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Thank You Ez I'm getting there...Slowly

Good morning, @Defontaine, and ... Plenty to read and amuse you here, and lots to learn and share. This is a common enough issue with those learning the guitar on their own, and is easy enough to answer, but it's maybe not an answer you're going to like. Those chord diagrammes are a fairly simple means of getting beginners started, and are very useful. They are, however, a bit like 'painting by numbers' as far as Music is concerned. No, that's not snobbery (I was a Learner, too, some decades ago, and went down a similar route...). You've already worked out, I suspect, that the figures represent the neck of the guitar, seen from above the finger board, looking down. The double line at the top represents the nut of the guitar (where the string's sounding length ends and they go on to the tuning pegs...). The vertical lines are the strings; the horizontal ones the first frets of the guitar. The number outside of the diagramme indicates at what fret the diagramme is placed (in all three here, it's the first fret, hence the double line for the nut...). The black dots, and the black bar, are the fingers of the Player, '1' for the index, '2' the middle, '3' for the ring, and the '4' is the pinky...). Above each picture, the 'O' shows a string to be played 'open', that's to say with no finger on any fret, but is to be heard, the 'X' shows a string that is not to be played, either by simply not plucking or strumming it, or by 'damping' its sound by some means (using the palm of the other hand, or lightly touching the string with an adjacent finger...). The letters below the diagramme tell us the name of the chord (C major, D minor and F major respectively...). All of that is perhaps easy enough to explain, but the difficulty, for a beginner, is the clean execution of these chords, most especially the 'bar' chord, 'F'. It's played by laying one's index flat over all six strings, then placing the other fingers on the strings at the frets indicated. That's quite a job when starting out, and many folk struggle with it if there's no-one to show how that is to be done, comfortably and quickly. What to do, then..? First recommendation: understand that it's not essential, especially as a beginner, to play every string, every time. If you're strumming these chords, it's very common to only play either the bottom half or the top half; the song won't suffer. If it's hard to play, play what you can and move on. It'll come, but not if you persist in a technique too early. How to acquire this technique..? the short answer is: good guitar tuition, with a tutor. OK, OK, that's not possible for everyone, but it's the best route just the same. Meanwhile, here's what to do. Use that same fingering pattern, but further up the neck, at the seventh fret, for instance. Placing the fingers higher up is easier. Do this as an exercise, not when playing a song, as the resulting chord won't be the right one for the song. Just get used to getting the fingers in place, slowly, methodically, ensuring as best as possible to get all the six strings sounding correctly. Move the whole position up a fret and do it again, then back down a fret; continue doing this, placing the fingers, playing the chord slowly, adjust the position until it sounds right, then back up a fret, then back down... Once this becomes a bit more natural (a couple of weeks, doing this for a few minutes every day...), move down to the sixth fret and do the same exercise. After a while, gradually moving down the neck, you'll find the 'F' chord easier to play, cleanly. Take your time; I often say that the fastest way to play is to do it very, very slowly. That's the secret to rapid results. There, that's enough for now; I hope this helps a little. Well done, and carry on; meanwhile... Keep well, stay safe. Douglas

I tend to hold mine like you do in the op picture, but there's nothing inherently wrong with holding a pick anyway that is comfortable, secure and makes a pleasing sound. When playing electric guitar, I tend to hold my pick 'upside down', using the blunt end to hit the strings, but for acoustic, I hold it the conventional way around (both ways are for tonal reasons). One of the reasons I hold my pick like your first photo is that I like to use pick and fingers, also known as hybrid picking.