The following article was written by ranked pro Chris Big HuniHunichen (pictured with little brother and little sister) in reply to the Poker Lifestylethread in the Poker Discussion forum…

First off, if you haven’t read the whole thread just go back and read the replies by Alex AJKHoosier1Kamberis and Mike Gags30 Gagliano. They are spot on. There have been a lot of posts in the thread so my apologies in advance if anything is repeated, but it’s probably important.

There are several times, probably over a thousand now that I have said the words “I hate poker,” and poker really is a love/hate relationship because of the stress that comes with the game. But for a majority of the people, it basically boils down to this: You love it when you’re winning, and you hate it when you’re losing. I absolutely love poker.. I have to if I have put in the amount of hours I have over the past seven years. It was definitely a lot more fun for me when it was more of a hobby than when it became my job, but I still couldn’t imagine going about it any other way.

I have a master’s degree from East Carolina so I had the potential to go out and do the real job thing, yet I chose poker instead. This was also at a time when I was definitely not financially stable enough to make that decision, nor was my skill level anywhere near what it needed to be. However, I did know that deep down… as stressful as poker can be, I had a passion for this game and I knew I had worked very hard to get where I was at, and I also knew I was willing to continue to work hard enough to hopefully become one of the best. This helped me go against basically all of my friends, family, and my girlfriend’s word to pursue poker over a business career.

However, this decision backfired on me. Ten months ago, I lost my fiancee of seven years and poker had a whole lot to do with it. The hours that you put in, not just the amount of hours, but the difference in schedules (she worked at a middle school, I was routinely going to bed at 5:00am after a long poker grind) and the fact that her parents absolutely hated it and just viewed it as gambling made things very difficult. As much as it sucks, I realized however that poker was something I was not willing to just give up for other people. You gotta do what makes you happy in life and you have to live your own life.

PocketFives Forum Poll Results: The lifestyle of a poker player is generally…

… much better than the lifestyle associated with other professions.
137 votes — 36.73%

… somewhat better than the lifestyle associated with other professions.
155 votes — 41.55%

… similar to the lifestyle associated with other professions.
25 votes — 6.70%

… somewhat worse than the the lifestyle associated with other professions.
35 votes — 9.38%

… much worse than the lifestyle associated with other professions.
21 votes — 5.63%

I could definitely go into the business world and make guaranteed money (let’s say approximately $60,000 per year as an example), with benefits and all that, but then I would have to be at work at the same time every single day — no exceptions. I would have to listen to people tell me what to do and have to follow people’s orders. This is something I don’t fair well with so poker was a great way to avoid that. While a good guaranteed income associated with some jobs can serve as a very nice cushion to fall back on, I play at least 10 tournaments every single week that have more than that for the top prize. Although nothing is guaranteed, the potential to make much more than $60k a year is still there. My parents ran a business from the time I was a little kid so I had been around that kind of lifestyle my entire life.

Playing poker professionally is very much like running your own business, even more for the unbacked players because of how important bankroll management is to this game. The backed players do have “bosses” so to speak (our backers), and we do have certain guidelines we have to follow (such as what tournaments we can play) but it’s much different from having a “boss” in the “workforce.” I can’t speak for everyone, but I have a great relationship with my backers. We speak pretty much every day, and they both know the ups and downs of poker. If I want to take a week off and go on vacation, I take a week off and go on vacation. If I wake up sick and don’t want to play, well then I don’t have to play. In the workforce, very few people have close relationships with their “boss”… and for the most part can’t just miss work whenever they don’t feel like working or if they are sick. If I don’t even have a reason, except for I don’t feel like playing that day… well I don’t have to play.

This is a huge advantage of the poker lifestyle, but at the same time, it is very isolating. Sitting at home and working can be very ideal, and I love it… but at the same time I don’t get the luxury to go out and see several different people a day and interact with a whole bunch of people. I have, however, been fortunate enough to learn a lot over the past year and my results have dramatically improved, which has allowed me to cut back from the 14 hour, 6 days a week schedule to playing just three to four days per week (except for the FTOPS, UBOC, and W/SCOOP seasons). This has allowed me do a much better job of balancing life and poker, which is a topic that I think needs to be addressed more in poker and I plan on writing an article about it soon. It has also allowed me to get out with my friends on a regular basis and not get too cramped up under the roof of my house. There are several “regs,” some even in the PocketFives Top 100 that I feel still don’t get out enough and let poker take over their lives. I have been down this road before and am thankful it is no longer that way for me, but I can say it’s very bad to get in that mode. It is extremely important to balance poker with your outside life or else it will wear and tear you down like no other job in the world, not to mention the long-term effects it can have on your social skills.

If you’re considering going pro, but still want to know whether or not you can do it, you need to first make sure you are financially secure. I prefer to say you need at least one year’s worth of living expenses, but others recommend different starting bankroll and savings amounts. The thing that people have to remember, including myself, is that poker owes you nothing. I am on the worst downer of my life and have about 25 to 30 Top 20 finishes with only two or three final tables in the past month or so… I am on by far, the most frustrating run of my entire seven year career and am running worse than I ever have deep in tourneys in my entire seven years, which has caused me to say that term “I hate poker” a whole lot lately. But that’s just the hate from the heat of the moment and the fact that the beats are taking so much equity away from us, because I know I don’t truly “hate poker.”

Overall, as many times as I have said the term, it’s impossible for me to hate poker or else I wouldn’t put myself through the grind this way. If you TRULY hate poker, you shouldn’t play at all, much less do it as a profession. With any job, there are going to be ups and downs and positives and negatives, but the most important thing is you have to enjoy your job or you will never be happy with life. I get to travel all around the country, I get to live in Las Vegas two months every year, and I get to do something I love with a bonus of financial gains, so even with the massive downswing I am on, I still think about how fortunate I am to be in the position I am all the time.

I will go on another heater soon and make another run… BUT I also know that poker owes me absolutely nothing, and I could potentially lose every race or get 3-outed on every final table bubble for the next month, 6 months, or even a year. I know there are zero guarantees in this game or lifestyle, so when deciding on whether or not to go pro, you need to sit down and individually address every pro and con depending on the way you live your life and what other options you have available, and you have to decide for yourself whether or not this is the right lifestyle for you. You are the only one that can make the executive decision on how to live your life and which direction you want to go in!

Best of luck to everyone at the tables. Let’s crush this final week of the WCOOP!

Chris Big HuniHunichen —BustoutPoker.com

*** PocketFives Article of the Month: September 2010 ***

*The opinions expressed in this article and all member-submitted content belong solely to the author, and do not necessarily reflect the views of PocketFives as a company. To add your views to this article, you can post a comment below or post a reply in the Poker Lifestyle Poker Discussion Thread.

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