Go Tie Those Shoes
Here’s a tip for the beginning guitar player, the one who is starting to get discouraged, the one who might give up. Go grab a pair of shoes and put them on your feet. Tie those shoelaces, and really think about how you do it. Then come back and read the rest of this blog.
********
OK, your back! Boy, remember how hard it was to learn to tie your shoes when you were little? Remember the pride you experienced after finally tying those sneakers on your own?
Actually, no. I don’t remember either. I’ve forgotten what that felt like too. We take it for granted. We tie our shoes everyday without anxiety, without frustration, without thinking about it…
Van Halen Nike shoes, awesome.
I want to remind all of you beginning guitar players that learning to play guitar can (and will) become the same! If you keep at it, you will one day forget how hard it was to learn, like tying your shoes. The problem is the learning curve to guitar mastery is higher. Guitar playing requires a physicality and mental prowess, and these two things need to work together.
The physical part? Your fingers’ muscles need to get stronger. Your fingertips need to develop callous. Your two arms and your two hands need to develop the fluid motions of working together. The mental part? You need to learn chords and scales. You need to learn how to read at sheet music and tabs. You have to learn a new vocabulary, the vocabulary of music theory.
Then you need to put those two things together, and stop thinking about it all when you play! If it was easy, everyone would do it. But it’s not easy. None of this is automatic at first. Your brain needs to tackle these concepts, and it will.
Just remember this the next time you tie your shoes, that strumming the three chords of “Sweet Home Alabama,” playing the opening riff to “Purple Haze,” or soloing a pentatonic over “Layla” will one day be automatic.
Tying our shoes is our daily reminder that what is hard now will be easy after practice.
