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Happy tilt is a real thing!
When villain 3bets 1/3 of his stack we need treat treat it as if he went all in. ie would you fold KJo to an all in? Solver says yes and so do I as players are tighter in this spot than they should be. A 3bet of 1/3 of his stack should have alarm bells going off.
As played I think you can consider folding top pair. Do you have a read that villain can only bet here with value like sets, better top pair, AA etc? What bluffs/worse hands does he have? QJs probably doesn’t 3B pre and on a rainbow board there are not many other bluffs from your average recreational player.
Solver would probably say you can’t fold top pair, but I would say you can make an exploitable fold.
Regarding happy tilt, it is a phenomenon that can happen when we are on a heater and feeling invincible. We assume we will keep winning to keep the rush going like a drug, we need to win more hands! I like that you identified that as an “I can’t miss” mentality. Knowing the feeling will help you to ground yourself when this situation comes up in the future.
Stop, think and try to put your opponent on hands that you beat. If you can put them on enough of them, CALL – if you can’t, FOLD.
The Poker Mindset by Matthew Hilger and Ian Taylor and The Mental Game of Poker by Jared Tendler and Barry Carter are two books that have helped me with my “inner game”.
