Do you practice your guitar hard but are still not making the progress that you'd like? Then read on to find out more about how you can improve your guitar playing by taking a slightly different approach.
We live in a culture where there is a lot of emphasis put on the virtues of hard work, and some people even seem to believe that if you don't struggle to get what you want, then it's not worth having.
Unfortunately, this attitude is common among many musicians as well, even though it's actually quite counter-productive in most instances.
While it's certainly necessary to practice consistently in order to make progress, it's not true that this practice should be difficult or unpleasant.
So if you've been trying to improve your guitar playing by going about it the hard way, and you're still not making the progress you want, try making these three very simple changes.
These will help to make your practice sessions pleasanter and less stressful, and will almost certainly improve your progress as well.
1.
Take more breaks First of all, make sure that you take enough breaks when you're practising.
While you're playing, pause at least every 5 to 10 minutes or so to stretch out your hands and fingers.
And at least every half hour put the guitar aside for several minutes and get up to stretch your legs and give yourself a complete mental and physical rest.
Doing this will help you to keep your muscles relaxed, and prevent overuse injuries.
Giving your ears a break will help you to stay attentive to the music that you're playing, and changing your focus for a while will help to keep things interesting and stop you getting bored.
2.
Relax your body Secondly, make an effort to stay physically relaxed when you're playing the guitar.
That might sound like an oxymoron, but it's very easy to unconsciously tense up, especially in your arms and shoulders.
Because this is usually an unintentional habit, for most people it takes some vigilance to ensure they're not allowing tension to build up while playing.
By relaxing in this way, your playing will be more fluid and the process more enjoyable.
Playing the guitar can be challenging, but it shouldn't be hard physical work.
3.
Lighten up mentally Thirdly, if playing the guitar ever feels stressful to you, you might want to re-examine your attitude.
While everybody has different motivations for wanting to learn to play, a fundamental love of music and of the instrument itself should underpin this if you're going to be successful.
Stress, on the other hand, is normally associated with external factors, such as trying to impress others, trying to pass music exams, trying to make it into a career etc.
If you're primarily motivated by things like this, it's easy to start taking the guitar way too seriously - an attitude which sucks all the joy out of it and makes practising less enjoyable than it should be, because the end goal becomes more important than the pleasure of playing right now.
There's nothing wrong with having these kinds of goals for your guitar playing, but they shouldn't dominate.
Instead, stay focused on playing for the fun of it, and the practice experience will be easier and more pleasant.