Why Life Gets in the Way of Mastering Gambling

You may have dreams of becoming a successful gambler one day. After all, professional poker players, sports bettors, and card counters can make lots of money.

But becoming a professional gambler is certainly no easy task. You not only need the skills to make consistent profits, but also overcome life‘s many challenges.

The latter can be even harder than mastering sports betting or poker strategy. After all, life has a funny way of making it difficult to accomplish any worthwhile ambition.

Below, I’m going to discuss various obstacles that can make it harder to become a pro gambler. I’ll also cover what you can do to overcome these challenges and eventually realize your gambling dreams.

Time Commitment

24 hours seems like a lot of time. However, your day can quickly vanish when accounting for everything that you need to do.

Six to eight of these hours will be taken up by sleep. Depending upon your job, another eight to 10 hours are consumed by work.

Assuming you work eight hours and sleep for seven, then you have nine free hours each day. This amount theoretically gives you lots of time to dive into your future real money gambling career.

But then, you must consider other aspects that will eat up your day. You need to eat a few times per day, spend time relaxing, commute to work, and more.

Here are examples of things that can gradually steal your time:

• Eating 3x per day, plus snacks = One to two hours
• Work commute (both ways) = Half an hour to an hour
• Entertainment = One to two hours
• Socializing and/or taking care of kids = Three hours
• Work = Eight hours
• Sleep = Seven hours
• Full day = 20.5 to 23 hours
• This leaves you with only a few hours per day for gambling

You still have time left over after accounting for all of this. However, you also may just not feel like doing anything at the end of the day.

Of course, you can always look at the weekends as a chance to finally get started on your side project (and future career). Again, though, you might feel exhausted after the week and find yourself wasting hours on the couch.

You could easily start on the road to being a pro gambler at some point if you efficiently used all 24 hours. But given that you only have a fraction of those hours, the task becomes much harder.

Procrastination

The English poet Edward Young once said, “Procrastination is the thief of time.” What little free time you do have left often goes towards trying to talk yourself into doing something.

Your reasons for procrastinating may vary. But two of the most popular reasons include perfectionism and low energy levels.

Mastering gambling to the point where you can make profits is a difficult pursuit. If it weren’t, then you’d see far more professional gamblers in casinos.

Due to perfectionism, you may be waiting for the absolute-best time to get started. The perfect opportunity could be when you’re all caught up on bills, enjoy loads of free time, and have your schedule mastered.

Rarely does this point come in anybody’s life, though. Therefore, you’re left either getting started at an imperfect time or not getting started at all.

Regarding the second reason, a busy day takes a lot out of you. You might wake up with the mindset of conquering the world but feel like you can barely get your shoes off at the end of the night.

This lack of energy makes it almost impossible to chase ambitions. You’ll feel more comfortable procrastinating and telling yourself that you’ll just get started the next day.

Future Life Changes

When many people set out to become a pro gambler, they only think about their current schedule. They don’t account for future changes that may arise.

Your life will likely change over the years. You may get married, have kids, and take on a more demanding job at some point.

All of these changes can certainly be blessings. However, they also take away from your free time.

You might have six free hours during the day to play and study online poker as a bachelor. But you won’t have this much time if you meet a significant other and, eventually, get married.

You can’t predict what will happen in the future. If you wait for the perfect moment, though, life’s changes will someday prevent you from having the time to study gambling.

Finances

You don’t have to be a multimillionaire to start on the path towards professional gambling. However, you will need a sizable bankroll no matter what game you’re targeting.

Even if you have pro skills, you’re not going to win every time. Most full-time gamblers only have a small edge that requires countless hours to truly profit from.

Bankroll requirements vary based on what type of gambling you’re pursuing and what stakes you wish to play. If you want to start a card counting team, for example, you’ll collectively need around $20,000 to $25,000.

Of course, you and your team could always walk into the casino with just $500 and hope for the best. But given that most card counters only hold around a 1% advantage, you’re bound to face volatility and quickly lose your bankroll.

You not only need money to pay the bills but also have thousands of extra dollars to take a real shot at going professional. Start with too little money and you’re relying on luck to survive the volatility and eventually profit.

How Can You Conquer Gambling Amidst Life’s Challenges?

You seemingly face a bleak proposition when trying to make it as a gambler. Luckily, though, you can use the following tips to conquer life and take a true chance at becoming a successful player.

Timing Is Everything

As covered before, many aspiring professional gamblers don’t look far enough into the future. They only consider their current situation and feel that they have plenty of time to improve.

Assuming your life stays the same for the next 10 to 20 years, you won’t have a problem with this. But your life is likely to change in one way or another.

These changes will take up more of your free time. You eventually won’t find the necessary hours to go from a novice to a master.

You need to seize the moment when it’s available. If you wait too long, then you’ll likely have other interest and responsibilities that prevent you from reaching your dream.

Learn Strategies for Overcoming Procrastination

A big reason why many pro gambling hopefuls don’t get started is because they procrastinate like many other people. They may wait for the perfect moment and/or not find the necessary energy to pursue their ambitions.

If you’re a longtime procrastinator, you will offer false reassurances that you’ll change any day. You’ll start tomorrow and everything will be perfect.

Tomorrow often brings the same mindset and vicious cycle of delaying your pursuits. Years may pass before you finally find the perfect time to get started.

Ideally, you’ll seek outside help for dealing with this problem. You can use various strategies to overcome procrastination, including the following tips:

• Recognize that you’re procrastinating.
• Figure out your reason for the delays.
• Seek an accountability partner to check on your progress.
• Use services that block time-wasting sites (e.g. StayFocusd app).
• Realize that now is the time and your life will change later.

Save up the Necessary Money

You have to spend money to make money when it comes to advantage gambling. You’ll definitely need a large enough bankroll to have a realistic shot at making it.

Again, much depends upon the game you’re playing and what stakes you wish to master. If you want to be a pro at $5/$10 no limit Hold’em, then you must start out with $20,000 (2,000x the big blind) to comfortably play these limits. Assuming you want to play $1,000/$2,000 NL holdem, you’ll want around $4 million to start with.

Whatever the case may be, you want to set aside the proper money. Otherwise, you’ll come into the matter underfunded and risk losing quickly due to the variance.

Conclusion

Life throws many challenges at you, whether you’re trying to complete college, save up a certain amount of money, or become a pro gambler. The latter often seems like a pursuit that you can put off for later.

However, changes in your life may eventually take away your free time. At this point, you’ll be focusing far more on responsibilities than taking the casino world by storm.

Of course, you don’t have to be a professional gambler to enjoy life. Some people are happier with normal jobs that provide a steady income.

But if you still dream of winning big through casino games or sports betting, then you must realize that the time is now. You need to figure out when you have free time and get started on the right path now, not months or years later.