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who’s afraid of the Sharks?

Running from shadows and jumping at the sound of things that go bump in night might be a staple of a classic horror film, but what could such things have to do with poker? Answer: fear. While these cinematic motifs might seem somewhat fantastical they do in fact point to one underlying premise of fear, namely, the unknown. This month Jared Tendler outlines the nature of fear, how it can hinder your poker game and how you can eliminate its negative effects.

n my previous articles I’ve covered the major mental games issues that may be affecting

your game, including tilt, confidence and motivation. In this article I’m going to explore the largely overlooked issue of fear.

The general definition of tilt assumes that it is anything that causes you to play below your best. If this definition is to be accepted then fear and anxiety don’t exist. However, as you know, I like to be a bit more specific about these issues, which is why I define tilt as anger. By doing this, fear and anxiety suddenly emerge as issues in their own right and relevant contributors to problems you experience at the table. Moreover, it now becomes important to realize that fear requires a different resolution strategy than tilt.

Before we go any further it’s important to point out that the fear we are talking about isn’t a fear of actually playing poker. You can still play poker but it’s the fear and anxiety of making decisions in and around the game that need addressing.

the Nature of FearJust as frustration is the small piece of anger which eventually develops into tilt or rage, fear is brought about by a single unit, namely, a question. Another way to see a question such as: “what does he have?” or “what’s the right play?” is that there are unknowns, that there is some uncertainty. These are legitimate questions in poker and people will have varying levels of anxiety, but when you strip them down to the basic layer it becomes clear that each question portrays some level of fear.

These questions can be big or small. Indeed, the larger questions such as, “will I ever become a pro?” can weigh on the smallest questions such as, “should I be raising here?” In this scenario a “small” question suddenly becomes a breaking point for the larger question, which subsequently increases the pressure on the situation and produces fear.

If this is the case then the way to become fearless is not to imagine being fearless, it’s to resolve these unanswered questions. The antidote to fear is certainty and certainty is born out of an answer.

There may be nerves but the anxiety and fear won’t be there. Obviously some questions such as “will I ever be a pro?” don’t have a definitive answer, so for these types of questions you need to solve the reason why you would ask that question in the first place. For most players a major part of why people ask these types of questions is because they want predictability. However, the nature of poker doesn’t allow for predictability and so

COMING SOONJared’s new book is set for general release in April.

I

psychology

“Fear of the dark, fear of the dark, I have a constant fear that something’s always there.”Iron maiden - Fear of the dark.

Letting your underlying fears rule you

will cause you to take unnecessary precautions.

the official world poker tour™ magazine 69

psychology

Jared TendlerJared is the mental game coach for over 150 poker players from 21 countries. To find out more, visit www.jaredtendlerpoker.com.

To solve the issue of fear you need to follow a similar “inject the logic process” that I outlined for tilt. Essentially you need to resolve the underlying

issue of fear by identifying the questions in your game and then answering them.

The answers to these questions become the logic

statements you need to inject in order to eliminate that uncertainty and subsequent anxiety that evolves from an unanswered question.

This may seem overly simplistic to reduce fear to a question, but if you have an answer there’s no need to fear because if there’s no uncertainty there should be no fear.

conclusion

by seeking predictability you’re essentially asking to take the risk out of the game, something which would ultimately make poker an unprofitable pursuit. Symptoms of FearWhen your mind goes blank in a big pot, you can’t think clearly and you’re not angry, that’s the pressure getting to you.

Obsessively thinking about past mistakes as you’re playing is another symptom. This is often characterized by second guessing your decisions, which in turn makes you fearful of pushing your game and moving up.

Over thinking a situation is a major symptom of fear. This is when you start to work in too many factors and put too much

pressure on a situation. In these instances your mind is constantly racing and you tie yourself in knots. For example, in a spot where you’ve been raised all-in on the river for a large sum of money you begin ask things like: “how much is this money worth to me in real life?” “Will the other players at the table criticize me for making a bad move?” “Is this player just bullying me because he knows, I know, he knows?”

Indeed, what was once a straightforward decision has now become a pressure cooker of competing ideas. Fear of FailureFear of failure is by far the biggest issue a player can harbor. This fear may stem from

a previous failure in another aspect of their life that hasn’t been properly resolved. In other poker literature, fear of failure generally asserts that you can’t fail if you’re continually learning, which to me seems like a cop out. If you’re learning then it can reduce the risk of failure, but fear of failure is more complex than that. Fear of failure exists because you try to control too much. So if a player believes they can control the outcome of the short term, then their definitions of success are far too broad. This desire to over control situations ultimately fails and so the player ends up fearing a situation they could never control in the first place.

TOP TIPRealising that you can’t control certain aspects of poker is essential if you want to quell any underlying fears that are holding you back in poker.

The demons come out at night. Answering your internal

internal questions will help eliminate any nasties from your game.