How To Stay On Track With Learning To Play Guitar

By Joshua LeBlanc

Guitar can be one of the most appealing instruments for aspiring musicians. It’s versatile, being used in almost all genres of music. It’s portable so you can travel with it almost anywhere. Also it’s able to be used as a melodic instrument as well as a harmonic instrument for accompanying others. However it is also one of the most frustrating instruments to start on. It’s very easy to get overwhelmed by all the technical complexities of learning where to put your fingers, getting the notes to sound, trying to move both your fretting hand as well as your picking hand in time with each other. Let’s talk about how to not get overwhelmed with the instrument.

Dealing With Overwhelm

The most common hurdle for any guitarist is getting overwhelmed with some aspect of playing guitar. Maybe you don’t know where to start and begin searching through various online courses, books, YouTube videos, etc. and everybody is telling you to do something different or start from a new starting point until you feel that you’ve burned a hole in your floor from running in so many circles. I get it, knowing where to start can be a challenge, and the thing is that the starting point isn’t necessarily the same for everyone. The first starting point for any guitarist is just getting to play something. Even if it’s just one note or one chord. Start with something and then grow from there. This is why in the guitar lessons I give, I make sure that whatever my students are working on is relevant and appropriate to them.

Not Only Sticking To Your Strengths

This is an issue that tends to be more common when you’re past the beginning stage. Let me ask you a question. Do you find that you tend to play the same things over and over again? Then once you’ve gone through those things, you don’t know what to do next? If you answered yes to one or both of those questions, then you are not alone. We tend to want to play the things that we are good at because we’re good at them. And because we’re good at them it makes us feel like we’ve accomplished something on the guitar. There’s nothing wrong with that feeling because you should be proud that you can actually play something. So what’s stopping you from the next thing you should work on? This is the question you should ask yourself. You may not know the answer at this point and if that’s the case then you’re just normal. Seeking out a guitar teacher could be the solution that you need.

Not Shying Away From Your Weaknesses

This kind of goes in hand with the previous topic I stated but it’s different enough that it warrants it’s own section. Maybe there’s a skill that you really want to learn how to achieve; fingerpicking, sweep picking, integrating new scales, utilizing the fretboard better, the list goes on and on. So why do players tend to shy away from working on these skills? Because we’re not good at them. It feels like we’re starting from zero and after all the hard work we put in it should be easy… right? Well just because you’re good at one thing doesn’t mean you’ll automatically be good at another (See Michael Jordan’s baseball career for example). However, if we want to achieve our goal and get to that next milestone in our playing, we need to embrace the fact that we’re not going to be very good at this one thing for a while. It doesn’t mean we’re a bad guitarist overall. You may have already accomplished quite a bit that you should be proud of. It just means you’re going to overcome a new obstacle and that’s a good thing. Again, finding a solid guitar teacher that is knowledgeable in the skill that you’re trying to acquire will help you to accomplish your goal faster.

In short, these are the three biggest obstacles that I have seen guitar students face when they try to learn to play the guitar. Don’t give up, just remember that staying consistent and diligent in working on your guitar playing is the key to making progress.

Joshua LeBlanc is the owner and lead instructor at Lafayette School of Guitar focusing on delivering the best guitar lessons in Lafayette, LA.