Posts tagged: Guitar Lessons

December 27, 2010

How to Make Guitar New Year’s Resolutions You Will Keep

categories Play Guitar | comments 0 Comments

As the New Year approaches, many guitar players and aspiring guitar players will be setting New Year’s resolutions.

But let’s face it: Most people have a hard time keeping their resolutions.

If there was a simple and effective way to improve your chances of keeping your resolutions and it only took a few minutes to do, would you be interested?

If so read on…

Think back to the last time you really, really, wanted something badly.  Did you just wish that somehow, someday you would get it?

If you really, really, wanted something badly, you probably sat down and spent some time trying to figure out what you needed to do to achieve it.

When you had plans and total “laser-like” focus to achieve your highly desired goal what happened?

Most likely you achieved your desired outcome. But even if you didn’t quite reach your goal, didn’t you get much closer to it than you would have if you never had a goal and plan in the first place?

Now think back to the last time you went on a vacation.

Did you just fill up the gas tank and start driving?

Not likely.

You planned where you were going to go.

You figured out how much money you would need, how long the trip would take, whether you needed your passport, etc.

Now here’s the big question:

“How much time have you invested into planning what you really want to achieve on the guitar?”

Most guitarists plan their vacations better than they plan their practice sessions. They usually have good vacations, but very little to show for their practice sessions.

The difference between a great guitarist and an average one is usually goals.

The great and elite guitarists didn’t become incredible players by chance.  They decided that they wanted to become excellent guitarists and created a plan to do it.

Is Goal Setting Really Effective, or is it Just a Bunch of Baloney?

Researchers have been studying this area since the late 60’s and the results have been an overwhelming yes to the effectiveness of setting goals.

Goal setting has been found to have a consistent and powerful positive effect on behaviour.

Positive results have been shown in 10 different countries, with over 90 different tasks and with over 40,000 participants (Locke & Latham, 1990).

If you want to get the most out of the guitar and become the best guitarist you can, you must set two types of clear goals.

You should have short-term and long-term goals for your playing.

Your short-term goals can be achieved in individual practice sessions or within a week, month, or even up to 6 months.

Your long-term goals can be realized through your progressive accomplishment of many short-term goals.  It is best to set daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly goals for your playing.

New Year’s Resolutions: How to Increase Your Chances of Success by 1100%

You’ve probably already learned from setting New Years resolutions, that setting goals can be easy, but following through on them is a very different story.

In 2006, USA Today reported on a study where researchers divided a large group of people with New Year’s resolutions into two groups: those that wrote down their resolutions, and those that didn’t.  After a year, the researchers followed up with the two groups.

Of those that did not write down their resolutions, only 4% had actually stuck with their resolutions.  However, with the group that had written them down, 44% had followed through and stuck with their New Year’s resolutions.  That’s an increase of more than 1100% in success rate!

Interesting isn’t it?  Just taking a few minutes to write out your New Year’s resolutions can increase your chances of success by over 1100%.

Most people don’t really think of New Year’s resolutions as what they really should be thought of: goals.

Now let’s look at how to effectively set goals so you are likely to achieve them.

Don’t Be a Dummy, Make Your Guitar Goals or Resolutions SMART!

One of the most effective ways of setting goals is to make sure they are SMART goals.

Specific

Measurable

Action oriented

Realistic

Time conscious

Specific

Each goal must be specific.  For example, don’t say: “I want to be a good guitar player”.   It is better to say: “I play _______________ (name of song) easily”.  Or you could say: “I play like _____________ (fill in your favourite guitarist’s name)”.

It is also a good idea to state goals in the present tense, so it is more effective to say “I play_________ (song name) from memory with ease”.

Measurable

Your goals must be measurable.  If you can’t measure your goals, how will you know when you have achieved them?  If you have not yet reached a goal, how close are you to reaching the goal?

Some aspects of playing the guitar are easy to set measurable goals to.  For example, the metronome provides a very concrete way to measure progress.

You can set a goal to be able to perform a specific song at say, 140 beats per minute (bpm).  You can either play the song accurately at the desired tempo or not.  If you can, you have reached your goal.  If you can’t play the song at 140 bpm, you need to continue to practice until you can.

Action Oriented

The next aspect of goal setting is to ensure that your goals are action oriented.  This shouldn’t be too hard given the nature of the instrument.  The main point about action-oriented goals is how you word your goals.  For example, say: “I do…, I play…”, etc.

Realistic

In order to get yourself to buy into a goal, you must make it realistic.  If you think that there is absolutely no way you will ever accomplish something—you are probably right.

What you want to do is set goals that will stretch you and challenge you, but they still must be goals that you believe you can achieve.

The great thing is the more goals you set and accomplish, the bigger each subsequent goal can become.  As you achieve each goal, you will become more and more confident with your ability to set and achieve goals, so you will start to set larger and larger goals.

Time Conscious

The last aspect of effective goal setting is to set a time element into the goal.  The best way to do this is to set a deadline for achieving the goal.  Just saying: “I want to be able to play ____________ (song title) some day”, won’t create any real sense of urgency.  If you set a date however, it forces you to get moving towards that goal now.

Setting deadlines for goals makes some people anxious.  What happens if you set a deadline and don’t achieve it?  Simple.  You set a new deadline.  As Brian Tracy says: “There are no unrealistic goals; there are only unrealistic deadlines.”

Ready, Set… Goals!

Now that you know the essentials of effective goal setting, it is time to get specific and actually set your guitar goals.

Grab a piece of paper and invest some time into setting your guitar goals or resolutions for the New Year right now.

Don’t worry, you don’t have to show anyone your resolutions unless you want to.  But definitely do yourself a favour and set aside the next 15 minutes to write out your top 10 personal guitar goals.

Is there really anything more important for your guitar playing than deciding what you want to achieve?

Don’t skip this exercise by saying “I’m too busy right now, I’ll do it later when I’ve got more time.”  If you don’t do it now, you probably won’t do it at all.  You do want to get maximum results from your practice time don’t you?  Good.  Then invest 15 minutes to create a top 10 list of your guitar goals.

When you have guitar goals, you can set up your practice sessions so you achieve your goals.

Goals give you focus.  When you have focus going into your practice session, you will accomplish more.  You’ll be more likely to spend your time on what you need to do to achieve your guitar goals.  You won’t want to waste any time.

So set aside 15-minutes now to write out your top 10 guitar goals.  Once you’ve got your goals written, stick them somewhere you can see them every time you pick up your guitar.

This is really important:

Look at your guitar goals at the beginning of every practice session.

Use your goals to determine what you practice and how often you practice.  Then see where you are after 30 days.  If you use this simple technique you will be blown away.

One of the biggest obstacles for guitar players is getting enough time for practice.  Check out my article 17 Great Ways to Get More Time to Play Guitar.  This will give you some excellent ideas on how to get more time to play guitar.

The other crucial key to achieving your guitar goals is knowing what to practice and how to practice for maximum results.  That’s the focus of my more than 50 books and courses on guitar.  My courses have helped thousands of guitar players reach their guitar goals in more than 50 countries worldwide and I’m sure they can do the same for you.

If you’re ready to take your guitar playing to the next level and beyond, and you want to do it in even less time than you ever thought possible, you need to take a look at www.GuitarAccelerator.com. Think of how great you’ll feel when you play guitar and get those chills running up and down your spine with every note you play!

November 12, 2010

Guitar Practice Checklist: The Top 10 Things You Must Have to Not Waste Guitar Practice Time

categories Play Guitar | comments 2 Comments

Every guitar player wants to improve their guitar playing.  And every guitarist wants to see improvements in their playing today.

But let’s face it.  You’ve already got so much going on that it’s virtually impossible to get enough time to play as much guitar as you want.

This means for you become the best guitar player you can, you must make really good use of your limited practice time.

One of the keys to getting the most out of your practice sessions is to make sure you don’t waste any of valuable practice time.

Get Ready to Play Guitar

Before you begin your practice session, you must make sure that you are prepared to practice.  Anything that wastes practice time will diminish your results on the guitar.

So the first thing that you should do before you actually start to practice is make sure you have all of your practice materials at hand.

There’s nothing worse than starting to play guitar, and then discovering that you forgot to get some practice materials.  You now have to stop and go on a search and rescue mission for some sheet music, or something else that you wanted to work on.

Whether you’ve got 30-minutes for practice, or longer, little time wasters can add up fast.

On top of that, if it takes a while to locate what you are looking for, you may return to the guitar cold and have to do a bit of a warm-up before you can really get back into your practice session.

The Top 10 Things Every Guitar Player Should Have Ready for a Practice Session

1.  Guitar, amp, patch cords, effects pedals, power cables, adapters, CD/mp3 player. To start your practice session, you will want to have your guitar out of the case ready to play.  Also, if you need to bring out an amp and effects pedals, you will need to do so.  If this is the case you will also need the appropriate power cables and/or adapters.  If you will be playing along with some songs, then you will need your CD/mp3 player handy.

2.  Guitar picks. I always recommend having a couple of extra picks with you for your practice session.  It is quite common to put your pick down to grab something and then have a hard time finding it again.  Also, you may drop your pick and who knows where it will land.  Always have spare picks around.

3.  Electronic tuner, or tuning fork. The very first thing you need to do before you start to play guitar is tune your guitar.  So make sure you have your electronic tuner, pitch pipe, or tuning fork handy.

4.  Music stand. When you work on chords, scales, or songs from a book, you’ll find it best to prop it up on a music stand.  A music stand will allow you to look at music or a book that you are using for your practice session.  What’s most important is that music stands are adjustable so you can adjust it to the right height for you.  This will help reduce neck-strain and eye-strain.  It will also help you to sit properly so you can maximize your technique.

5.  Metronome. This essential little tool will help you develop rock-solid rhythm.

6.  A cloth for wiping down the neck of your guitar. You will want to do this before and after your practice session.  This will help prolong string life.

7.  Suitable clothing. A lot of guitarists practice in rooms that are not heated properly.  This can be a big problem.  A cold room will reduce blood flow to the fingers and arms and inhibit lubrication of tendons and joints.  A cold environment can also slow down nerve conduction.  Obviously this will negatively affect your playing.

If you don’t have the option of practicing in a well-heated room, get a small space heater or whatever is appropriate for your practice space.  If this isn’t an option, then you need to make sure that you dress warm while you practice and you may want to consider fingerless gloves to help warm your hands.

8.  Sheet music, songbooks or any guitar books you are working on. Have all of the music learning tools you will need for your current practice session ready.

9.  Guitar practice binder. A good idea is to create a guitar practice binder.  Get a big 3-ring binder.  Place dividers in it and add some blank paper.  Also add some blank manuscript paper and/or blank tab.  A good practice binder is a very useful tool.

In your practice binder you can jot down any ideas you get for practice.  Take notes about new things you want to work on, your current practice routine, etc.  In your practice binder you might want to include the scales that you want to practice, the chords you are learning or want to review, arpeggio fingerings, technique exercises, etc.

10.  A glass of water. You will probably get thirsty while you practice, but you won’t want to have to stop to go and get a glass of water, so have one handy.

Customize this list to suit your guitar practice needs. Grab a sheet of paper and write out the items from the checklist that apply to you.

Now it’s time to customize.

Write in the stuff that you are working on beside the applicable point.  Write in the current song(s) you are working.  Write down the books you are working on, etc. If you need to set up and tear down your amp every time you play, you might want to create a detailed checklist of all of the gear you need.

When you have finished your practice session, update your checklist to include what you want to work on in your next practice session. This way when you grab your practice checklist the next time, it will be current.

All you have to do is grab everything on the list.  This is great time-saver!

Place your practice checklist as the first page of your practice binder. This way it’s always easy to find your checklist.

Always return your practice stuff to the same place. When all of your guitar practice materials are in stored in the same place, it makes it easy for you to grab everything you need for your practice sessions.  This means there’s no running around trying to find stuff.

You might want to get a container or box for all of your practice stuff. This way, all you have to do is put everything you need into the box.  Then it’s really simple to get ready for your practice sessions: all you have to do is grab the box.

Also, teardown is easy too.  All you do is put everything back into the box and put it back in its place.

Are you just getting started on guitar and looking for a fast way to learn to play guitar?  Check out -> 14 Beginner Guitar Lessons.

October 25, 2010

Guitar Tutorial: One Simple Step to Avoid the Trap of Wasted Guitar Practice Sessions

categories Guitar Lessons, Play Guitar | comments 0 Comments

It’s a common scenario…

You’ve got limited time to play guitar.

You grab your guitar and start to practice.

In a snap, your practice session is over.

The problem is you feel like you got nothing done and have nothing to show for your time.  What’s worse is, more often than not, this pattern seems to repeat itself.

Well, you’re not alone.

A lot of guitar players experience this from time to time.  Today we will look at a very common reason for wasted guitar practice sessions, and most importantly, we will look at a simple solution.

Imagine this…

A friend has decided that he’s going to compete in the next Olympics.  He invites you out to his workout/training session.

You grab a seat.  Your buddy starts to warm-up and begin to train, but about 6 minutes in, his cell phone rings…

He stops and answers the phone.  He talks for a short bit and then resumes training.

About 10 minutes later, your buddy stops again. This time it’s because he hears the “ping” notification of incoming email.  So he stops training to check his email.

What do you think of your friend’s training program?  It’s laughable to think that anyone would train this way and expect to get even half-decent results.

Now think about your guitar practice sessions.  Now I know you are not competing for the guitar Olympics, but, you do want to get the best you can from every practice session, don’t you?  Well, one of the keys to getting the most out your practice sessions is to keep your focus on the guitar and what you are doing.

The Key to Focus

To keep your focus during your practice session, you must eliminate as many potential interruptions as possible.  When you eliminate potential interruptions before you start to practice, you ensure that your practice session remains your practice time, not time that can be easily interrupted and stolen from you.

An interruption is anything that diverts your attention from what you have chosen to spend your time on.  An interruption may be someone knocking on your front door, someone calling you on the telephone, or if your computer is on all the time, it could be the little “ping” sound that says you have email.

Picture this: you are writing an important report for school or work.  You have just come up with an amazing idea, your fingers are typing as fast as they can and then out of nowhere…ring, ring, ring.  Someone is calling you on the phone.  You get up to answer the phone to find out that it was just a wrong number.  You walk back to the computer and sit down.  Now, where were you?  You read what you have written and get up to the point where you left off, and now you can’t remember where you were going to take that last idea.  Sometimes you are lucky and you can recall your idea almost immediately.  Other times it may take five, or ten minutes to get back into the flow again.  Worst-case scenario is that sometimes you can’t remember where you were going to take the idea.

As you play guitar, you will find that you will sometimes get into the “zone”.

You start to make great progress on learning that new song.

Your fingers fly effortlessly over the neck as you play that new scale, or perform that new guitar solo.

You lose track of time.

You don’t even notice that you’re hungry!

If you get interrupted, you may or may not be able to get back into the flow.  But even if you are just enjoying a normal practice session, any interruption will take you away from what you have chosen to focus your time and energy on.

Interruptions hurt your focus and steal time away from you.  When you allow an interruption to do what it does best—interrupt—you are allowing someone else to control your time. Most interruptions are random and make no consideration for your valuable time.  When the phone rings and you answer it, the caller has no idea that you actually were busy at the time they called you!  The caller steals time from you in two ways:

  1. The actual time of the interruption.  This is the amount of time it takes you to put the guitar down to answer the phone and then return to playing the guitar.
  2. Once you are playing again you have to pick up where you left off. It can sometimes take quite some time to get back into the flow of what you were doing, or sometimes you just never quite get back to where you were.

Depending on what you were doing until you were interrupted, a simple wrong number or annoying telemarketer can sometimes steal 5, 10, 15, or more minutes of valuable practice time.  If your practice session is 30 minutes and you lose 10 minutes due to an interuption─you’ve lost 1/3 of your practice time!  Don’t let this happen.  Take control of your time and eliminate as many interruptions as you can before you start your practice session.

4 Simple Ways to Avoid Interruptions When You Play Guitar

  1. If you share accommodations with others, tell them that you are not to be disturbed for the duration of your practice session.
  2. Turn off the ringer on your telephone and your cell-phone.  Let your answering system handle any calls that occur during your practice session.  If you are expecting a call, be the caller instead of the callee.
  3. Turn-off the TV and your computer.
  4. Have all of your practice gear ready.  Create your own checklist of everything, and I do mean everything, that you will need for your practice sessions. This way you simply grab your checklist and then get everything you need for your practice session.  There is no messing around.  No forgotten metronome, or missing sheet music.  You’ve got what you need so you can use your practice time for practice not search and rescue missions.  Be sure to update your checklist as needed.  This is crucial!

This is just one of many ways to get the most out of your practice sessions.  To learn how to practice for maximum results, check out Guitar Accelerator.

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