Nicole SGT RJ(Rejiester)

Nicole Rejiester, Mental Game Coach at PokerVIP.com

Hello, I am Nicole “SGT RJ” Rejiester, and I have decided to bring my knowledge and experience in the world of counseling and psychology and use it to help people become better at a game I love to play. Poker. But since this is a poker website, you probably guessed that.

Academic background: My background in psychology began when I minored in the subject as an undergrad (‘94-’98). While I was serving in the US Army (’00-’05), I got the opportunity to take some masters level classes in counseling psychology. I absolutely loved it, and decided to pursue further education in counseling. I received my masters in Counseling Psychology in ’06 and am currently completing work on my Ph.D. in Counseling (all work complete except my dissertation), which should be finished by the end of this year (’12).

I’ve worked for hundreds of hours with dozens of clients over a variety of settings, with issues ranging from the relatively minor (adjusting to college) to major mental illnesses and personality pathology. While I am not currently licensed in any state as a counselor, I do have the necessary educational background and experience to help poker players deal with the particular stressors and issues unique to this challenging game.

Poker background: I started playing “real” poker in early ’08, first playing online on PokerStars in late ’08 and joining the Two Plus Two community (as “SGT RJ” for both) in early ’09. I primarily played tournaments (SNGs and MTTs) and was a winning low stakes STT player and a slightly losing MTT player. While I put some effort into understanding the game and improving my play, I never played for a living, and would consider myself a “serious recreational” player.

While I’ve never played poker for a living, I have played enough to understand the mental skills necessary to improve and excel at this constantly shifting, complex, fascinating, and sometimes frustrating game. I understand variance; I’ve experienced tilt and how it can impact your game; I know how lack of motivation can lead to difficulty improving; I’ve been frustrated at my own lack of progress on small poker goals and felt that surge of pride when things begin to click.

What I bring to coaching: Due to the combination my education and my experiences in poker, I believe I can help poker players of all games and skill levels to help locate, understand, and plug the mental leaks that lead to tilt, lack of motivation, difficulty progressing in poker, and various other issues that impact players ability to play at their very best, and can help players to get the most they can (monetarily and experience wise) from the game of poker. In addition, I can assist players in taking skills they learn in poker and apply them to other areas of their life (and vice versa), find balance in their lives, and generally become happier and mentally healthier individuals.

My approach to mindset coaching (and counseling/psychology in general) is cognitive-behavioral. What this means in non-psychobabble terms is that I can offer focused advice and interventions specifically tailored at helping individual players correct distorted thoughts that lead to tilt/motivation issues (in life and in poker), as well as providing specific, unique things that you can do in your day to day life that will help not only with your game, but also with other parts of your life. If decide to pursue mindset coaching with me, expect to spend a lot of time focusing on the specifics of how you think about situations (in poker and otherwise) that create tilt, anger, frustration, or other disruptive emotional experience. You should also anticipate needing to do work in between sessions (yes, homework) in order to get the maximum benefit from the experience.

As a final caveat, I am not a poker coach. I am a poker mindset/life coach. I won’t help you identify the best line to take, or tell you how often and when you should be 4 betting light, or take your hand histories and help you identify other leaks in your game. What I can offer is to help you do things like this:

Identify why you tilt, and how to maintain/regain control

Help you to establish appropriate goals to improve your game

Tackle and improve issues of low motivation

Find an appropriate poker/life balance

Understand and overcome anxiety about success/failure

Work with issues of self-confidence/self-esteem

Improve communication and interpersonal relationships