Subject: Do I Have To Repeat Myself?
You are getting this e-mail because you subscribed to it on www.learn-to-play-rock-guitar.com. If you don't want to receive these e-mails any longer, go to the bottom of this message and click on "unsubscribe." Hey there Friend, Yes. If you want to get good, you have to repeat yourself. And thanks to Robby, the beatings will continue until practicing has increased! Seems he enjoys a good woodshedding session...There is something beautiful about the power of repetition. When the skill is new, repeating it over and over can feel monotonous and boring. The strange thing is, the more you repeat the skill and consequently get better at it, the more you begin to enjoy practicing the skill. Last week we talked about practicing skills until you reach whatever goal you've set for yourself. A key element in the process of practicing is to repeat the skill or technique until it is second nature - you don't have to think about it any longer, it just happens. It's in your fingers. Consider one of the earliest habits you developed in your life... walking. You walk because you have practiced it every day of your life since you took your first step. By repeating the process of walking every day, you went from taking a single step on very unsure footing to running in a matter of a few months. And then no one could keep you tied down. To master any skill, repetition is the key. But repetition by itself does not guarantee success. You need to ensure you are repeating these practice exercises correctly. To do this, you need to learn how to execute each technique properly and then practice the technique repeatedly until it becomes ingrained in your muscle memory. Going back to the example of walking, in the beginning you fell down... a lot. You had to repeat the process of getting back up and trying again. You had to build up your muscle strength and learn how to balance on these spindly things. You trained the muscles to support your posture and weight as well as handling the muscular adjustments necessary to allow for standing versus forward motion at different speeds. Learning guitar is really no different. We have to train our fingers to do things they aren't used to doing, and then repeat these new actions until the muscles remember them on autopilot. The process starts slowly, because our fingers aren't used to the movements. Most people will try to rush through the movements because they want to get past the boring 'fundamentals,' but this isn't the answer. To train the fingers correctly, we have to be methodically and play each exercise slowly until our fingers have learned the pattern or technique. Only then can we start speeding up the process. It seems really stupid to have to continually slow ourselves down in order to increase our speed, but it's been proven successful time and again by our guitar heroes. Learn it slowly and through repetition, and then speed up the exercise until you reach the desired tempo. There's an added benefit to improving your skills in this way. If you take the disciplined approach I'm suggesting here, you will start seeing results exponentially, meaning you will actually begin to improve faster than if you tried to sledgehammer your way to mastering the guitar. She can be downright cruel to you if you push too hard and don't treat her with respect. Imagine the levels of frustration you might endure if you treat her wrong and she leads you down your personal highway to Hell, taunting you all the way by masterful performances of guitar gods Hendrix and Clapton, Satriani and Vai, Hammett and Mustaine. Take heed, fair readers, and stick to the proven ways of the guitar sensei's of old... A word of caution: be careful that you are using proper form as you practice. Repetition of incorrect technique will reinforce bad habits, which will slow you down in the long run. And we know how you don't like to slow down... Perfect Practice? I'm sure you're heard the saying "Practice makes perfect." Someone then expanded on this idea by saying "Perfect practice makes perfect." And then there are critics that slap that concept down by saying it's impossible to practice perfectly. In fact, I'd offer that it's impossible to do anything perfectly (unless you're my wife), because we're humans (and inherently flawed). Or maybe it's just me... No, I'm pretty sure none of us are robots (although I'm not so sure there aren't extraterrestrials roaming around amongst us). Even the most disciplined and rhythmically capable people must have off days with a flawed practice session (or performance). I suppose the number of days like that are what separates the amateurs from the professionals. But if we strive to learn the proper techniques and to practice those techniques as perfectly as we can, there's a high likelihood we will be competent guitar players. Here's the point I'd like to make. Learn how to do each technique properly. Start off slowly, paying close attention to how you are performing each exercise. Make sure you are doing each technique correctly (this is a good reason to have an instructor, whether local or online). Practice your technique at a very slow speed so that your muscles are trained in the proper movements. This process is where you develop the perfection in your technique. When each exercise can be played perfectly at very slow tempos, the fingers have memorized the proper technical movements. Then you begin to increase the speed at which you play the exercises. Do this incrementally, raising the tempo by 5 BPM (beats per minute on your metronome) for each pass. You can continue raising the tempo until you reach a point where you begin making mistakes. This is your new threshold. Now slow down the tempo by 5 BPM and practice your exercise until you have mastered it perfectly. Your fingers now have a new reference point and you've built a new level of achievement. It might not seem like much initially, but this simple approach will raise your playing ability exponentially in a relatively short time. You just have to commit to taking the time and slowing yourself down so the growth can happen. You know what happens when someone breaks a bone then doesn't have it set properly - there's a good chance the bone will take on a weird angle and cause other problems in the future. Better to do it right at the outset than to have to go back later for corrective actions. The same applies to learning your instrument. So what do you say? Are you going to take your time and give yourself the best chance of success, or are you going to force things, get frustrated and ultimately quit? I hope it's the former - we need more successful musicians in the world - keep rocking! Peace~ Dave Dave "Eddie" Vance is a rock guitar enthusiast and gear nut. He has been playing guitar for over 30 years and enjoys tormenting the neighbors every chance he gets. When he's not slaving for the man, you can find him rocking out with his B.C. Rich Bich guitar, a cold beer and some sweet tunes. He also runs Learn-To-Play-Rock-Guitar.com, but you knew that already! Follow Learn To Play Rock Guitar:I welcome your feedback! Did you like today's message? What other topics would you like to see covered in my e-mails? Please let me know at: dave@learn-to-play-rock-guitar.com As always, please feel free to forward this email to a friend! I review products before recommending them. 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