Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV

April 2007 – My Training Begins

I began my No-Limit Hold’em training with Jason, in the beginning it was very frustrating because the switch from Fixed Limit to No-Limit is hard, at least it was for me. I lost for a month or so playing No-Limit but eventually I started understanding the concepts that would help me become the solid winner I am today.

I literally spammed Jason with hand histories after every session I played. I was paying up to $600 a month for coaching. I was really squeezing all the value I could out of my coach, I really wanted to learn, and I had the motivation to do so.

It wasn’t long until I was playing in the $1/$2 No-Limit Hold’em games and earning over $10,000 a month again. I was happy to have learned a new game and it kept me going, my burnout was subsiding and I was feeling the joy of poker again.

The summer months were near when I got the urge to play golf again. I originally picked up golf when I was 9 years old, I played until I was about 13-14 and then played on and off some years here and there. I did a Google search and found a golf coach in my area (in Spain), I decided to contact him and take him up on some of those golf lessons.

I had never before taken any lessons except when I was a junior and got some free group coaching from the golf club, they arranged a golf summer school for kids in which I participated.

In total I probably took about 5-6 golf lessons in Spain and again, learned a lot of new things about golf and it improved my golf game. I became more consistent, again proving the power of coaching.

Thinking About Home

In May my friend who I had lived with for the past 6 months decided to head back to Sweden, I decided to join him and spend 2 weeks at home. I spent the time with family and friends, when my 2 weeks were up another friend wanted to come and see how I was living in Spain, so he came with me and stayed for 2 weeks.

In June my mother came for a visit in Spain and during her visit I spontaneously decided to head back home to Sweden. After 8 months in Spain I was ready to return home. I guess I long for the cold climate too much

Golf and Sunshine

During the summer in Sweden I hardly played any poker at all. A big chunk of my time was spent playing golf and hanging out with friends. I got my handicap from 56 to 13, which I was very satisfied with. I really worked on my game and spent several hours a day at the golf course, the summer was beautiful with plenty of sunshine and just enough rain to nourish the nature that surrounds the small town I live in.

After the summer I started playing more poker and making money again, but I had lost my drive for poker. I had enough money to get by, so I didn’t want to just play poker for the money. If I wanted to play poker I wanted to do it for the challenge, for the fun of it. I wanted it to be what it was when I started playing, poker had become a job for me so a prolonged break was imminent.

Travel Time!

Me and my friends started crafting travel plans, we eventually decided to travel to Thailand for a month. We left in early November and traveled through Bangkok, Phuket and Koh Samui before returning back to Sweden in December. All in all it was a great trip and the warm climate was much needed contrast compared to the -20-30 Celsius we had at home in December.

Moving Into a New Place

After Christmas and in the middle of January 2007, a poker playing friend and I decided to get an apartment in the city. We moved in during the coldest months of the year, which sucked but what are you going to do about it .

January was also the month I began taking coaching in internet business from a company called Internet Marketing Center. I learned a lot during the time with the Internet Marketing Center, even though the website I built with them didn’t become successful, mostly because I wanted to approach it from a different angle.

Originally I was going to charge for everything that you’re reading, but I decided to make it all free and instead of making money selling eBooks, I would be making money recommending products that I liked and making money off of contextual ads. The whole idea of making the information free made me feel a lot better than charging for it.

More Traveling and Learning

In April I attended a Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) Seminar with my brother, it was held by Paul McKenna, Richard Bandler and Michael Neill. The whole thing was a 7-day course in London.

It was a great week without a drop of rain (pretty unusual in London I would think). My brother and I did some sightseeing and general exploration of the city. Overall, I really liked London, I didn’t have any bad experiences. No one robbed me or cursed at me, I don’t know if that is unusual or not?

If you have the money and time to attend an NLP seminar I would highly recommend it. I learned a lot about myself and how much control we really have over ourselves.

Even More Traveling

I returned from London and after just a few weeks my roommate was talking about going to Aiya Napa, Cyprus. It was a last minute booking and he asked if I was interested, to which I responded “Sure!”. We spent one week there, unfortunately we had 3 days of rain, I guess I had it coming when I didn’t experience one drop of rain in London.

In Aiya Napa I learned that Pizza Hut tastes delicious and that people really like to party over there. I never was the kind of person who enjoyed drinking and partying. I’m more of the watch a movie and hang around type of guy. I have no qualms about sitting in a pub if the music is at the level where you can actually have a conversation with someone.