Plateau

[Bunny]

Lately, despite practicing more, I've gotten much worse at playing. I'm getting finger placements wrong, missing strings, can't keep time etc. It feels like I'm starting from the beginning again. I'm still having regular lessons and I've downloaded an app which has only highlighted the little to no progress I've been making.

Does anyone have any ideas as to where I've gone wrong? Any advice or links to resources I could try to get me back on  track would be really appreciated.

[Dad3353]

19 minutes ago, Bunny said:

Lately, despite practicing more, I've gotten much worse at playing. I'm getting finger placements wrong, missing strings, can't keep time etc. It feels like I'm starting from the beginning again. I'm still having regular lessons and I've downloaded an app which has only highlighted the little to no progress I've been making.

Does anyone have any ideas as to where I've gone wrong? Any advice or links to resources I could try to get me back on  track would be really appreciated.

 

You give no inkling as to time scale here; are we talking days, weeks, months, years..? 'Plateauing' is a well-known phenomena in the learning process (not just instruments; it occurs in many other fields...). How to avoid it..? Difficult. What to do..? Work through it. For how long..? No idea, as it varies even for oneself. One or two tips, however...

 

1 - Practice little and often, rather than super-long sessions. Two bouts of fifteen minutes each, per day, are worth more than any two-hour stint.

2 - Little..? Did I say 'little'..? OK, but regularly. This is key; every day, with no exceptions.

3 - Start again: Pick up your very first method book, or first lesson notes, or whatever you started out with. Go through it, from the beginning, as if you're starting again. Do the exercises diligently (no cheating..!); it'll get you back, rapidly, to where you are now plus a bit more.

4 - Pick up your instrument as a 'leftie' (or 'rightie', if you play 'leftie'...); that how it felt when you began, and shows that progress has, indeed, been made.

5 - A bit more difficult, but essential... Arm yourself with a big bucket of Patience; all players, at all levels, need this, and need to fill it up regularly. Learning is a Long Game, and never finished. Just when you think you know it all, you realise that you don't. This is Normal.

6 - Set yourself achievable goals (targets...). A song to learn, a technique to attempt, a genre to bring on board... Give yourself a decent time scale for it, and add it to your practice schedule. Go through the basics, go through your next lessons, then have a go towards this target. Every day in short sessions, going back now and again over older stuff. It'll work; we've all been there. 

 

Now for my tried and tested 'words of encouragement'...

 

'It's the first forty years that are the hardest, after which things sometimes tend to get slightly better.' 

[Bunny]

Thank you.

 

I started lessons just over a year ago and feel like I've just had to begin all over again. 

21 minutes ago, Dad3353 said:

Arm yourself with a big bucket of Patience

This is hard! I'm getting so frustrated with myself!

 

What would you see as an achievable goal for a beginner, and what sort of time scale to do it in? Please don't say wonderwall. Even with simple slow songs I can't keep up and it all sounds so fragmented and disjointed. I'm practicing little and often but I'm definitely loosing motivation again. 

 

I know the worst thing to do is compare yourself to others but every beginners guitar group on fb I see posts like 'oh I've been playing for 3 months now and here's a little song I've been practicing', and then they proceed to play the piece perfectly. I can't find any in person or online live practice groups for beginners that are completely shite like me, which is a shame as I think that would help me. 

 

21 minutes ago, Dad3353 said:

It's the first forty years that are the hardest, after which things sometimes tend to get slightly better.' 

Noooo I can't wait that long!! I just want to be good at something!  

[randythoades]

Everything that @Dad3353 says above. It happens to everyone, whatever their skill level.

Sometime, just taking a week off really helps. For some reason the brain digests everything when you aren't even playing and suddenly you make a jump forward without even realising it.

[randythoades]

The best advice I got was from a guitar teacher (not mine). He told me to join a band.

 

I said that I couldn't do that because I just couldn't play... He asked me to play for a few minutes and then asked why I was so frustrated. I said that I wanted to play like Clapton, Van Halen and Chuck Berry, but I just sounded like me. He agreed and pointed out that those players really only played in one style too (their own), and none of them could play like me either! I was about 18 months into playing at this point.

 

I gained confidence in that, whatever I can do I do in my own style, shaped through experience, bad habits, physical restrictions etc and I realised that I didn't need to play everything in every style. I just needed to play the stuff I wanted in the style I play, both good and bad. Some songs work for me and some don't.

 

In a band you pick up so much, you gain confidence and you push yourself to keep up with the best player there. You don't have to play live, it could just be a regular jam in someones living room.

 

Once you have gotten over that initial hurdle of being able to play the main open chords, some barre chords, some major and minor pentatonics then the rest is window dressing, you can play along with a small group. A large proportion of the pop, rock and blues from the last 70 years have featured pretty much this.

 

Some players never progress beyond that, some go on and on. As @Dad3353 says, pick a few songs that you like and play a simplified version of it (there are bound to be simple versions on YouTube), play for 15 mins at a time and then gradually add in bits as you learn them, it doesn't have to be note perfect, it is just an approximation.

I used to jam with a guy who could play any scale you wanted at 100 miles an hour top to bottom, but couldn't play Knocking on Heavens Door.

[Dad3353]

1 hour ago, Bunny said:

... I started lessons just over a year ago...

 

Lessons, eh..? With a decent tutor..? Do you still attend these lessons..? What did/does your tutor say about your progress..? What practice routine did he/she give you..? What medium (method book, song sheets, exercise sheets etc...) did you get for these lessons..?
One year is not a Long Time when learning stuff. Some folk pick things up easily, others plod along a bit longer. Your pace is your pace, there is no point in comparing with others in this respect. Persistence will overcome every obstacle, more especially when guided by a competent tutor. On one's own it's a great deal more of a rocky road (no pun intended...).

Oh, and did I mention Patience..? In some situations it pays to be stubborn; carry on, in the light of what your tutor tells you, and will some of the helpful hints here, and it'll work out just fine. As I wrote, we've all been there, and felt exactly the same, at times. 

Edited July 17 by Dad3353

[Bunny]

37 minutes ago, randythoades said:

The best advice I got was from a guitar teacher (not mine). He told me to join a band.

I'd have to have friends and the ability to socialise to do that also frustratingly I can't drive which limits my location options a bit. 

39 minutes ago, randythoades said:

In a band you pick up so much, you gain confidence and you push yourself to keep up with the best player there.

This is something that makes me want to find people I can play with, support, encouragement, and some accountability to keep practising when I want to give up. I think that is something that would really help me.

43 minutes ago, randythoades said:

gained confidence in that, whatever I can do I do in my own style, shaped through experience, bad habits, physical restrictions etc and I realised that I didn't need to play everything in every style. I just needed to play the stuff I wanted in the style I play, both good and bad. Some songs work for me and some don't.

This gives me pause for thought. I do have a few physical restrictions that I've taken into account, but keep thinking I might be able to overcome to a degree. I've never really thought about not trying to play in every style. I kinda felt that in order to be good and happy with what I can do, I'd have to be good at every style and know all techniques, etc and not just a few. 

 

 

 @Dad3353 I'm having weekly lessons and he is a good tutor, teaches in schools, which probably helps him deal with me as I have the intelligence of a small child. He has played professionally in the past. The last two lessons I've bought up that I'm getting worse and struggling more and he had noticed so we went through some different bands that I like to find songs that I may enjoy learning and I was given the tab for them to practice. I've also download yousician in the hope it will give me a bit more structure to my practice.

 

Thank you for the help and for taking the time to read through my post. I really do appreciate it.

[Dad3353]

4 minutes ago, Bunny said:

I'd have to have friends and the ability to socialise to do that also frustratingly I can't drive which limits my location options a bit. 

This is something that makes me want to find people I can play with, support, encouragement, and some accountability to keep practising when I want to give up. I think that is something that would really help me.

This gives me pause for thought. I do have a few physical restrictions that I've taken into account, but keep thinking I might be able to overcome to a degree. I've never really thought about not trying to play in every style. I kinda felt that in order to be good and happy with what I can do, I'd have to be good at every style and know all techniques, etc and not just a few. 

 

 

 @Dad3353 I'm having weekly lessons and he is a good tutor, teaches in schools, which probably helps him deal with me as I have the intelligence of a small child. He has played professionally in the past. The last two lessons I've bought up that I'm getting worse and struggling more and he had noticed so we went through some different bands that I like to find songs that I may enjoy learning and I was given the tab for them to practice. I've also download yousician in the hope it will give me a bit more structure to my practice.

 

Thank you for the help and for taking the time to read through my post. I really do appreciate it.

 

It sounds to me that you're in Good Hands with a suitable tutor, and that your own, personal, needs are being catered for. It's not a race, so 'softly, softly catchee monkey' applies here, as in other endeavours. Follow what he says, diligently, and you'll be as best as you can be, at every stage of your journey. Regular little and often practice of whatever he gives you will see you through. Keep us posted as to progress from time to time, please..? 

[randythoades]

Just stick with it, follow your tutor and keep at it.

I don't think many of us on here can claim to have 'done it all' on guitar, we all need help and we all have stuff we can't play. You generally only hear other people playing stuff they can actually play rather than the stuff they can't. You can already play a huge amount better than someone else just starting their journey and probably a huge amount better than some that have been playing for years.

 

I had a massive issue with Mr Brightside by the Killers. The band wanted to play it, but I just can't get it. I have tried. The melodic intro section that repeats through the song is just beyond me and my fingers. So I got them to slow it down and change the key by a semitone and we did it acoustically like a country song with open chords. They got to play it and I managed to change it sufficiently enough for me to play it. Crowd still liked it and sang along so everyone was happy.