Have you hit a plateau?
Posted: Thu Oct 07, 2010 6:25 pmI was writing an email to a friend of mine, and realized that what I was writing applied other folks as well, so I'm sharing it here:
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I stopped playing guitar for 10 years, because I got burned out . . .
I got back into playing about 6 years back, and bought a new guitar. But the new guitar only played the SAME SONGS as the old one!
Sheesh!
When I started writing my own music, everything was new and fresh - that's what it's all about, eh?
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Your practicing of songs enables you to play the songs you know.
Sounds redundant, sure - but the very nature of practice tends to saturate us with any given song; and we get too much of a good thing.
And we can get bored when the magic is gone . . .
A lot of folks stop playing guitar at that stage - they call it a plateau. It happened to me, too.
However - at that stage, you have already learned the basics, and all the playing tools needed to learn new songs.
So, what happens at this stage is that any new song we learn takes less practice.
And the song stays fresher, longer.
And we recover the magic, one song at a time . . .
.
If we are to enjoy playing, it is important to learn enough songs so we can always be able to play something that hasn't been played to death.
As we get older & more experienced, we learn songs faster.
And so we can learn more songs in any given period.
What's neat is when a song that always seemed too hard to even attempt - suddenly becomes simple . . .
.
Also, what is neat, for me, is when I am just practicing certain hard chord changes and techniques, and suddenly I realize that I am actually playing a brand-new song, by accident.
That's what comes next . . .
.
Plateaus are GOOD. You just have to know what to do when you get there.
Each plateau is like a step on a staircase - you just need to take the next step . . .
.
I stopped playing guitar for 10 years, because I got burned out . . .
I got back into playing about 6 years back, and bought a new guitar. But the new guitar only played the SAME SONGS as the old one!
Sheesh!
When I started writing my own music, everything was new and fresh - that's what it's all about, eh?
.
Your practicing of songs enables you to play the songs you know.
Sounds redundant, sure - but the very nature of practice tends to saturate us with any given song; and we get too much of a good thing.
And we can get bored when the magic is gone . . .
A lot of folks stop playing guitar at that stage - they call it a plateau. It happened to me, too.
However - at that stage, you have already learned the basics, and all the playing tools needed to learn new songs.
So, what happens at this stage is that any new song we learn takes less practice.
And the song stays fresher, longer.
And we recover the magic, one song at a time . . .
.
If we are to enjoy playing, it is important to learn enough songs so we can always be able to play something that hasn't been played to death.
As we get older & more experienced, we learn songs faster.
And so we can learn more songs in any given period.
What's neat is when a song that always seemed too hard to even attempt - suddenly becomes simple . . .
.
Also, what is neat, for me, is when I am just practicing certain hard chord changes and techniques, and suddenly I realize that I am actually playing a brand-new song, by accident.
That's what comes next . . .
.
Plateaus are GOOD. You just have to know what to do when you get there.
Each plateau is like a step on a staircase - you just need to take the next step . . .
