Guitar playing and the stuff that comes with it like backing up your audiofiles, writing down your lyrics and music becomes even more enjoyable if you got the right tools for the job.

Or some nice blues backingtracks to improvise over. It makes practicing a hell of a lot more fun.

Let’s take a look at these guitar productivity tools:

- Blanksheetmusic.net Notation sheets for every instrument and vocals

- www.guitarvoice.com Awesome guitar backingtracks. Search by artist, random or genre.

- Crashplan.com Unlimited Online backup storage for all your precious audio files and everything else for only $3 a month

- Audio.online-convert.com Online audio/video/ebook converter

- Mflow is a really good sounding/looking Online Social Music Streaming Tool next to Spotify, Last.fm and Grooveshark

- Audio speed tempo pitch changer (reducing audiospeed while remaining pitch and vice versa)
for Windows: Windows Media Player 12
for Mac: Audiolobe

- Masterwriter.com Songwriter tool used by famous artists and producers including Rob Thomas and David Foster.

- The 150 Essential Chords Ebook I would be a fool not to recommend my own 150 Essential Chord Ebook. A good organized, categorized and easy to read chord book with a nice layout. Free to download.

- Reading sheet music:
A short version:www.musictheory.net
An extended version: www.readsheetmusic.info

- More Tools 21-must-have-online-musician-tools-for-guitar-players

If you know some cool guitar productivity tools, please share it in the comments.

I appreciate it.
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

Working on increasing your picking speed is not just for the hell fire speed guru wannabe’s.

Once your speed increases your whole style of playing loosens up. Your fingers will feel light and flexible and you’ll gain more freedom in your playing.

Your fingers will float easily across the strings without trying so hard. It’s an important skill to work on and to maintain.

Increasing your picking speed comes with obstacles, victories, ups and downs, lots of patience and hard work. It’s all about practicing and equally important “the right way of practicing”. Just practicing a lot of hours doesn’t necessarily increase your picking speed if you don’t do it the right way.

Every individual has it’s own specific hurdles to overcome, but if you focus on these tips you are already off to a great start.

You can do it too!

1 – Practice slow
Most people know this already but don’t have the patience to go slow. Everyone wants to go fast now not later. But in order to go fast we got to slow down first!

Do not ignore this rule or you will become a sloppy guitar player.

Start out slow and gradually build up your speed. Make sure you play with proper hand position and good posture. Don’t go any faster until you can play each note Clear, Correctly and Comfortably.

2 – Use alternate picking
The most used picking technique to increase speed is the alternate picking technique.

There are other picking techniques as well like economy/sweep picking but alternate picking is the most common one and it creates a certain sound that is different from other techniques.

Alternate picking means you hold the pick between your thumb and index finger with the pointed end facing toward the strings. You strictly use alternating down and up strokes. The first note you play is downstroke, the second an upstroke, the third one a downstroke, the fourth one an upstroke and so on.

3 – Use a metronome
To learn to play accurate and get your speed up to a high level you need to learn to play with a metronome. You can get a metronome at your local guitar store, download a metronome app for your Iphone/Ipad or you can find one online.

Here are some neat and functional metronomes on the web:

Metronomeonline

Bestmetronome

Gieson

4 – Avoid tension
When you try to play faster your fingers probably get more tense. Tension reduces speed so try to loosen up while your playing. Relax those muscles a bit. Be constantly aware of this while you build up your speed. Also avoid any tension in other parts of the body like your wrists, arms, hands, shoulders and back. They all have an effect on your playing.

5 – Practice fast
Once you’re able play slow clear, correctly and comfortably you can try to play faster. Sometimes even a little faster than you think you can handle.

You can compare it to weight lifting. Sometimes you want to try to lift some heavier weights, a bit heavier than you’re used to just to try to exceed your limits. Then you’ll take a short rest and turn to some lighter weights. You’ll notice the lighter weights have becomes easier to handle than before.

The same thing works for practicing speed. Sometimes you need to turn up the BPM (beats per minute) on your metronome and go a little faster than you’re used to in order to exceed your limits.

Note: You still need to practice slow, because practicing slow makes you learn to play clear and accurate. Practicing fast is to build speed.

6 – Analyze your playing
Analyze your playing every single workout. Take notes from your observations. Study your left and right hand. Where do you come short? What and why doesn’t work the way you want it? Be creative, think and come up with exercises or solutions to make it work.

For example: If your ring finger and pinky are to weak to speed up, then create an exercise for just those two fingers to get them in shape.

7 – Video yourself
Another great way to see what you are actually doing (analyze) and how you’re doing (progress) is to video yourself each workout or once a week (if you’re busy). You can really take a close look at your hand position and posture. You’ll see things you probably won’t notice otherwise.

It’s also a neat way to see how far you’ve come and see the difference in your technique and speed over time.

8 – Practice regularly
Increasing speed is not an overnight thing. To play really fast can take months even years of practicing, but if you work on increasing speed you will get results quite fast and within a couple of weeks or months you’ll become much faster and flexible than you’ve every played before which is also great benefit because it will have a huge effect on your overall playing.

So…..
Practice regularly better yet practice daily for a half an hour to an hour to get virtuoso results.
If you don’t have this much time then 15 minutes of daily speed practice will get you great results as well.

Again it’s not just how much you practice but also how you practice. Keep that in mind. But anyway regular practice is a must.

9 – Exercises
Here are some great exercises to build up your speed:

21 Cool 3 Notes-Per-String Exercises to Rock On!

12 Cool 3 Notes-Per-String Exercises to Rock On! Part II

22 2-String Alternate Speed Picking Exercises

Why Guitar Players Need to Be Fit (See the below section of this post)

Now practice and amaze yourself!

If you think this post is going to make you play faster stumble it so everyone can benefit.

Do you know more ways to increase your speed?
Please share it in the comments.

I appreciate it.
Thanks, Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

You might doubt if your ever gonna learn a particular piece as well as you would like to. You may feel hopeless about your technique or you might be disappointed about your overall results.

I had many doubts, I guess I was as much insecure about my playing as I was confident.

One way I overcame most of these insecurities is when I started reading and learning about how the mind works. The wisdom obtained from Zen and Taoism can make a huge difference in your playing. The other way to find solid self asteem has to do with how you practice.

Let ‘s take a look at the keys to becoming a true confident guitar player:

As you are so is the world ~ Ramana Maharshi

What does this quote teach you about guitar playing?

Well let’s first explain what it means:

If you are positive minded, the world will come across as positive too. In reality the world is just the world. It’s neither positive nor negative, there are neither good nor bad days and to put it into guitar terms, there are neither great practice sessions nor lousy ones.

The world and thus your guitar playing is just how you perceive it. If you feel like your guitar playing isn’t working, it’s because you think it isn’t working.

Practicing is progress. Sometimes it feels like you are doing great and sometimes it feels like it ain’t going nowhere. It’s part of the process of getting better. One step forward and two steps back, two step forward and one step back. Accept it like it is. If you’re not experiencing any struggle you’re probably not doing the hard and challenging work.

So again, there is no use in feeling disappointed. Just keep an open, positive and focused mind at all times. That’s how you make progress. And you definitely will.

The guitar habit

Creating and maintaining a good guitar habit is all about keeping yourself motivated.

The most important rule about motivation is being passioned and passion will stay with you as long as you make progress and the only way to make progress is to practice on a regularly weekly basis. Better yet on a daily basis.

The more consistent you practice, the more progress you’ll make and the more excited you will get. It’s as simple as that.

Try to practice 30 to 45 minutes a day or 45 minutes every other day without exceptions.

If you can keep up your regular practice schedule for 30 days it has become a habit and there’s a good chance it will stick with you.

Congratulations! You’re on the road for good things to come.

Now there are also secondary ways to keep you motivated like:

- What to practice.
Practice songs or a style that makes you eager for more. What style of music do you like? Jazz, blues or classical?

- Where to practice
You’re practice environment is of great importance to your motivation. Create an inspiring practice space where you would love to hang out.

- Who or what inspires you.
Study and learn from your favorite artists, guitar players and guitar teachers. Read inspiring blogs and magazines. Watch DVD’s and go to concerts.

- What get’s you high.
Find that thing that get’s you turned on. Do you love playing in a band, perform or jam with other guitar players?

How to practice
Write down on a worksheet what you are going to practice and stick with it. When you practice you focus on practicing and no you don’t go to the toilet, you don’t have conversations, you don’t surf on the net or play something that is not on your worksheet.

You practice and practice only. Try to stay relaxed and focused, analyze, slow down, speed up, think creative, experiment, work hard, be persistent and keep up your good spirit at any time.

There is a lot to practice depending on what your goals are. There are chords, scales, solo and solo techniques, picking and fingerpicking techniques, strumming patterns and then there is music theory, ear training, songwriting, etc. Don’t let it all overwhelm you. Just enjoy your musical path as it comes to you and where it will lead you.

There a lot of musicians out there who have limited knowledge of music but still make great music. However anything you will learn will contribute to your skills, make you a better musician and expand your ideas and guitar vocabulary.

Practice what your teacher encourages you and besides that learn one song, solo or one other thing that really really excites you and practice it on a regular basis until you master it inside out. Make it yours!

If you run into any problems or get stuck somewhere then ask your teacher for advice and continue perfecting your song or what else you’re working on.

Fail it until you nail it!

If you’re confident enough to play it in front of an audience (don’t matter how big or small) you can continue to work on your next musical piece or project.

This way you’ll gain courage and faith every step of the way.

As your favorite repertoire expands keep rehearsing and repeating your material on a regular basis to maintain and grow your confidence.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. ~ Lao Tzu

Share the knowledge and stumble this post.

You have my gratitude.
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

Sure there are a lot of songs you can mention but there are always certain songs that stand out from the rest and which most guitar players want to know how to play when they start out.

I still know how great it felt and what a victory it was when I could play “Sweet child o’ mine” and “More than words” for the first time. The golden days of learning your classics you will never forget.

To give you an idea of what guitar songs have really made a name for itself I put together a list with 20 guitar classics with help and many thanks of guitar players on twitter and in real life.

I appreciate every song you want to add to this list. I know the list is far from complete and not each and every song may suit your taste, but it’s here to give you some inspiration. You might want to learn to play some great classics that have made musical history.

Here they are:

1 Hotel California – The Eagles

2 Nothing else matters – Metallica

3 More than words – Extreme

4 Wonderwall – Oasis

5 Stairway to heaven – Led Zeppelin

6 Sweet child o’ mine – Guns ‘n roses

7 Knocking on heavens door – Bob Dylan

8 Sweet home alabama – Lynyrd Skynyrd

9 Wish you were here – Pink Floyd

10 Blackbird – The Beatles

11 Smoke on the water – Deep Purple

12 Under the bridge – Red hot chili peppers

13 Dust in the wind – Kansas

14 Heart of gold – Neil Young

15 Sunshine of your love – Cream

16 Autumn leaves – Joseph Kosma

17 Girl from Ipanema – Antonio Carlos Jobim

18 Smells like teen spirit – Nirvana

19 Give a little bit – Supertramp

20 Tears in heaven – Eric Clapton

Here is one song I really love. It’s not necessarily a guitar classic, but just a beautiful song I often play. Orginally written by the Bee Gees, but this version by Ray La Montagne and Damien Rice makes me fall in love with it over and over again.

1 To love somebody – Ray La Montagne & Damien Rice

What is your favorite guitar classic?
Let me know.

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

Of course we all know how to feel good, but sometimes you just need some reminders or fresh ideas and go like.. Oh yeah!

So let’s get out of that chair and start feeling good today. Let’s make some positive changes that will make this day a great one.

In my daily life feeling good is my number one priority.

I wanna feel good as much as possible. It makes me get things done.

Getting things done will in return make me feel good. It reinforces creativity, inspiration and boosts my musical productivity.

I really get into the flow of things like writing songs and improving my guitar playing.

Life is too short to get in or stay in a slump. If you don’t like things fix it or change it.

Never forget to take care of yourself. If you are not happy you can’t make others happy.

So do everyone a favor and start feeling good today.

Think positive thoughts and you’ll attract more positive things.

Like buddha said: “All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.”

Let’s get you started:

1 – Put on feel good music and start doing something.

2 – Go for a run, jump on your bike or work out. It’ll change your day!

3 – Make yourself a hot cappuccino and play one of your favorite songs you haven’t played in a while.

4 – Stop thinking in terms of limitations and start thinking in terms of possibilities. No but’s anymore.

5 – Replace any negative thought for a positive one.

6 – Step out of it. Go outside, walk and enjoy your surroundings. Enjoy the little things.

7 – Life is too short for worrying. Lighten up. Stop make things complicated. Simplify everything you do!

8 – Write down a musical goal you want to achieve and take the first small step today.

9 – Live in the now. This is today, no yesterday and no tomorrow.

10 – Pick up the phone and call some fellow musicians to jam with. No rules, no expectations, just fun.

11 – Put up a picture on your wall of a feel good place, a good memory or an artist that really inspires you.

12 – Practice the song you always wanted to learn and take small steps. Be happy with your effort.

13 – Read an (auto) biography of your favorite artist / band or go see live musicians on stage.

14 – Let go of feelings of boredom or tiredness. Change what you are doing now. Do something totally different.

15 – Learn something new today. Get into music theory, ear training, (Note: I am not being paid to endorse this software in any way) a new technique or go to a workshop.

16 – Live your own musical life. Make your own choices. Don’t try to live anyone else’s. Be unique. If everyone goes in the same direction, go the opposite way.

18 – Let go of control. Stop being a perfectionist. Aim for completion instead of perfection.

19 – Practice! You’ll feel the pay off afterwards.

20 – If what you’re doing ain’t working, change your routine. It’s okay to change your mind or make mistakes. Try new ways.

Live life and dare to explore!

“When it comes to luck, you make your own.” ~ Bruce Springsteen

Please let your fellow musicians feel good as well and share it on Stumbleupon. I appreciate it.

Cheers!
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

It consists of some important elements.

Of course like a lot of guitar players I also started out practicing songs, riffs and licks of my favorite guitar heros, it’s why I started learning guitar in the first place.

But to let your skills and creativity reach it’s full potential there is a lot more to learn.

It doesn’t matter whether you play rock, country, jazz, blues or classical guitar, practicing all the aspects below on a regular basis will motivate you and make you grow into a good skilled guitar player.

Be sure the include every aspect into your overall workout. You don’t necessarily need to put everything in one workout, but spread out over a day or week.

You’ll benefit for the rest of your guitar playing life!

1 – Warm up
Always start practicing some scales, rhythm or exercises for a good blood flow and circulation to get your hands warmed up. Warm up for 5 or 10 minutes.

Warming up prevents your arms and hands from injuries. It releases the tension in your finger muscles that will make your guitar playing run more smoothly. A good way to start.

2 – Repertoire
Build a repertoire depending on your goal and taste to perform before a live audience. Write down the songs on a piece of paper and start practicing and learning your repertoire by heart.

Each practice sessions mark the songs you’ve mastered and which you still need to work on. Make sure the repertoire you want to perform is within your capacity so you feel confident enough when it’s time to really hit the stage.

Tip: Building, practicing and memorizing a repertoire makes you feel confident as a musician.

3 – Chords & Chord progressions
Learn new chords and apply them to chord progressions and your favorite songs. New fresh sounding chords will bring your music more flavor. It will spice things up and make your guitar playing more interesting.

Tip: Speak new chords out loud while you play them through the chord progression, it’s the best way to memorize them.

4 – Building vocabulary
Part of each practice session needs to be focused on building a vocabulary of scales, scale patterns,
arpeggios, triads, intervals and licks.

Building an extended vocabulary is important because it allows you to express yourself freely on the guitar. The bigger your vocabulary, the more creative ideas come to mind.

5 – Applying vocabulary
Apply your vocabulary by improvising over a backing track or ask a fellow musician to accompany.

Applying your vocabulary is as important as building a vocabulary. One is of no use without the other.

Learn how to play melodies out of scales, intervals, triads, etc. Creating melody on the spot is the hard part and takes a lot of effort, but work hard on it and you’ll get there.

Start small. Try to create melody out of 2, 3 or 4 notes, use phrasing and pauses in between. Try to avoid sounding like your playing scales.

Tip: Work on melody, timing, feel, dynamics, articulation and diversity.

6 – Music Theory
Make sure studying music theory is part of your guitar education. Learn to understand the theory behind scales, intervals, chord structure, cycle of 4ths and 5ths, etc.

A good knowledge of music theory makes you a better skilled and more confident guitar player.

Note: Music theory can be put into practice! It will open many doors to improve your playing.

7 – Ear Training
Learn to sing and recognize scales (major, minor, harmonic minor, pentatonic, blues, etc.), arpeggios, intervals, etc.

You can use ear training software to develop your aural skills. (Note: I am not being paid to endorse this software in any way)

Practice transcribing songs. Train your ears to recognize chords, rhythm, notes, guitar techniques (hammer ons, pull offs, slides, etc.) and then translate it to the guitar.

8 – Fun
The number one most important thing is to make your practice workout as enjoyable as possible.
If practicing is fun and motivating you want to do it all the time and there is no need to discipline yourself.

Here are some ways to motivate your playing:

~ Practice songs you love.
~ Search for ways to make things fun if you find difficulties or boring aspects in your practice.
~ Apply every thing you’ve learned to your favorite songs, solos, rhythms, etc. Applying makes it fun.
~ Use good materials: A good sounding guitar, a tuner, a capo, picks, a comfortable chair.
~ Wear comfortable clothes.
~ Practice in a private, quiet room with fresh air and good lightning.
~ Make your practice space inspiring. Put up posters, pictures or quotes of your favorite guitar players.
~ Adopt and maintain a positive attitude while practicing or thinking about practicing.
~ Think about what makes you want to practice and incorporate in into your workout.
~ Pour yourself a cappuccino, some hot tea or a nice smoothie.
~ Think about your dream goal.

When people are learning instruments, they should be encouraged and advised: if they say they don’t enjoy their practice, I always say, well, FIND a way to enjoy it.” ~ John Williams

If you liked the post please share it on Stumbleupon. I appreciate it.

Thanks,
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

I also evaluate what I have accomplished, experienced or how much I have grown.

I can look back with awesomeness.

In May my son Vince was born (he is really into guitars already), I spend more time practicing guitar and learned a lot of new stuff, Guitarhabits has grown rapidly and I really love the feedback I got from everybody, I started a new blog about simplicity, reduced and downsized a lot of my stuff, I have become an early riser (I wake up at 5 am) and enjoy teaching guitar as a profession at home.

This year I want to spent less time on the internet, simplify more and worry less about achieving goals.

I want to focus mainly on teaching and practicing guitar, Guitarhabits, meditation, running/walking and spending time with my family.

For those who are new to the blog I hear you, what’s up with all that simplifying stuff Klaus?

Well here’s how you can make great use of this simplifying stuff and stick to your new years guitar resolutions:

Downsize your goals
Choose as few goals as possible. For some people it’s the hardest thing to do. If you have too many goals you will lose focus and it will be at the expense of your most important goal. Concentrate on the most important one. Downsizing your goals makes life easier, more productive and more fun.

Reduce your stuff
Getting rid of stuff makes you realize what is truly important, it will save you time in maintenance, repairs, moving it around and being distracted by it.
Reduce your stuff, use what is really important and make the most of it.

Eliminate and clear distractions
Limit the constant supply and access to digital data. Reduce the time you spent looking at a screen. Make less use of Twitter, Facebook and surfing around the net. Notice how much it occupies your precious time.

Eliminate emails by unsubscribing to advertisement, use spamfilters, respond with shorter emails or try not to respond at all. Clear every possible distraction that keeps you from
realizing your dream goal or following your true passion. Turn of the TV, your Ipad, Iphone or Iwhatever.

Focus on learning and creating.

Keep simplifying
Simplifying is an ongoing process. With every step you take to simplify you’ll reap the benefits and you will experience how it will enhance your life.

Keep thinking about how you can simplify more. More simplifying means more time to play guitar and listening to music.

Thanks and cheers to a new year!
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

Everybody wants to hear a good old fashioned christmas tune during the holiday season.

So to entertain your family and friends or impress your audience you got to prepare, study hard and learn from the best.

Besides that, you might want to listen to some decent christmas music yourself from time to time.

We all know the famous christmas songs we hear everyday on the radio, but guitar players need quality input to improve, to be fueled, to be inspired, to fall in love with and stay ambitious.

Listening to christmas guitar albums makes you understand how melodies and rhythm work in different ways.

It shows you how every guitar player has his own unique way of phrasing.

There is so much to learn from just by listening to records.

Listen to the records and hear how guitar players make use of scales, patterns, triads, arpeggios, intervals in the most creative ways.

Listen to the feel, dynamics, timing, tempo, techniques like hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, tapping, etc.

When you’ve listened close enough to the lead guitar and rhythm guitar parts start listening to the bass guitar, the piano, the drums and other instruments.

Concentrate your ears on one instrument at a time throughout the whole song. You will learn to start listening differently with your musical ear.

It’s important for a guitar player to listen to every instrument on the track and how it relates to the guitar.

Be inspired by all those different sounds and colors. Absorb everything, be influenced and reflect it on your own playing.

Here are 4 Brilliant Christmas Guitar Albums worth listening, enjoying and studying:

Merry Christmas to all!

1 Six-String Santa – Joe Pass

Listen to samples on Amazon

2 Merry Axemas Part I

Listen to samples on Amazon

3 Winter Nights – Al Di Meola

Listen on Spotify

4 The Christmas Guitar - John David

Listen to samples on Amazon

Note: I am not an Amazon associate, so I don’t receive any money from affiliates. I am not trying to sell you these albums, I want you to be inspired.

I appreciate your comments. Let me know your favorite christmas guitar album.

Thanks,
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

It somehow explains the essence of what the person is trying to bring across.

I love quotes from great blues, rock, jazz and classical guitar players or quotes from wise people like Lao Tzu or Buddha.

It makes me want to learn more and realize what is important and what not.

I hope these quotes contribute to your inner motivation and inspire you to study, practice, create, enjoy and achieve something amazing!

Listen and learn from the greatest:

1 – “I dedicated all the time I had to it. The 10 hour workout was just what I put in the magazine at the time, but for me it was every waking moment.” ~ Steve Vai‎

2 – “A lot of people think that if they learn to read music they are gonna lose their feel or their groove or something. It’s the stupidest thing I have ever heard.” ~ Frank Gambale

3 – “I started out playing guitar because Jimi Hendrix was my hero, so my roots were really based on Jimi Hendrix and his style of playing.” ~ Joe Satriani

4 – “I practiced two or three hours, sometimes none, sometimes six. It was very varied.” ~ Julian Bream

5 – “The beautiful thing about learning is nobody can take it away from you.” – B.B. King

6 – ‎”Listening is the key to everything good in music.” – Pat Metheny

7 – “For me, the ultimate form of expression is blues, where jazz appeals to me on an intellectual level.” – Scott Henderson

8 – “If you play music for no other reason than actually just because you love it, the skills just kinda creep up on you.” ~ Nuno Bettencourt.

9 – “You can’t think and play. If you think about what you’re playing the playing becomes stilted. You have to just focus on the music I feel, concenctrate on the music, focus on what you’re playing and let the playing come out. Once you start thinking about doing this or doing that, it’s not good. What you are doing is like a language.

You have a whole collection of musical ideas and thoughts that you’ve accumulated through your musical history plus all the musical history of the whole world and it’s all in your subconscious and you draw upon it when you play” ~ Joe Pass

10 – “you’re always learning about this thing everytime you pick it up” ~ Keith Richards

11 – “When I look for what I’m going to listen to I go backwards. I’m always going the other way you see. Most people are trying to figure out ‘how do I get in the fast lane going that way?’. I’m going in the other direction. I wanna find the oldest thing to do.” ~ Eric Clapton

12 – “I do a lot of the stuff that I started out doing that I think any guitar player that’s concerned about the craft needs to do. It’s basic practicing of the basic elements.

I try to practice like a well rounded regiment of things where I can kind of do whatever I wanna do and I also have to practice the actual songs to keep that under my fingers as well.” ~ John Petrucci

13 – “I came from the last couple of years in a generation where we didn’t have a computer around so we didn’t waste as much time on the internet as we do now so I had large chuncks of time which to devote to doing something.” ~ John Mayer

14 – “Forget about every other lesson in the book. You have to be able to tap your foot or else none of what you doing you are not gonna have any control of your symptom.” ~ Al Di Meola

15 – “Every July, August and part of September I escape of the guitar, I escape of Paco de Lucia and I go to Mexico to the Carrabian. I have a little house there where I spend two months listening to music, no playing because I don’t bring the guitar with me, fishing and cooking my fish and charging the batteries for new concerts.” ~ Paco De Lucia

16 – “I had struggled with alternate picking for a very long time. I never thought I could do it.” ~ Paul Gilbert

17 – “I find that musically, looking back, I have learned much more from those relationships, people I have bumped into that I have admired, that’s the way I feel musically I have learned most in life.” ~ John Williams

18 – “I just play, just you know, If i just sit down with the guitar and just do whatever for, you know, an half an hour or an hour whatever. That’s pretty much, that should do it for me.” ~ Slash

19 – “I want to figure out how I can make the most important statement with the least amount of information, so I don’t run out of ideas by the time I get to my second or third chorus.” ~ Larry Carlton

Let me know what your favorite quote is in the comments.

Thanks for taking the time!
Klaus

Click here to download your free copy of "The 150 Esstential Chords" Ebook

In the past I have done some things using discipline in order to accomplish a goal, but it never brought me what I wanted or what I expected. Later I realized why discipline didn’t work out for me.

Discipline is forcing yourself to do something you really don’t want to do in order to achieve a goal you think you do want. Doesn’t that sound strange to you? Well I’ve learned my lessons.

As a chinese proverb says: “The journey is the reward”. What it means is that you have to enjoy what you do all the way or make sure you enjoy it and forget about the destination or success what so ever.

Everything is about the journey, about what you are doing right now. Make sure you love what you do. It’s the number one rule to guitarist productivity and everything else in life.

Let’s get into it:

Passion equals motivation
What is your favorite part of being a musician? Are you crazy about the blues? Do you love writing songs? Lies your strength in playing metal riffs? Are you obsessed with jazz improvisation? Do you just simply want to learn how play and sing cool songs?

Find out what your true passion is. Think about what part of guitar playing makes you want to pick up that guitar and do what you need to do. When you are driven by passion you don’t have to motivate or discipline yourself. Your passion is the motivation.

Setting a goal
Choose a goal you want a achieve (learning a new song, writing a song, making a cd, learning to play the blues or jazz, performing on stage, making a living of music) so you have something nice to look forward to, but make sure you are driven by passion and fun.

Everyone is motivated the first day they set a new goal, but motivation quickly runs out after a few days if the goal is not really driven by passion or fun. Create a circumstance and environment where you enjoy what you do every second of the way.

I’m not a big fan of setting a tight deadline because it puts the pressure on and it keeps me from living in the now and enjoying what I do in the very moment. You can strive for a certain day or month to finish your project or to achieve a goal but don’t get hung up on it too much. Just enjoy what your doing, take it step by step and the project will finish itself.

Productivity time
As you get older your personal time becomes more precious because of your daily responsibilities, running errands, doing chores, obligations, etc. If you really want create some valuable time for yourself then waking up earlier is a great tool.

Waking up early gives you undistracted time to focus on your passion and goal. It gives you an amazing head-start on the day and provides you with a great feeling of satisfaction.

Waking up early is a perfect time for solitude and pure productivity. Try it!

Focus
Choose as few goals as possible but focus on only one goal at a time. If you have too many goals you will end up achieving just a little bit of everything instead of something really great.

The best is to make a priority of your biggest goal and focus on that. Clear all distractions while you are working on your goal. Avoid being distracted by people (create solitude), stay away from Facebook and Twitter, turn of your mobile devices and follow your passion with undivided attention.

The perfect moment
Do what you want or need to do, but get to the point. Do the right things and do them now! Don’t wait until you bought better equipment or mastered a certain skill. The time is now.

If you want to write a song, write it now. If you want to start a band, start it now. If you want to make a cd, start recording now. There is no such things as a perfect moment to achieve your goal.

Do it now and correct mistakes along the way!

Sharing this post or leaving a comment is appreciated of course.

Thanks,
Klaus

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