I’ve been mulling over the Kimmy Kurse, where I seemingly always lose any hand during which wifey Kim calls me on my cell phone. I still don’t believe in superstition outright, but I do believe that some of the intangibles in this world affect us in ways we do not realize. In other words, breaking a mirror will not bring you 7 years of bad luck because superstition is nonsense. But if you break a mirror and then go around expecting problems, you’ll find them. It may be things that were always there that you are now associating with the mirror. For instance, you break a mirror and then find out you were fired. Well, the mirror likely had nothing to do with it, but the mental association occurs. Besides this selective association, I also think that the expectation of a problem sometimes brings about a problem. So, if you break a mirror by accident and are overly worried that you are going to be blamed, and then go around in a defensive manner, people may pick up on your defensiveness and blame you, much in the same way you feared.
So, as applied, there are likely one of two things happening (or a combination of both) when wifey Kim calls me during poker. One, its just mere coincidence and/or I ignore all the times she calls and I succeed because those stories are boring and don’t stick with me. Or, Two, after she calls, I expect to lose and then subconsciously make it happen.
I was thinking this over recently as I caught up with some PokerRoad podcasts. I was listening to the first podcast of the 2010 WSOP with guest Phil Hellmuth. He is espousing a new Phil Hellmuth, based around PEMM, initials for Positive attitude, Exercise, Mediation and being in the Moment. Granted, its a pretty douschey acronym, but it is Hellmuth, after all. Something else that caught my attention was an idea from Joe Sebock; Sebock considered shutting off his cell phone during future tournaments to prevent the distractions that inevitably come.
Two routes to the same place, inner peace when wifey Kim wants to talk during a poker tournament.
By following Hellmuth’s advice and keeping a positive attitude, arguably those “bad luck” moments won’t stick in my head, and the curse will naturally dissipate. By remaining in the moment, I won’t be thinking about wifey Kim or the call when the hand plays out, something that I was actually doing in the AA v. 78o hand in the tournament. Exercise, well, that’s another story, and meditation sounds great on paper, but it isn’t something I have been able to adopt. But perhaps an attitude adjustment and keeping in the moment is one way to counteract the self-fulfilling bad luck that is a call from wifey Kim.
Ironically, while it is a lot harder to change one’s mental/emotional outlook, it may be even harder to follow Joe Sebock’s idea. When I play poker, usually the only person to call me is wifey Kim, but there are a lot of occasions where my buds are also playing the event or are in the poker room and cell phones are the obvious way to find each other. Then there is the idea that poker is not so important that I should let it literally put my blinders up to the rest of my life. If there is an emergency, I suppose I should be available. Should. But nonetheless, my goal is to try this technique at my next session. Phone off, with a text message to the wifey beforehand that I will be unavailable and a call afterward to let her know I’m available again.
Of course, all of this will require my pimp hand to be super strong when the time comes to pull that line. First attempt will likely be Saturday at the I Had Outs tournament.
Until next time, make mine poker!