When progress begins to slip....

No, you are not being too hard on yourself. We all go through it and get to that, "slow down" check point called reality.

Yes, you are being silly because you are putting WAY to much pressure on yourself.

Go to your lessons and go from there. Learning any instrument takes time and unless you plan on pushing up daisies tomorrow, take your time and soak it all in. There is a lot going on here. Be cool because stressing out will be your worst enemy and that seems like the direction you are heading.

Take it day by day.

For the record, what chord are you having a problem with?

Mike

Mike is absolutely right. And you actually hit the nail on the head yourself:

Needless to say, I am driven to learn, and my motiviation for doing this is only that I love music and have wanted to play for years.

Loving something is about commitment, not competition. Commitment is about taking a trip together and enjoying each moment of the trip. Where you end up doesn't really matter. You are going to have a life long relationship with music, so relax and have fun.

Like anything, you can push yourself too hard. Take a moment and take a break. Don't play one day. Go to a show and listen to someone else play instead. Find people to play with to make making music more than just working at practicing. That will help you see two important things: first, you've already come quite a way and secondly (and you've already guessed it, no doubt :wink: ) that you've quite a way to go. That's how it's always going to be. And that's the coolest thing about playing.

And keep posting! You'll find lots of kindred spirits here.

Peace

In addition to what has been said, you've got a lot of books & other sources for such a short time (5 weeks). I can't speak for anyone else, but I cannot learn well if I'm trying to learn from several sources at once. You might want to consider working through just one from start to end, taking as much time as you need to do it well....not moving to the next lesson until you've mastered the current one (or at least can do it reasonably well). Though there's nothing wrong with consulting with other sources (or this website like I often do) for questions that are unanswered.

thanks for the input all....thinking about it, just like any relationship, it takes work and time. I shouldnt be in such a rush...it's important to remember to stop and smell the flowers along the way...and I believe this journey will be filled with flower gardens!

David and the others can vouche for me that I posted many similar threads to this one and as the others stated you will hit MANY walls while learn the guitar. The only difference I found is that experience allows you to get over the wall so you can climb the next one. I have been at it for 6 months now (I also tried playing when I was younger now I am 39) and I am learning what everyone always told me...RELAX (easier said than done!!). It's easier for me to just walk away from the guitar now when I am feeling frustrated. I used to just keep at it until I got it right because I didn't want to "fall behind" in my learning.

Sounds to me like you could do with a break for a couple of days. But if you cant manage that then, you should leave the theory and scales ect and just play some songs that your good at for a while and just try to enjoy it !

What a timely post for me.

Everyone's learning approaches vary, and the real key of teaching is figuring out how to approach a student's learning style in a way that most benefits them. I have a student right now who reminds me an awful lot of your post - not in the details, but in the general approach - and it's been a real struggle. I feel frustrated, and I believe he does too... although I think (hope) we turned a corner at his lesson last night. Here's the brief history... (and by the way, if you should happen to be that student and you're reading this, I'm not trying to say this is a bad thing - just that the evolution of your progress might help somebody else here):

Student e-mails me, tells me he's not a beginner (10 yrs playing), but hasn't had lessons. He's learned a lot of stuff, can read standard notation, plays regularly with others, and wants to learn more about improvisation.

At the first lesson we cover pentatonic scales. He's already familiar with a couple positions. I show him another one, and how they connect. He runs through it a few times with a chart in front of him, says he can get it from there. I show him another, then another - we've now covered the whole neck, and we're ten minutes into the lesson.

Since this is a first lesson, I'm taking him at his word that he can get them down on his own. I'm making a few corrections in fingering, I show him how to better shift between positions, etc. and we move on. He wants to work on some specific songs, and we go through various techniques for lead playing: slides, bends, hammers, pulls, vibrato. We talk about the importance of rhythm in a solo, and I demonstrate how simple lines can be made interesting with different rhythmic approaches.

That's a lot. He seems happy.

The next week, he's learned one of the three new positions I've shown him. That's ok, because he wanted to alternate technical stuff with songs, and I've prepared one from his list - a Hendrix tune. We work through the progression, I show the lead lines. He works through them once or twice, and will work on them on his own. We end the lesson with me laying down a rhythm and him improvising over it for a few minutes with the patterns he's learned.

Somewhere around this lesson, or maybe the one after, we decide that bi-weekly lessons will be better - his work schedule won't allow for consistent practice, and that's why the scales aren't down.

I think next came major scales. Four positions in one lesson - again, a lot. Moveable chords too, major, minor and sevenths... and the inversions of each one.

The lesson after that is when I realize I've really got a problem as a teacher. He wants a lot of stuff... and I'm delivering a lot of stuff. Now that I've shown major scales, he wants to move on to how they're used, changing scales in solos, etc. From his perspective, I'm there to give him that stuff. From my perspective, I'm there to get him to play better... and of the four scale positions, he's learned a couple, plus maybe one more of the pentatonics, so all of those aren't down yet.

The problem for me: if all he wants is more 'information' about playing, he's far better off buying a bunch of books. Twenty bucks on books will give you a lot more info that the same money spent with me. He'll get frustrated (and soon!) because his playing won't improve much, and I'll be to blame... but if I present less information, he'll feel like he's not getting what he's paying for. The next couple of lessons feel very frustrating for me - teaching isn't about punching a clock and collecting the money, it's about... well, teaching :)

Last night I think I finally found a workable approach. The entire lesson was devoted to one song, a John Mayer tune. It allowed for a lot of 'info' (pedal points, chromatic motion, rhythm approaches, polychord voicings, etc.) but that was incidental - talk about a point, work on the song. Talk about another, work on the song. At the end of the lesson, he could do a decent job on both the rhythm and the lead for the tune, and had about 75% of both down before he left - a much better learning percentage than anything so far.

There's nothing at all wrong with learning a lot of stuff, but try to learn at least one thing WELL from each lesson. The skills in music build on skills you've acquired, not on stuff you 'know'.

From the books you've listed, you've got material at hand that will take you several years to master. Rushing through it won't master it - so take your time and enjoy making the music while you go!

I call my stalls plateaus. you rach a point whnen everything you play sounds the same.

then something happens one day and everything sounds fresh again. you are playing things that you havent thought of before. you hands nail all the chords or nottes. they sound sweet. you can tput the guitar down.
then one day you wake up and it is the same old all over again.

another plateau.

when that happens I seek inspriation. it appearsi the oddest ways sometimes.

jam along with a Cd when you feel stuck.
it's cheaper than buyinmg another guitar...which without fail always inspires one to greater things.
and then you suck again.

it is a repeating cycle.
growth/boredom/growth..

just dont beat yourself up. play for your enjoyment. and if you can play for others enjoiyment because that is a real kick and keeps you on your toes.

Fellow "mature" player (I'm 47) you sound like me a few months ago. Although I don't believe I have attacked it with quite the vigor you have, I have been practicing at least an hour a day for the last 9 months.

Last Nov. I felt like I could do nothing right, I was going backwards instead of forward. One day i was so annoyed I almost threw my 6 string friend !!!!

What I did after some great advice from the people here was go back to the start and revisit some things. I found I had rushed ahead on some things and did not really have a mastery of them. I was doing too many things at once, and none of them really good. (damn internet guitar resources!)

And, I decided to make at least one practice day a week "just for fun" No books, no nuthin, just me & a coffee (or beer) play what came to mind, string together chords and make up lyrics, pick out the notes to some crappy bugglegum song I hated as a teenager, try to sing like Lennon or Geddy Lee or Hank Williams---whatever!

And TWICE, while doing this, a family member has walked in the room and said " geez Dad/Dear you are really getting good"!! My daughter even went so far to say I should consider playing at the next campfire!

Anyway, I hope you pull out of this little rut. Have fun!

I've been 'playing' for a year now and seem way behind most people on here. In the last two weeks I have finally managed to get a reasonable mini f chord about half the time I've gone for it. Yet last night I was woeful again. When that happens I either:

1) Go back to the first few pages of my 'learn guitar' books and prove I've learned something in the last 12 months. This shows I am making progress and kind of makes me feel a bit more positive.
or
2) Hang the guitar back on the wall in the knowledge that I'll probably be better tomorrow.

I used to get a bit fed up, now I recognise it as just part of the process and try not to let it get to me.

As Dave T has said, I also regularly go back to stuff I have skipped over. For some reason I can read/play simple standard notation from a low C on the staff to a high G (think 3rd fret fifth string to 3rd fret 1st string). I know where the notes are on the guitar (first 3 frets all strings) but I just can't connect the note notation to the string, if that makes sense. It doesn't bother me anymore though, I know it will come in time if I keep going back to it.

Blimey, that was a wordy way of saying "take a break when its winding you up and come back to it another day"!

ldavis04

I like all the advice everybody is giving. As far as feeling rushed, that is a perfectly normal feeling. I started playing when I was 18 years old. I felt that was very late and used to really push myself to "make up time". You would probably laugh at that, but I felt the very same way you do now.

It is never too late to start. Dom, the bass player in my band started bass just 4 years ago. He just celebrated his 58th birthday last month! So you are way ahead of him. But I tell ya, I have really heard him improve in the last year I've been with this band. He's getting pretty darn good.

So just practice and you will get good.

One thing I might differ with the others is this. I think you started out right. Play songs. That is what it is all about. You don't practice to know theory, scales, and chord progressions. The goal is to play songs.

Now, I am not against knowledge whatsoever. Keep studying theory and scales. That is very helpful. But learn to just have fun and play songs as well. Start with very simple 3 or 4 chord songs. Get your strumming down and even learn to sing as well.

So, what I am really saying is have a balance. Too much pressure to learn the complicated things will just stress you out. Practice those things. In time they will come. But also, just let go and have a little fun. Play songs you love. So balance it out.

And keep coming here to GuitarNoise. You will find lots of friends who love to be helpful. And believe me, we can all relate to the total psychological problems guitar causes. :D