Blog: Harmony and Poker

Resonance, Fatigue and Winning $1,700

 Is harmony a valid skill in poker?

When I was at university, and for a good couple of years after graduation, I played online poker for a living. That was quite unusual at the time, although not within my circle of friends. We lived with a successful young pro, who taught our group how to play in a serious way. Not everyone took to it in the long run, but we had fun and made money. These were the days of the poker boom, with weak competition making life easy.

At the time, I also discovered all of the different kinds of eastern practices and theologies. The internet brought new information to the forefront of my mind, and my mind was, in turn, opening up new doors of discovery.

One of the pop spiritualities at this time was the Law of Attraction, the idea that the mind was responsible for manifestation and that things like “vibration” and “harmonic resonance” impacted the events in life. The late 2000s, for me, started to feel a bit like a watered-down continuation of the late 60s. ​
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Law of Attraction Meets Hard Stats
One of the biggest difficulties for me when I turned pro was getting my head around the idea that hard statistics rule the world of poker. Our highly logical poker friend Matt, the one who had taught us in the first place, warned us that the only way to beat this game was to become better than your opponents and to play the mathematically correct move. That would lead to a long-term edge that would result in a profit.

The friends within our circle listened to varying degrees. We all put effort into learning more about the game. Some maintained that resonance was still the most important factor. It was clear to me that knowledge and consistent play were the winners. Matt’s results spoke for themselves. Here was a guy sitting on thousands and thousands of dollars of spare cash while the rest of us struggled to pay our rent.

Hard statistics assert that certain outcomes happen at a certain frequency. So, if you flip a coin, you can expect a 50/50 split of heads and tails in the long run. In the short term, you may see skewed results, but the more you repeat the event, the closer it will come to its statistical average. In poker, pocket tens beat AK off-suit in a pre-flop race 56.68 percent of the time. You can’t argue with the stats.

Apart from you can, the Law of Attraction, which is itself a stripped-down, new-age version of ancient knowledge and ideologies, says that your willpower and intentions impact events, even beyond what you think you can control. If you can believe it and hold yourself in resonance with your intention, then it will come to be.

The two ideologies don’t match up. There are lots of dualities to bring together, especially by great thinkers and artists, but in this case, I (personally) had a lot of trouble. Still, there could be no harm to learning and practicing the game. Perhaps, it is this that puts us in harmony and gives us the real willpower to succeed. The greats in sports and the arts did not get there by imagination boards alone. They may have visualized the ball in the back of the net (I’m sure many do), but they also practiced for years to get that good.

Harmonic Resonance
Regardless of taking a mathematical and knowledge-based approach to poker, thoughts about resonance and intention often crept into my mind during long sessions. That was, after all, part of my world view, so to omit it from one area of life was a challenge. I also couldn’t help but notice weird happenings at certain times.

One night, I played a poker session in my room when I entered a spontaneous trance-like state. I had meditated often but never had I been thrown into ecstasy like this before. I sat out several hands while tranced out, but when I came back around, I continued to play, feeling refreshed and light. Out of five 180-person games that I played, I won two and came in second place in another, an epic and unlikely result. Since resuming play, I had a strong feeling that I would win the games.

On other occasions, I would notice that my “harmonic resonance” with the game would significantly impact my results. When I felt good, I would win more often. However, critics would say that the mind is quite selective or even (probably more accurately) that being in “resonance” with the game would lead to a greater state of flow and more profound decision-making.

Did I win?

I’m $1,700 richer, but still.

One night I played a major Sunday tournament. For those not familiar with the online poker world, Sundays are a big day with more players and the prize pools. Among others, I entered a $22 tournament that night. The number of entrants was several thousand, and the first place was to receive over $26,000, a life-changing amount of money.

I eventually made it down to the final two tables, with the money getting quite serious indeed. The play whittled down to 15 players, and after another bust, I opened the lobby to check the prize money. I had an average stack, and if I busted now, I would walk away with a decent amount of money. I wanted the double-up, but I also sat tight to move up the huge pay jumps.

I get pocket jacks and raise it to the middle position, with the intention of calling a re-shove from most of the players. The small-blind player re-raises for a third of his stack. I take less than a moment to think and shove all-in. He calls and flips his pocket aces, ending my tournament life.

It’s 4 a.m., and I’m $1,700 richer, but still, I ask myself the question: “Did I win?”

In retrospect, this was a dangerous poker hand to hold at this stage in the tournament. When the tight opponent put in the small re-raise rather than shoving all-in, they told me that they had a decent hand. They were unlikely to fold for the remaining portion of their stack, and my jacks played against their range of mostly overpairs badly.

Did I choose my fate?
There are a few different ways to look at this hand. The first is that it was statistically unfortunate, which it undeniably was. It’s unlikely to get a pair of jacks and face an overpair at that crucial stage of the tournament. There’s also the argument that I made a mistake, and again, there are elements of truth in that. I could have played the hand differently and secured a spot on the final table where the prizes were life-changing.

Still, as I lay awake pondering what had happened, one more thought slipped into my mind. Maybe I dropped out of resonance? Maybe my intention wasn’t strong enough? What was fascinating was that moments before the fatal hand, I had looked down at the time. It was late. Really late. I wanted to go to bed badly, with every minute feeling like an hour. I had checked the lobby to see where the prizes were at: it was $1,700! Awesome! No matter what happened now, it would be a good night indeed.

And with that thought, a little intention could have shot out to the universe, and the universe thought: “He’s ready for bed now. He’s happy to go out. It’s the right time for an almost unavoidable clash of hands.” Cheers, universe!