The Success Principles of Poker – Be Clear Why You Are Here

An Image on a Milk Carton Nobody’s Looking For

I wasn’t ignoring them. I just didn’t know that they existed. I was well and truly in the rat race. I was the little hamster on the wheel and boy could I run.

I thought I was doing all the right things. I had a great job. I had a great pension plan. I had a wonderful wife, a beautiful little boy, great friends and family and lived in a safe and loving environment.

I was also a sleepwalker. I was taking each day as it comes, and every day I had my eyes closed.

I was on automatic pilot. I felt like an image on the side of a milk carton, only nobody was looking for me. I should have been incredibly happy but I was riddled with anxiety, stress and unhappiness.

When I learned about life purpose things changed irrevocably.

Suddenly I knew what I wanted and that’s a big paradigm shift to being on automatic pilot. The latter brings you random shit; the former brings you exactly what you love.

Situation: You open-raise to 2.5 big blinds with K Q in late position. The table has been playing somewhat loosely, and you sense an opportunity to pick up blinds and antes. Two players call, and the flop comes K 6 3 . You continuation-bet half the pot, and one opponent calls. As the turn approaches, a wave of bigger-picture thoughts distracts you: winning another pot is great, but you start wondering if this is how you truly want to spend your energy. That internal conflict reminds you there might be a deeper purpose beyond just the chips in front of you.

Magical Things Start to Happen

I was very good at my previous job, but it wasn’t important to me. I didn’t think that I was doing enough for the world and I didn’t think I was growing in the right way.

Once I found my life purpose magical things started to happen. Resources, people and actions would just materialize/occur when I needed them to.

I can only relate it to switching on my internal GPS system.

I might have been writing an article about the effects that alcohol has on your liver, but my sub-conscious was busy figuring out how I could create a company to spread the word worldwide.

I interview a lot of young poker players and I ask them what their life purpose is. Most of them are taken aback by the question.

They are not prepared for it, and I understand that. 

The usual stock answer is “I don’t have one.” They are young and the current lifestyle of earning lots of money whilst playing a game is good enough for them.

I can’t blame them, but I do urge them to reconsider their point of view.

Raising for Effective Giving

Money can be used for a wide variety of things.

It can be used to buy a new Bentley. Or to back a friend in a big poker tournament. To eat in expensive restaurants. Or to help a young African kid cure the tapeworms that prevent him from being allowed into school.

Together with Liv Boeree and Igor Kurganov, Philipp Gruissem has created the charitable foundation known as REG (Raising for Effective Giving).

Jump into a Michael J. Fox car and whiz back a few years and Gruissem was just a young kid, earning millions of bucks, going through the motions.

Now he has life purpose. His poker-playing lifestyle now has a means to an end. The money he earns is going to help somebody else.

He is contributing to society. That is the reason he is on this planet and why he has been given the talents that he has.

Daniel Colman is a young man who I also believe is going through a paradigm shift at the moment. His refusal to promote his $15m BIG ONE for ONE DROP victory is a direct result of his internal conflict with life purpose and what he currently does for a living.

Colman will find his path, as will you once you realize there is one waiting for you.

Situation: You are on the final table bubble with 9 8 . Your chip stack is comfortably above average, and you’re guaranteed a decent payout. You think about how these winnings could be used beyond personal gain. Instead of focusing solely on your own bankroll, you feel a renewed drive, imagining ways to channel your success toward causes or initiatives that matter to you. That simple shift in perspective changes how you approach each hand.

Reset Your Internal GPS

“Decide upon your major purpose in life and then organize all your activities around it”

— Brian Tracey

So how do you discover life purpose? It’s not easy, but I have some advice for you.

During my coaching sessions with Jack Canfield’s team I was asked to write a list of everything that brought joy into my life.

It was a small list. I cried with frustration and anger at how meaningless my life was.

“Think about your job,” my coach said. “I know you hate it, but what are the parts you love?”

Coaching people. Seeing the looks on peoples’ faces when they succeeded against all the odds. Being the boss.

The sound of my own voice talking, reading, promoting people and seeing people who I have given a chance, succeed.

I knew that my life purpose was to use my experience, passion and drive to help and inspire others in their work and family lives.

I have chosen to do this by helping people with their addictions. My internal GPS has been given new coordinates and I am on my way.