Tag Archives: taking chances

The Psychology Of Gambling

It was about 2 1/2 months ago when I wrote an article comparing blogging to playing in poker tournaments. Once again I’m diving into the gambling world, this time time the stakes are drastically different (see what I did there?). This is also an updated blog post from over 14 years ago; my memory isn’t bad, but some of what I’m addressing early on isn’t as memorable as I might allude to.

it’s a gamble living in central New York

There was this period of time back then where I read news stories about people in positions of authority that had been caught stealing money from their organizations and using that money to support their gambling habits. Locally, there was the story of a man who’d just been sent to prison for stealing $272,000 or so and spending it all on gambling.
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5 Keys To Winning Poker Tournaments And Blogging

By now those of you used to reading this blog know that I love to play poker. I’ve written a few posts over the years comparing poker and blogging, including this one, 5 Things Bloggers Can Learn From Poker. I’m kicking this one up a notch and I’m going to talk about winning poker tournaments. Did I win a poker tournament? Stay tuned as we go through these 5 keys.

Photo by Amanda Jones on Unsplash

1. You have to prepare for the long haul.

Poker tournaments are long. If you’re in a very large one in person it could take multiple days. The main World Series of Poker tournament in Las Vegas takes more than a week, not including the final table, which is usually held months later. Smaller tournaments can take a couple of days to complete, although some will end in one day; it’s rare that it happens that way.
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It Takes Guts To Have An Opinion

It’s hard to get mad at people who take the safe route and withhold their true feelings, in their own names, online. After all, sometimes people will say something that others don’t agree with, and no one wants to be derided for their feelings. These days we have the term “cancel culture”, and it sounds scary. People risk losing their jobs, their friends, and being castigated all over social media; I understand.

Mickey Mouse Protests Disney's Rainforest Destruction

Rainforest Action Network via Compfight


Often, it seems the people who fear this the least are those with true hate in their hearts, those who could care less about everyone, only themselves and those like them. Those are the folks who believe it’s always better to be your ugliest self up front, then apologize later and say people took what they had to say out of context, or give a false apology as in “I’m sorry if you were offended by…” Yeah, I bet!
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