Why Playing Poker For a Living Is Not Easy Money

With the enormous glut of poker players playing on the internet these days has come a new breed of poker players who want to play poker for a living, or play professionally. It is much easier to do so in this day and age than it used to be. Travel, if you have to do it is much easier. The amount of prize money available online is incredible and most people can even find a decent live game in the area they reside in.A� However, what you need to remember first and foremost if you want to be a poker player is: IT IS NOT EASY!!!!
I believe the biggest trouble that most poker players I talk to have, is that they want the game to be easy. They want making money to be easy. Perhaps it is the society that we live in, but everyone wants to take a magic pill and be on easy street. Many novice poker players figure that if they just read the right book or employee the right strategy, they will always win money and the game will be easy. Nothing could be further from the truth.
If it was easy to make a ton of money playing poker then everyone would be doing it. (you have probably heard that one before, but it is true!) Learning to play poker well on a consistent basis is not easy, nor can you do it by reading a book or adopting a certain style of play. You need experience and most importantly, you need to be able to THINK. Poker is about correctly analyzing situations that you encounter at the table. The better you analyze, the more successful you will be. However, if you think you can institute a one size fits all type of thinking to make it easier, you are sadly mistaken.
Here comes the really bad news: even if you analyze the situation perfectly, you will still sometimes lose. Just watch any footage from the final tables from the last two WSOP Main Events on ESPN. You will see suck out after suck out. You will see pros winning hands that they should have lost. Yes, I am saying it: LUCK PLAYS A FACTOR.
I know everyone likes to say poker is a game of skill and it is. However, sometimes you have bad luck. Golf is a game of skill as well, but sometimes the putt breaks the wrong way and the ball doesn't go in the hole. Baseball is a game of skill but sometimes the wind blows and that homerun ball doesn't clear the fence. You get the picture. Dealing with bad luck is the second most important thing to remember when learning poker. You will have to deal with it, it will be a factor nearly every time you play. How you deal with it will likely determine whether or not you have the mentality to make it as a professional poker player.
Poker can be fun and it can be a huge money maker. More and more people around the world are turning to it as a source of income. Remember that games like No Limit Hold'em are played all around that world and are becoming very competitive. Quit thinking it is easy!