Zen Zone

For the past couple weeks, as quiet as I've been, I've been trying to find my "Zen Zone". I've spent most of the past couple of years of my life living in a very unsubtle, unstable state. I had moments of extreme happiness, as well as a lot of moments of deep to mild depression. For the past couple of weeks, I've been level.

I've been working a lot, partying a little bit, but the biggest difference in it all has been my state of mind. Since I was put in a position to have to stop playing poker/gambling a couple months ago, my mind and my personality have really steadied out. I was never in a completely crazy state of mind, but most of my time the past couple years has been teetering between one extreme or the next.

I feel like it's because of that that my poker game suffered, and I went from a winning player to a complete losing player in a matter of a couple months. It got worse and worse until I forced myself to stop playing altogether. Now, with a fresh frame of mind I feel like I could start playing again without much consequence.

Now that I've been away from any serious game for so long, I feel like it's a great time to start playing again. The only problem is money! I have been working, but I've also been paying a lot towards bills, credit, and weekend fun. Santa Barbara is a great place, it's fun every day and every night, and it's on the beach. The sun is always shining, and even when it's not the town is so rich that people can pay the sun to show its face again. Because of all that, it's expensive as all hell to live here.

I did receive some great news last week, and it came in the form of a financial offer. My raise was presented to me, and although I don't know how much it is going to be exactly yet, it should help a lot. With the great news buzzing in my ear, I've been swinging from a calm mood to various levels of happiness.

Knowing that I won't have money to play for a little while, Mitch and I decided to hit up Vegas in June. I completely was absent-minded in that I didn't even think that the WSOP was going to be in town then. Of course, if I have enough money or if I can find a back, I'll be hoping to play one or two or five of the smaller buy-in events.

Ever since we made the plans last week I've been excited as a kid on Christmas Eve. While sitting at work, acting like a giggly little girl for plans that won't come to fruition for a month and a half, I had a great idea: Vegas....now!!

I hit up John yesterday, and made a few calls to get a crew together to hit up Vegas this weekend. We'll be crashing John's place and probably sleeping on the floor, and I doubt I'll play much, but it should be a hell of a fun weekend. There will be lots of drinking, minimal playing, a lot of relaxing in the humid Vegas heat. I'm sure we'll probably be playing some cards on some level, since three out of the four of us that will be there are poker players, but definitely not as much as any of us would like there to be. And sadly enough, there won't be for a while to come until I can get some solid funds under my feet.

Plans for the weekend definitely put alchohol before cards, but if I can get together a small stash of cash, I might put in a few hours at the $1/$2NL tables. Although it would've killed me a few months ago to even mention $1/$2, I definitely am in a great state of mind right now to play any size game and still crush whatever crowd I get presented with. Obviously I'll report how accurate that feeling is after the trip, but for now I feel like it'll be pretty true.

I keep telling myself (and my readers) that I'll post more, but I have yet to follow through on it. Now that I'm on an even keel, I'll probably be able to write with more enthusiasm and hopefully post more regularly than I have been doing the past couple months.

Zen is good.

Until next time.