put some short term/monthly goals but I'll leave those for tomorrow. Baby steps.

I'm looking forward to doing this blog. It's not only going to be poker related. In fact I'm sure I have lots of retarded drunken stories to share. One of my future goals will probably be to drink less, but I'm not ready to write that down yet and unsure how I'd enforce it. Whatever I write down here I must accomplish or at least make a damn hard effort trying.

Not too exciting, but right now this blog is for me. Once I deal with my personal stuff, then the blog will be more for the fans...hopefully I have some!!!


Chris