Why play poker?

I've been playing poker, no limit texas holdem specifically, on and off for years. That being said the question isn't "Why play poker?", I already do that.  The question is two-fold, "Why play poker as a source of income?", and "Why take a shot of playing poker now?".

1. Why play poker as a source of income?

Poker is interesting to me because it is competitive activity.  I guess I first got this idea planted in my head when I watched the movie rounders in the late 90's, and it was this scene in particular that sealed the deal.

 

Bear in mind I had no idea what was going on, or even what game they were playing, but the idea that someone could play the "best" at something and win by out thinking them was ridiculously appealing to me.  The seed was planted at this point but I didn't really get into poker other than the odd 7 card stud with wild cards game that popped up at friend's houses every so often.  A few years later Chris Moneymaker won the world series of poker by winning a couple of satellites online (today is actually the 10th anniversary of the satellite that gave him his main event entry).  At the time this was intriguing and I started to see more poker on TV, but I was involved with my art career that was taking off and never got into playing.

In 2006 a friend of mine from Sweden was staying at my apartment for the holidays and he was taking out a couple hours each day to play sit n go's.  I watched him play a really simple strategy and was amazed that he was able to take money out of his account periodically to help pay for his trip.  This was my first real introduction to playing poker for income as a reality.  Like most people back then I figured I could do what he was doing and it would be the most fun and easy job in the world.

Due to life and the way it goes I didn't really start to play or win until 2009.  I starting reading books and trying to learn as much about poker as I could at that time.  I started frequenting forums like two plus two and realized simultaneously that I was late in my arrival to the scene and that winning at poker wasn't going to be as easy as I thought it would be.  Still by the end of the year my hard work paid off and I started winning consistently. I always had a job at the time but all my free time was spent playing online tournaments and I started to bring in a nice modest income on the side.  I started playing some live tournaments too and also started taking weekend trips to Atlantic City, which were both marginally profitable.

Everyone who played online poker in the US knows how Black Friday changed everything.  That coupled with other things that were going on in my life at the time pretty much put poker on the back burner.  Then last year I looked in my carbon poker account and noticed I had $30.13 in there.  I binked a $5 tournament right away and started playing all the time again leading up to a 3rd place finish in a $33 1r1a in their first ever Poker Maximus series.  At this point I had a bankroll again and a renewed interest in playing and studying but was working 52 hours a week at a dead end kind of job.  Online poker in the US was sketchy at best, and has gotten worse to the point that I don't even play anymore, and I wasn't rolled to move out of the US and take a shot at playing on the big sites again.  With all my long work hours most of my play online was getting worse and with less new people coming in and more regulars getting better all the time I started having losing months for the first time in a long time.  Quitting poker altogether was never an option so I started going to local casinos and playing live cash.

Cash games were new and I'll admit I was the typical online tournament donk at first.  This motivated me and once I got over the obvious frustration with slow games and different dynamics I started to think more about poker again and got excited.  I went down about 3 buyins ($900) at 1/2 during the learning phase but have adjusted enough to have a decent win rate after 6 months of playing.  My sample size is still too small to say too much one way or the other but I feel like I am improving each time I play and that is what is most important to me.

All of this amounts to an answer to the question of "Why play poker as a source of income?"  I realize that there are cons that go along with these pros, so in my next post I will answer question 2.