Reality Bites

Question: When is an experiment no longer an experiment?
Answer: When the researcher becomes emotionally entangled with the results.

The YIPES trial has been underway for four months now (actually five, if you count the month of June, when the experiment was put on hold for 30 days). Things started out bleakly, when the original $5 buy in was reduced to a little over a buck. I almost gave up at that point, planning to shoot my remaining wad on a single table SnG, but my buddy Bret convinced me to stay the course and eke out a series of small gains at the 2/4-cent tables. Fortunately, I heeded his advice and, over the course of the past four months, built my bankroll up to well over $110. Things were going great. YIPES was growing. I was invincible. I would soon be rich! WSOP, I’m on my way!

Oh, how the mighty can fall…

When the month of August began a few weeks ago, the upward climb of the ‘roll began to sputter to a halt. Then things started going badly, very badly. I would zoom up to $115 or $120 dollars, but then plummet back to $100. Then I would build my stake back to over $110, only to see it drop to $90. I couldn’t seem to get any traction, rising up ten or twenty dollars, but then dropping twenty or thirty. Yesterday was no exception. I started the day at $111, but after an hour and a half of play I was down to $80. Thirty-one bucks lost in an hour and a half! Worse, I didn’t think I was doing anything grossly wrong. The cards just weren’t falling my way. I was playing solid poker, paying attention, being tight but aggressive… and yet it still wasn’t working.

The results were unsettling. No, make that demoralizing. In fact, over the course of two weeks the whole experiment had become downright unpleasant. Four months of hard work going down the drain in inexorable, painful, excruciating fashion. I couldn’t do anything right. The poker gods had it in for me. They were going to take away my stack of money and laugh while they did so. Arhghg. This was NOT fun anymore.

In my black mood, I fired off an instant message to Bret in which I bemoaned my luck. I whined about my shrinking stack size. I complained and griped and whimpered.

Bret responded at first by trying to tell me it was all part of the game and to stay the course. He advised me to take a small break, get a life, and come back fresh and rested.

But I whined even louder at those clichéd suggestions. I wasn’t winning and, dammit, I should be! I’m a good player, but I wasn’t being rewarded for it! This was a travesty. This wasn’t fun anymore. I hated poker.

Yes, I actually typed that I hated the game and YIPES and cards in general.

There was a long pause on the other end, and then the response on IM came back clear and in no uncertain terms:”get real.”

Huh? What? Get real? I am real! Didn’t he understand? I…. I…. uh, wait a minute. Get real. What is real? Hell, what am I doing? I’ve turned something I like into something I hate. What the fuck?

Brets Get Real statement was, in hindsight, just what this researcher needed to hear. Somewhere along the way, I had lost sight of the original purpose of the experiment, and instead I had become emotionally caught up in the results. YIPES was originally intended to see how far five bucks could be grown. Somewhere along the way, I started thinking the money was real. I started to think that YIPES wasn’t an experiment, but rather a means to an end. And when the results didn’t line up with my expectations, I felt disapointment and, dare I say, anger with data.

Wow.

It was time to reassess, time to remember what I am trying to achieve, which is NOT entry into the WSOP, but rather a sober look at where $5 in seed money and a goal of doubling every month will lead. The purpose of YIPES isn’t necessarily to succeed, but rather to see IF I can succeed. Or, just as telling, to find out where and when the monthly doubling comes to a halt. Hell, this may in fact be the month that that happens. The way things are going, I’m not sure I can/will hit $160 by the end of August. But you know what? That’s okay. I just have to remember what the point of this silly experiment is. And I have to get real. It’s only a game. It’s only an experiment. It's just YIPES, for crying out loud.

All-in for now…
-Bug
PS. With a Get Real mantra in my head, I played another hour-long session last night and grinded out a gain of $20, putting me back over $100. It will be interesting to see which direction the stack goes from here….but it’s just a number, nothing more, nothing less. I hope it goes up, but if it doesn't, that's okay too.