Hi RIO crew,

Thought I'd bring up the topic of state management after tonight's session at the local casino (Crown, Melbourne).

Experienced players are familiar with this concept. Throughout everyone's poker life, you go through times where you are the top of your game and times where you're a clouded with a victim mentality ready drown in their own self fulfilling prophecy. Now obviously variance is part of this but not the point of discussion here.

Let's use the phrase 'on form', When someone is on form, it virtually doesnt matter for that session whether he is up, down, even, faced with a bad beat, coolered, etc. When that someone is at top of his game, only one thing really matters to him and thats making the correct decision. The mental state that you are in at this point is so golden that its almost like a holy aura radiating from you.
I am golden. I am King - I'm sure many of you can relate.

Now this state is obviously very profitable. It means that you're making the most optimal plays (as per your knowledge of the game).

Question: What do you use for state management? Ways to ensure that you start every session in that golden state.

Now keep in mind that I am primarily a live player at this moment.

There is a concept coined by a few psychologists in their respective fields (I forgot the name of the concept... completely slipped my mind)
It refers to when professionals (usually referred to athletes) use some sort of ritual (can be as simple as clapping your hands, a particular smell, anything really) when they find themselves 'in state'. What these individuals later do is repeat said ritual before their performance (in our case, the poker session) and the brain invokes the state back to when that ritual was used last...

Is anyone familiar with this or currently using it for their game? If so, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

I'm currently just playing $1/3 cash (300NL) at the casino. Planning to take my game to the next level and trying to battle some of the obstacles in the way. That post can be found here - http://www.runitonce.com/chatter/taking-my-game-to-the-next-level-the-p/

Keen to hear for you guys!

Tutor