I’ve finally worked my way through Jared Tendler’s new book “The Mental Game of Poker” (TMGP), and I am excited to say that this book is an absolute MUST READ for anyone who takes poker seriously. Casual players and players who play just for fun need not read this because its not a book that you just read, it requires much thought and effort aside from simply reading the book. It took me about a month to work my way through it and to really think critically about the many leaks that I have in my mental game. So finally, I thought it appropriate to take some time to write up a little review of this book because I believe it to be very unique in that it is really the first of its kind. Or at least, it is the first of its kind that I have read.
Let me start by saying that I ordered this book around the middle of April when it first came out, and after a shipping mixup that delayed delivery of the book for about 2 weeks, Jared was kind enough to personally sign a copy for me and mail it himself. Very cool and very professional!
I was a little leery and skeptical about even ordering the book in the first place because the only other “mental game” book that I have read before this was “The Poker Mindset” (TPM) by Matthew Hilger and Ian Taylor. I read TPM several years ago back in ’07 when I was deployed to Iraq, and TPM is really the one and only book that I have relied upon over the past 4 years to understand how I should be thinking about the big picture as a poker player. I dabbled from time to time with some of the Alan Schoonmaker books on psychology and your worst enemy, but I found these books to be not up to par with TPM. Therefore, when I had bad runs, I would routinely reflect back on TPM to get my head straight. So when TMGP came out in late April, I ordered it for 2 reasons: 1, it was post Black Friday, and I felt that since I couldn’t play online, I would try to learn as much as I could and really make an honest effort at improving my live game, and 2, I heard Jared talk about some of his tilt concepts on the Cardrunners podcast “Cash Plays” a few times, and his chats about tilt intrigued me. Right as Black Friday occurred, I was in the middle of probably my worst online downswing, as documented in this blog, so this also caused me to have some interest in TMGP. Unfortunately, the timing of Jared’s book being released just after Black Friday is absolutely terrible, as I believe if it came out a year or even 6 months ago, most online grinders would have got their hands on it and spread the word on how ground-breaking it is. However, the timing of TMGP’s release really was perfect for me!
Once I got the book and started reading, I was immediately overwhelmed with the amount of information and the amount of effort it would take me to get through it. I really did not know where to begin, so I resolved to reading it through from cover to cover and to complete every exercise along the way about some of the mental flaws that I have. After doing this, or really after reading the first 4 chapters, I soon realized that this is not a book to read just 1 time. It is a book that I will have to read again and again as well as reference the different exercises when I am experiencing the different mental game lapses that I experience.
In the book, the first 4 chapters lay the foundation for consistent learning and self development, and then it gets into what Jared calls the 4 central areas of every poker player’s mental game: tilt, fear, motivation, and confidence. I think that the main source of marketing for this book came directly from Jared’s chapter on tilt where he is really the first to break tilt down and divide it into 7 separate types of tilt: Running Bad Tilt, Injustice Tilt, Hate-Losing Tilt, Mistake Tilt, Entitlement Tilt, Revenge Tilt, and Desparation Tilt. This chapter definitely intrigued me about the book because at times, I often experience all 7 kinds of tilt. However, the chapters on Fear and Motivation really struck me personally as important to my development as well. I have benefitted mostly from these 2 chapters in the short term because I am applying the concepts learned in the fear chapter when to go down to the casino to play live, and I have been surprising motivated more and more about poker with every day since Black Friday.
One thing that Jared stresses throughout the book is the importance of writing and keeping notes/stats about poker. When I used to grind online, this “light content” blog is literally all the writing I did because I had HEM to rely on to keep all my stats. Well, now that I play live about twice a week, I don’t have that anymore. So I’ve been keeping a spreadsheet of all my live results, stats, notes, and critiques. I’ve also been typing out all of the mental exercises that Jared recommends in the book. One thing that I kind of developed from some of the examples in the book is that in my spreadsheed, I am now assigning my performance a score from 1-10 for each session on how well I do in the following areas: tilt, fear, total mental score, and strategic score. While my results are still varying (over of course a very small sample), I will say that this exercise is extremely useful because it gets me thinking about my performance and allows me to learn from it.
There’s just something about using this book that kind of hits home with me because as I read the book, Jared describes many situations that make me say to myself “Wow, this really applies to me” or “Wow, I’ve been there before many times.” I think that overall, this is a book that is going to really help me in the long term to get my head straight while I can’t play online. I have not heard of these concepts anywhere else before, and I truly believe that when the time comes for online poker to be legal again, I will have the right mindset from the start to maximize my performance. Again, I recommend this book to anyone, and I welcome any questions that anyone might have about my experience with the book.
Until next time,
- “Formerly” 6 Deuce Suited
Good post and I’ll be sure to check out the book. I’ve gone through spurts of keeping very detailed spreadsheets and somewhat lighter written logs of players, especially at my regular home games. I’m sure reading this book will propel me to get back to keeping up with that part of my game.