I think it is perceived to people differently by the stance they chose to take (voluntarily or involuntarily) about life. There are a set of people who see life as maximizing risk to stand our from the herd. It is mostly people who learned the world not by books, but by experience: Musicians, artists, entrepreneur, etc. The other set of people try minimizing the risk to make life predictable: engineers, lawyers, doctors are likely to fall in to this category. I don't think one is superior to the other. It is just matter of your innate genes, early life experience, or from your parents whether you are risk seeking or risk avoiding.
And in poker you can take two strategies, play tight win small many times, or play loose win few big ones. Poker teaches you which strategy fits to your emotion/personality, and where you feel the most happiness. What I learned in poker is that I am much more of a loose player even if I bet real money. I was once a full time employee of a big tech firm, and playing poker just revealed what has been missing in my life: risk and thrill. So I decided to start by own business to maximize thrill and risk which has been much more 'emotionally' rewarding so far.
I am also a decent chess player (lichess.org elo 1800), but I find poker much more challenging and resembles many aspects of life. The frustration of being rejected by girl is strikingly similar to losing 3-betted pot in poker. The agony of seeing your stock price fall feels the same as your opponent folding his hand while you have a nut. Going through these up and downs teaches you a profound wisdom, as also mentioned in the article, that you shouldn't be taking too much feedback from success and fail but you should optimize the the rate of success of your strategy.
Of course, life is short and we only have few hands. Even if we count a day as a hand, we only have 365 * 40 = 14600 hands. So I don't think either strategy is superior to the other. It is more about what strategy feels right to you. Poker teaches exactly that. You get to know more about yourself
Author here. I like your poetic take. I do think both games offer tremendous value. And I do think certain personality types may be attracted to one or the other, although there is a surprisingly big overlap (many people that play poker at a high level also play chess, and vice versa).
And in poker you can take two strategies, play tight win small many times, or play loose win few big ones. Poker teaches you which strategy fits to your emotion/personality, and where you feel the most happiness. What I learned in poker is that I am much more of a loose player even if I bet real money. I was once a full time employee of a big tech firm, and playing poker just revealed what has been missing in my life: risk and thrill. So I decided to start by own business to maximize thrill and risk which has been much more 'emotionally' rewarding so far.
I am also a decent chess player (lichess.org elo 1800), but I find poker much more challenging and resembles many aspects of life. The frustration of being rejected by girl is strikingly similar to losing 3-betted pot in poker. The agony of seeing your stock price fall feels the same as your opponent folding his hand while you have a nut. Going through these up and downs teaches you a profound wisdom, as also mentioned in the article, that you shouldn't be taking too much feedback from success and fail but you should optimize the the rate of success of your strategy.
Of course, life is short and we only have few hands. Even if we count a day as a hand, we only have 365 * 40 = 14600 hands. So I don't think either strategy is superior to the other. It is more about what strategy feels right to you. Poker teaches exactly that. You get to know more about yourself