Teaching yourself the guitar is a great way to add a new talent to your repertoire and to impress everyone you come across.
The great thing about playing the guitar is that it's something that can be done anywhere and something that almost everyone ones.
If you teach yourself guitar then you will be presented with plenty of opportunities to show off your skill and to have a play - whether it's at a house party or just busking on the beach.
This is very much not the case with something like the piano, and though the piano is also a beautiful instrument to play, it's not something that you will be able to use regularly.
A piano is a large and expensive piece of equipment that you will have to leave in the room you put it in at all times.
A guitar meanwhile is light enough to be strapped easily over your shoulder or to be carried under one arm.
This then means that you can play it anywhere you go.
The acoustic guitar in particular is very light and requires no power amp or speakers meaning you can literally pick it up and start playing - and as everyone seems to have one that means you'll very rarely be without your instrument.
The guitar is also a very sociable instrument partly for this reason, and that means you can sit around and sing songs with it together.
The fact that it's small and that it's held in front of you allowing you to maintain eye contact, means that you can play while sitting in a circle and chatting with friends.
The relaxing but uplifting tones of the acoustic guitar also means it makes great background music, while the fact that guitars are used in so many popular and current songs will mean that you can choose from a range of pieces of music that are bound to please your audience and get them singing along with you.
Bon Jovi anyone? Beatles? There are countless songs that you can rock out to, or chill around a campfire to when you teach yourself guitar.
At the same time another benefit of the guitar is that it's a highly versatile instrument capable of playing a lot of different styles.
Regardless of the music tastes of your listeners then you should be able to learn something that they will appreciate, and this will mean you have multiple strings to your bow.
At Christmas or other family gatherings you can play something for Gran, something for Dad and something for the kids.
Perhaps the real reason so many people choose to learn guitar however is how easily accessible it is.
A guitar is not an easy instrument to play in that there is an awful lot to learn and it'll be a while before you playing guitar solos as the lead guitar in a rock band; but at the same time being able to string just a few chords together will be sufficient for people to start singing along with songs they recognise.