I highly recommend the ‘getting off on the right foot’ series. Even after playing and studying poker for the better part of 10 years, that series helped me tighten my fundamentals and identify some less than great thoughts that were hurting my decision making.

I tend to interpret small flop leads from the blinds as one of three things. I think villain is likely either trying to set the price for a marginal draw (ie. middle card flush draw), testing the water with a marginal made hand (any Kx), or trying not to scare customers with a monster hand that doesn’t want to risk a free card (trips, trips, and more trips). Facing the large turn check raise I think we can mostly rule out the first two categories.

I don’t hate the turn bet but I think it’s pretty marginal. SB might pay us 1 bet with worse Kx (only if they flat too wide preflop, but that’s not uncommon) but CO might only have K9s, and we have a handy blocker to the flush draw. I’d prefer looking for value on most rivers, especially if our response to a check-raise is anything but snap fold.

theginger45 said
Don’t spend time trying to use table talk/live reads to gain an advantage until you’ve already broken down the nature of the spot to a detailed degree, since it’s liable to lead you into a mentality of trying to figure out what your opponent has right now, rather than what their range looks like. This will lead you into difficulties in future when you come up against decent players with well-constructed ranges.  

You perfectly summed up my first 7 or so years in poker, lol.