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Hello everyone, I am about to go on a great adventure once again, and I figure it deserves a primer. This is the first blog I've posted since my departure from Korea, and I'd like to discuss what I've been up to and where I'm headed. I'll give a quick summary of my previous blogs for those who don't want to read my previous blogs.
Life in Korea blogs, read these if you want a more detailed look on the last 2 years of my life and what has led me to this point:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Finale
TLDR summary for the past ~2 years of my life: I loved Starcraft, went to Korea to cast proleague, it didn't work out. I lost my passion for Starcraft but gained it for Dota 2, and started casting it. Unfortunately that didn't work out as well (but I kept my passion). With no work, I had to return to the United States. I decided that I wanted to peruse a career path as a Poker player following my experiences in Korea.
I wasn't entirely sure if I wanted to post this blog on teamliquid, liquiddota, or liquidpoker. I did start at teamliquid back during the Brood War days, so regardless of where I'm headed I would like to post the first part of this blog here. I'll post a mirror on liquidpoker and continue my future poker blogs there.
I'll start with my return to the US from Korea. It was weird readjusting to life in the States, but after about a month things were feeling normal. I moved back to my hometown of Naples, Florida to refocus, re-energize, and prepare for the future. My plan was to get a job and save money for poker, then move to Canada in early 2015 to play full time with friends. While in America I also wanted to get in better shape and eat healthier. I'm proud to say that I accomplished both of my goals; I saved up money for Canada and I lost around 30lbs + gained some muscle. I also put a lot of time and studying into poker over the past few months (surprise). I started playing on Bovada, watched a lot of videos from various poker sites, checked out a few books, and talked to many of my poker friends about the game. I've only begun to scratch the surface of poker but I am having a blast doing it. Naples has been a good place for me; I got to reconnect with old friends, physically and mentally recover from my time in Korea, and enjoy a much less stressful lifestyle. Alas, Naples is boring and I need to move on to grow as a person. It's time to travel to a new county and begin my new journey into poker!
There will be three of us total. Everize, his friend Riddick, and myself. We are moving from the US to Canada because poker laws are much less stringent north of the border. I will arrive in Canada February 1st to join them and we will begin grinding after we settle in. The plan is to play for around 5-6 months, get as good as possible, and evaluate where we stand around mid year. We all plan on playing/studying around 40-50 hours of poker per week. They are both a lot better at poker than me, and with Everize willing to help teach me I feel like this will be a great environment to quickly improve in. I have become fairly confident playing 2/5nl and I plan on moving up to 10nl when I get to Canada. Even if I run into some rocky bumps in the poker road, I have money set aside so I could play for 5 straight months without earning a single cent from poker, and that doesn't include the money I set aside as for poker bankroll. By mid-year I want to support myself entirely from Poker. It won't be easy, but I believe it is possible with a strong mindset and work ethic. If poker doesn't work out for me I can always go back to school, but I honestly can't see myself failing.
I'll write a blog after we've settled into Canada. We're moving to Toronto/GTA so if any fellow liquidians live nearby don't be a stranger! Thanks it from me, thanks for reading this blog, I'll talk to you guys soon.
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good luck, may you always draw pocket aces and win on the river
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
Do you still wear make up
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I have no idea who you are. But I read through each one of your blogs.
You are taking a risk here. Going into poker. You said in one of your last blogs "I'm tired of being broke. I'm tired of being stressed out". My guess is that poker as a career, is going to lead you right back to that point.
I less risky move would be to actually go to school and get a degree. Work toward a stable future. And look, even that isn't going to guarantee you financial stability and low stress. But, in my opinion there is much less risk.
Maybe you'll prove me wrong, but think about how you felt when you were first moving to Korea... You probably had the same ambition, same attitude, same naivety.
I wish you the best of luck.
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Be careful of what might happen if this plan of yours does not pan out. Always have an option B for when the shit hits the fan. Best of luck.
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I was all for you until the very last sentence "If poker doesn't work out for me I can always go back to school, but I honestly can't see myself failing."
You seriously can't see yourself failing at poker?? how many have tried and failed poker and what makes you special?
School + job sounds boring, may even be boring, but it's very low risk. Poker is HIGH risk.
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On January 31 2015 03:21 Smancer wrote:
I have no idea who you are. But I read through each one of your blogs.
You are taking a risk here. Going into poker. You said in one of your last blogs "I'm tired of being broke. I'm tired of being stressed out". My guess is that poker as a career, is going to lead you right back to that point.
I less risky move would be to actually go to school and get a degree. Work toward a stable future. And look, even that isn't going to guarantee you financial stability and low stress. But, in my opinion there is much less risk.
Maybe you'll prove me wrong, but think about how you felt when you were first moving to Korea... You probably had the same ambition, same attitude, same naivety.
I wish you the best of luck.
http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/Whiplash
or google
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On January 31 2015 03:16 lichter wrote:
Do you still wear make up
Not since they've put me on camera :p
On January 31 2015 03:21 Smancer wrote:
I have no idea who you are. But I read through each one of your blogs.
You are taking a risk here. Going into poker. You said in one of your last blogs "I'm tired of being broke. I'm tired of being stressed out". My guess is that poker as a career, is going to lead you right back to that point.
I less risky move would be to actually go to school and get a degree. Work toward a stable future. And look, even that isn't going to guarantee you financial stability and low stress. But, in my opinion there is much less risk.
Maybe you'll prove me wrong, but think about how you felt when you were first moving to Korea... You probably had the same ambition, same attitude, same naivety.
I wish you the best of luck.
Looking back on my experiences in Korea, there was a lot of factors that were out of my control that lead to things not working out. With poker there is certainly a degree of variance and luck, but those numbers can be accounted for, planned for, played around. I will have more control over my success with poker then I ever did with broadcasting, simply because I play a much larger role as a key factor to that success.
On January 31 2015 03:27 NeThZOR wrote:
Be careful of what might happen if this plan of yours does not pan out. Always have an option B for when the shit hits the fan. Best of luck.
I have a solid plan B if poker works out. I can still go back to college and get a degree if things go south.
On January 31 2015 05:27 lantz wrote:
I was all for you until the very last sentence "If poker doesn't work out for me I can always go back to school, but I honestly can't see myself failing."
You seriously can't see yourself failing at poker?? how many have tried and failed poker and what makes you special?
School + job sounds boring, may even be boring, but it's very low risk. Poker is HIGH risk.
Compared to the average person that wants to get into poker, I have a much larger background in competitive strategy games, and I have a lot of friends that are successful poker players. I've seen the personalities and the mindsets of these poker players, and have talked to many of them on how I can become a successful poker player. I feel like I have the resources, time, motivation, and mindset that the average person giving poker a shot may lack or not have access to. I WILL make poker work, no matter the cost.
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Glad to see you're doing just fine after everything I know you went through.
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I'm glad you found something else to do. It's really intereseting how connected brood war people are to Poker. haha.
But yea, I felt really bad how bad you got shafted, I know how badly you wanted to be part of the korean dota scene.
What ever happened to Michael?
Anyway, safe travels!
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EPT
