Alan Longo is a High Performance Psychologist with five years of experience coaching high-stakes poker players. Passionate about sports, he educates and empowers players with the tools to build their mental foundations, professional routines and competitive planning for consistent, high-level performance. Find out more at his website.
In my work as a sport psychologist specializing in poker, I’ve seen that players are relentless in their pursuit of an edge.
You study Game Theory Optimal (GTO) solvers, analyze hand ranges, and refine betting strategies. You dedicate hours to the technical and mathematical aspects of the game, believing that mastery of these elements is the primary path to success. Yet, every player has seen or felt it: a technically proficient player making uncharacteristic mistakes after a bad beat, or a sharp mind clouded by frustration during a downswing.
The most sophisticated strategy is only as effective as the mind that executes it. This is where the mental game comes in — an area often discussed but frequently misunderstood.
Many players approach their mental game reactively. The reality, however, is that these elements are not isolated problems. They are part of a deeply interconnected system. To strengthen your mental game, it's helpful to understand the dynamic relationship between your mindset, which can be cultivated; your emotions, which must be regulated; and your confidence, which is built over time.
While the mental game has many facets, understanding how these three elements interact is a powerful starting point for improving your performance and enjoyment of poker.
The interconnected system of your mental game
Consider the chain reaction after losing a key pot to a bad beat.
The initial spike of frustration (emotion) fuels negative thoughts like, 'This always happens to me' (mindset). Soon, you hesitate in key spots, second-guessing your decisions as your confidence takes a hit.
This reveals why trying to simply 'control your emotions' is often ineffective; it's like plugging a leak without turning off the water. A negative mindset and unregulated emotions create a vicious cycle where a hit to one area destabilizes the others.
Conversely, when you work on them as an integrated system, you create a virtuous cycle.
A resilient mindset helps regulate emotions, and that emotional stability provides the foundation upon which robust confidence is built.
Pillar 1: Mindset – the architect of your poker reality
Your mindset is the lens through which you interpret everything at the table. A useful distinction is between a 'results mindset' and a 'performance mindset.'
A results mindset ties self-worth directly to outcomes, creating an emotional rollercoaster where winning is validation and losing feels like a personal failure. Because every pot’s result feels personal, the intensity of your emotional response becomes tightly bound to the result, making feelings of frustration and anger far more potent.
A performance mindset focuses on the quality of the decision-making process. Players with this mindset learn to separate their choices from the immediate results. Crucially, this doesn’t mean they don't care about winning — they channel that desire into perfecting the one thing they can control: their process. Their primary question shifts from 'Did I win the hand?' to 'Did I play it to the best of my ability?'
The crucial takeaway is that your mindset isn't permanent. While shifting deeply ingrained beliefs is a challenge, mindset is cultivated through the small, conscious choices you make daily — like choosing to review hands after a tough session or praising yourself for a well-reasoned fold.
Pillar 2: Emotional regulation – navigating poker's swings
Poker is an emotional game. The goal isn’t to be emotionless, but to regulate your emotions. This means managing your response so that feelings don’t dictate your actions. It’s the ability to create a crucial pocket of space between an emotional trigger and your behavior.
Your mindset is the foundation for this. A performance mindset that views a bad beat as a neutral event makes the resulting frustration far more manageable. While suppressing emotions might seem disciplined, research shows it’s a losing strategy that depletes the mental resources needed for good decisions. True regulation fosters the resilience needed to navigate downswings.
The foundational principle is this: your emotions don't have to control you. Regulation is a skill that requires practice. It starts with awareness — simply acknowledging 'I am feeling frustrated' without judgment can stop an emotion from escalating.
Often, a single, deliberate breath is all it takes to create the space you need to get back to your A-game.
Pillar 3: Confidence – the product of your process
Many players anchor their confidence to their recent results. This is fragile. The alternative is process-based confidence, a more stable form of self-belief that you actively build from your own actions.
It is constructed from:
- Mastery of your process: This is trust built from dedicated work. Every hour spent reviewing hands and every session you stick to your game plan provides tangible proof of your preparation and discipline.
- Emotional composure: This comes from proving to yourself that you can handle pressure. Every time you regulate frustration instead of tilting, you build trust in your ability to execute your strategy under fire.
- Constructive self-talk: Confidence is impacted by your internal dialogue. It means acknowledging a well-played hand regardless of the outcome and framing mistakes as learning opportunities rather than proof of inadequacy.
This type of confidence is far more resilient because it is based on your efforts, not the whims of variance.
This brings us to the final principle: confidence is built, brick by brick, through every study session and well-reasoned decision.
Laying your foundation
Your mental game is a unified system. True strength at the tables comes from actively cultivating your mindset, consciously regulating your emotions, and deliberately building your confidence. These interacting elements are the bedrock of your performance. They are also the starting point from which you can develop other critical skills like motivation, resilience, and focus.
By focusing on this complete system, you shift your attention from chaotic, short-term results to the controllable process of long-term improvement.
What is one aspect of your mental game you will commit to strengthening this week? Acknowledging where to start is the first step in building a stronger foundation.
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