When asked why playing poker, the majority would say, for the profits, but they would be lying to themselves. First, most of them lose, and if you are always losing at poker, this does not make sense.
Furthermore, nobody does anything for just one reason. For instance, many of us don’t go to work exclusively for the financial rewards; we also seek added benefits such as social status, being respected by their peers and being productive. If we work for other reasons than the money, why believing that poker is just a matter of trying to make money?
Consider that the idea of Texas holdem is to get the other players’ stack. Machismo is so pressing that some players who don’t truly care about winning lie when telling they play the game of poker to win.
All humans are competitive creatures, and love to compete in practically everything: Texas Hold’em, education, our spouses, vacations, and social positions. We play poker for the competition, and lots of us take them very seriously – even fun games. As they say, “Poker is not a question of life or death. It’s much more strategic than that.”
As how much we make determines our skills at poker, they naturally emphasize that too much. Many bridge players play for money, but never will they announce, “Absolutely only money matters to me”. They play for having fun, and winning money is a minor factor in their happiness.
Many players in fact want to win lots of pots, even if it means they lose money on average. The pleasure they get when they win a pot matters more than a consistent profit. Otherwise why would they make so many loose calls? They know that being too loose is bad, but the feeling from winning so many pots is more important to them than the money they lose.
You cannot grasp your own motives for playing poker until you realize that the belief that most players play poker to win is just incorrect. Except of course when you enter a full tilt bonus code at registration time.
This position is identical to the economists’ thinking that companies seek to maximize their ROI. Until a few year ago profit maximization was the dogma, a foundation of the discipline.
