5 Life Lessons Poker Can Teach You

It may not be surprising to find out that lessons learned on the poker table can extend to other areas in life. This popular game may be full of glamour on the outside, but it involves so much more than the superficial appeal. Just like in life, poker players have to make their decisions on calculated risks, often with limited information as there’s no knowing what cards your opponents have until they’re on the table. With so much going on in a high-stakes game, here are the 5 life lessons that anybody who plays poker can learn.

1. Making Mistakes and Learning From Them

Mistakes are normal, and they are part of everyday life, whether at home, at the office, or wherever you might be at any given time. Most people tend to fixate on their mistakes, but poker players have learned how to handle these momentary setbacks more constructively — they ask themselves how they’ll learn from them. In poker, the player that fails to learn from their mistakes gets left behind and ultimately loses. The very best learn quickly and avoid committing the same error again. The key here is not to deny that you’ve made a mistake but, rather, to embrace it. Whether you’re on the poker table or at your office desk, remember to pause after making a mistake and commit to rising above it.

2. Be Wary of Confirmation Bias

Life is full of cognitive biases that influence your daily decisions and judgments, sometimes leading to faulty outcomes. The most common and devastating is confirmation bias, which leads us to believe what we want to despite evidence to the contrary. In poker, this manifests in gameplay as the greater likelihood of believing other players are bluffing, continuously searching for signs that will confirm that belief. Life mimics poker similarly as people focus on the signs and patterns that point to the desired outcome, even with empirical evidence proving otherwise. Poker can teach you how to view all these factors logically and rationally and assess whether a decision can work in your favor or against you.

3. There’s Always a Silver Lining

Losing is a normal part of the game, but to become a great poker layer, it’s important not to dwell and to find positives in your losses instead. Losing is a very real possibility — even for the world’s biggest players like Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu. That’s why one of the mental skills poker players master over time is the ability to learn from their mistakes. A losing hand in poker doesn’t have to be the end of the world; you just need to dust yourself off and look at what you can do better next time. In life, the same principle applies. You’ll have some wins and encounter many losses, but the best course of action to take after each one is to find the silver lining and carry on through!

4. Make Decisions with What You're Dealt

In poker and in life, you won’t have any control over what you’re dealt with. However, what you do with them is entirely up to you. The main difference between amateurs and professionals in poker is how they react to their cards. The latter deals with what they’re given and play the game regardless, quite similarly to more experienced people who understand that life is best lived by making the most of what you have.

5. Think Long Term

Poker wins are accomplished by understanding that the game spans over the long term. Even if you’re winning by the hour’s end, it does not guarantee your emergence as the victor. When life is viewed this way, you’ll find that the singular bad day you had is just a small part of all your other days, good or otherwise. Work to improve the average state of your daily life, and you might find that you’re doing just fine over the course of the long term.

Just like poker, life can be thought of as one long and exciting game. The stakes can be high or low, and you’ll always have to soldier on and learn how to take risks no matter the outcome. By knowing how to accept the hand you’re dealt with, you can learn to accept and live the game of life a little more fully.