After being around this degenerate industry for more than 10 years, I thought maybe I could share some little tidbits about the truth of this shithole. For all of the guys coming up now and scouting forums, reading books, listening to podcasts, going to scam seminars, joining discords, just know one thing, it's one big circus and 99% are a bunch of frauds that couldn't make money at it and all they have left is bitterness, resentment, zero or no funds, and a story to tell. Coincidentally enough, they all love to 'team up', I wonder why(sarcasm). Once you actually start doing whatever AP activity you're interested in, it doesn't even matter what it is, the truth comes out ten-fold. I remember when I first started getting into this right when I turned 21, I watched the movie 21 and found it to be right up my alley with my competitive video game background and just being obsessed with anything gaming my whole life. I never had doubts about my discipline, it was just getting the skill down as well as the nuances around it to make it work, and also seeing if this thing even worked to begin with. I was obsessed with building up a bankroll, reading everything I can, talking with other AP's on Norm's forum, listening to podcasts, etc etc. I had about 15-20k to my name with no debt (tough to remember but more or less) and I was living with my parents at 21. This was in 2011. I then had the brilliant idea of deciding to buy a sports car in 2012 for about 13k of which my dad ended up paying half (of which I had no idea he was going to until the last second). Nonetheless, I probably had like 10k left over after that. Over the next couple of years, I built it up to about 35k or so working multiple low paying jobs and was also investing most of that in a penny stock. Yes, a penny stock. I ended up losing about 5k and is probably the only degenerate thing I ever did in my life. I remember it wasn't your ordinary hype penny stock, but we've all heard that before. Regardless, it had an actual business, stable cash flows, and were at the cusp of being profitable. That stock actually ended up tripling from the time I sold it in 2016, if I held it. That's exactly why I say it was degenerate, because I didn't know how to value a business like I do now with the investments I make. Even though I minored in finance and majored in business management, a lot of the stuff I forgot post-degree and wasn't exactly paying that much attention in college, just did enough to get by, get my 3.0 and call it a day. Going through lessons and learning from it is all part of it, which I'll get to below when it comes to gambling. The part that's important, is learning from it. If you don't learn from it and just keep doing it, that's when it becomes degenerate. I mean hell, even Warren Buffett in his early days investing, thought technical analysis and timing/predicting the market was how you beat it. There's steps to success. The key is to learn from it and grow.
This is what I really want to get into regarding this 'industry'. There's no grind story. I remember red chipping in AC during the years from 2012-2013 and like 1 or 2 sessions in 2021, when I first heard about card counting through the movie 21. I was going on the bus with $400 in my pocket backcounting with a 2x40 max bet, probably generating like 5 bucks an hour, if that, in crowded conditions. This was in the first year or so after a day of delivering sushi post-college (now that was depressing). Bachelor's degree to deliver sushi. As depressing as that sounds betting 2x40 with 400 bucks in my pocket, the idea that I could beat this game was all the motivation that I needed. I didn't know what I was doing, just had the bare basics down of how to keep a count and told myself that backcounting made the most sense because I'm not playing any negative hands. I would take the late night bus to save money on gas and not have to drive back tired at 5am after working all day. I would take the bus about twice a week and would bust my $400 more often than not, but this was all part of the adventure of finding myself and figuring out what it actually takes to succeed in this. The same 'adventure' these forums, discords, and podcasts seem to never have. The most you'll get is them 'grinding' and giving up. Where are the successful grind stories where it tested their very soul and they dug out of it. That's the real key. When I say grind story, I mean getting your ass pounded and finding a way to battle through it. Very few in this 'industry' ever had a grind story. It's actually one of the biggest red flag tells on how to spot a fraud which I'll talk about further down this post. As much as these frauds on here want to say you can just go to a million if you listen to me blah blah blah whether it's on discord, on here, on gambling with an edge, or other outlets, I have a newsflash for you, THERES NO SKIPPING STEPS. You have to go through the grind. There are no shortcuts in AP or in anything in life. The ones that tell you otherwise, or worse, the ones who believe it, are absolutely cooked. The ones that sell you get-rich quick bullshit, like always, be not just skeptical, but just don't associate with them at all. If you don't have a grind story, I'm already 99% of the way to not giving one shit about what you tell me. That logic will serve me well throughout my life, regardless if one person here or there I end up being wrong about. It's all about probability and psychology, and if you skip steps, I'll play the odds that you're full of it.
Regardless, I eventually started driving to PA around 2013-2016 and bringing a lot more than $400 with me after learning more about the game and everything that comes with it. I bought the software, talked with other APs on the forums, and just became much more well-rounded. I remember asking people where the best penetration games were and a user by the name of smallcapgrowth sent me straight to a mega sweatshop shithole Valley Forge to get my first OSN entry. A place where it was so sweaty, they asked for mandatory membership and ID to get in. Imagine paying $10 or whatever it was just to get into a casino and just to get OSN'd. Never did I ever see something like that again just to enter a casino. Regardless, I wore the backoff and OSN entry like a 'feather in a cap' type of thing. I remember thinking, "Wow I'm a threat!, look at me", "Casinos are scared of me". Cringy, I know, but it's all part of the learning process. Smallcap, if you ever read this, FU, but do appreciate you telling your story during that time, as it did motivate me, whether it was true or not, and that's what I kind of want to get into now.
When I first got into this, I was just like all the new players I see now, I believed everyone. Everyone peaked my interest. I couldn't believe AP was actually a thing and people were able to beat casinos. I was fascinated by it and blinded by the noise because the hype and excitement got in the way of it, not to mention lack of experience. Experience is the biggest teacher in anything. Once again, you got to go through hell and back to be successful at anything. Why is it only the 'gambling industry' where people are allowed to skip steps and go straight to a million? You think it's a coincidence that it's also the same industry with the most pathological degenerate people? Put two and two together. The reason it's portrayed that you can skip steps and go straight to a million is because that's their shtick. It's an industry ripe with scammers, skimmers, degenerates, and pathological trash, that will do their best to manipulate you out of your money or to just make themselves feel better about themselves after they failed and went bust. No other profession on god's green earth can you just become an expert in a flash and make ridiculous sums of money. Knowledge/Experience is a predecessor to money and money follows those two things in literally everything other than gambling? They will counter and maybe say, well what if the knowledge was given to them on a silver platter? Yeah that doesn't happen without you giving them much more in return, don't fall for that. If the knowledge is really that good, no one is giving that away for free if it took them forever to obtain that information by going through hell learning it. Regardless, here's the thing, like I said before, I believed everyone including smallcap. I trusted he would also look out for me and he didn't. Whether his story in the beginning was true or not of how he built it up so fast, knowing what we know now about his degenerate upbringing as well as his tendencies, I can see him running it up quick and then as we know what happened, eventually crater. I do know one thing, it's not the worst story I've heard compared to some of the stuff on discords and gambling with an edge. He didnt start with 3k like these fairytale people. He started with what I think was 75k from a home line of credit or something. He wasn't associated with BJA garbage and had nothing to sell. Him being vulnerable towards the tail-end of his career and on the podcasts, also tells me a lot as well. If someone isn't able to show their vulnerable side EVER, stay far far away. You should never trust anyone that never has a bad thing to say about themselves and this isn't just about gambling, it's LIFE.
What's another red flag about how to spot a fraud? Here's a big one. They love talking about their wins. They'll come up to you out of no where and show you screenshots. They'll DM you screenshots just to get a reaction out of you because that's where all of their dopamine comes from. It's not from actually beating the game or making money. It's to portray the image that they're successful. They're so bad at gambling, that that's the only way they can stay relevant. They'll talk about the big hit they got last night or whatever the fuck. They'll talk about how they hit for thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions. They also love to celebrate their wins in the moment, which goes hand in hand with what I just said about showing off their screenshots of jackpots, etc. They physically celebrate in the moment. This could be from making noise, jumping out of their chair, fist pumping etc etc. Real AP's talk and dread about their losses, degenerates talk and celebrate about their wins. That's the distinction. AP's sit in their chair or at the table stone cold when they win. Now if you want to throw in cover talk or playing the part at the table, that's a different story. Deep down when there's not an act going on, they're stone cold, and guess what, all the guys that talk about how they play the part at the tables are mostly just frauds anyway trying to sound like an expert, because an act sure can buy you some time if done right, but your attention is better served elsewhere like getting the money down and getting OUT. All this bullshit online and in books about persona at the table is just word diarrhea. If that's where you're focusing and bragging about or telling us what is buying you time at the table long-term, then I got a bridge in vegas to sell you. It's shit like that, that this industry is so known for. Talking like an expert and making it sound believable. Experience is the best teacher, but the problem is no one ever lasts that long to get experience and are easily fooled and allowed to be scammed or lied to time and time again.
Here's another. No successful gaming history prior to gambling. This doesn't just have to be strictly games like video games. Sports, playing an instrument, something that requires some level of skill, discipline, and/or critical thinking. If you're just some joe schmo that came off the street that spent his whole life partying in clubs, living in the gym, doing drugs, having a degenerate lifestyle relative to money, and the only reason you're gambling is that you're in it for the money and want us to believe you've been successful, especially if it happened in short order, then once again the bridges in vegas are selling at top dollar. Skill, discipline, and critical thinking are the top 3 traits to be good at this. Bankroll is tied to discipline so I'll leave that out. Most people are missing 1 of the 3, some even 2, some all 3. It's actually really hard to find an AP that has all 3, but when you do, they all have a successful gaming history because a successful gaming history ties all of those same things together. That's why you see, the best AP's are awkward, 'weird', quirky, introvert types. Introverts tend to have those traits. You won't see many bodybuilders being good at chess. Most of their dopamine comes from stimulating their brain physically. There's two types of people in this world. People that need physical stimulation and the ones that need mental stimulation. The physical stimulation types will never be good at gambling, which is why I referenced living in the gym before. Some might think that's a ridiculous take, but you just don't understand psychology and how people think. It's the same reason the ones who came off the street with a degenerate lifestyle also fail. They are physical stimulant types that have no discipline. They're just a bunch of monkeys on a tree that need to fuck whatever is moving down the street. Once again, there can be exceptions to anything, but I'll play my odds once again.
I can go on and on. I guess I'll end it with this. You can't turn discipline on and off. You either have it or you don't. If someone tells you their life story and most of it resembles being loose with money, run. You were either always disciplined or never disciplined. Your brain develops at an early age and those traits stay with you. The worst thing you can do as a parent is over-stimulating your kids always keeping them busy. You need to let your children be alone in a room sometimes and letting them spark their creativity. I see it all the time with parents, they constantly want their kids to be active and doing something. That will teach their brain to actually not have any discipline. They will grow up always needing to be in a relationship and physically stimulating their brains with some type of activity. The brain then becomes massively uncomfortable with being in solitude, which is a terrible thing to have. Too much alone time is also bad, but like everything in life, its about BALANCE, but balance doesn't sell, nobody cares about balance, too boring, no excitement. Some of the strongest people in the world are not found in their muscles but in the power of being alone. I can guarantee you, most people on here would go absolutely insane if they couldn't fuck a chick for more than 1 year or 2 years etc. I guarantee you these same people would go absolutely crazy if they had to spend any part of their day in a room alone reading or studying certain topics. It's not in their nature and it all goes back to their active childhood where their brains weren't developed properly and were over stimulated. If these people tell you they've been successful at gambling, be very skeptical.
Pce
