I have spent the last couple of days really concentrating on making my guitar chords ring true. Really paying attention to where my fingers go every time. Paying very close attention to the thumb and palm positions on my fretting hand. Trying to make sure that the guitar is always facing straight up and down, and not cheated up toward me so that I can look at my right hand.
It’s hard to not look at the fretboard, but it is the only way to fix my hand and posture problems. Life is really nothing but a bunch of small tedious problems that cause big failures, isn’t it? Fortunately, they are the things that are easy, if annoying to fix.
I rewatched some lessons on Justin Guitar and the Justin Guitar Beginner Lessons app, and I realized that there were some subtle things that I had missed the first time around. Justin is a great teacher, and upon rewatching I saw that he warned me of all of the various mistakes I ended up making.
<Shrug>
I am smooooothly switching between chords when I make changes. Not trying to go fast, but making sure that every note sounds right, that no strings are dead. This has temporarily slowed me down, but I am organically fixing some of the bad habits that I was starting to pick up. I think those encroaching bad habits were leading to my practice malaise and also some of the hand pain.
It’s only a couple of days, so I’m not ready to declare victory, but I do feel back in the groove. Which is a victory of sorts, right?
A small request:
I am always grateful to receive emails and advice from y’all. You’re my team. That said, if something costs over $10US, please don’t suggest it to me as a resource or tool. Unless you are going to foot the bill.
I’m serious.
If you are not offering to pay for it, it is beyond my means, and not actually helpful to me. Please do not even mention it.
My budget for this blog (and my life in general) is incredibly low. Expensive (to me) solutions just remind me of how much money I do not have, and add unnecessarily to my stress and anxiety—honestly it demotivates me. $100US may as well be ten thousand when you are broke like I am.
I am not upset with anyone, but I do feel this needed airing. Believe me, if I could throw money at my problems until they are solved, I certainly would.
Yer broke pal,
Jeremy
As always, thank you for reading. Please sign up for my email list if you have not already.
Please feel free to drop me a line at: jeremydnichols@gmail.com
Follow me on Twitter: @jeremydnichols
Follow me on Instagram: @germynickels