I see it all the time. Students come in, and I can tell if they are either struggling with the material or just did not practice much. All it takes then is a quick question to figure out which it is. I know practicing can be boring and monotonous a lot of times depending on what you are working on. Unfortunately for those bored with practice, the old adage holds true that “practice makes perfect.” In the book “Outliers,” by Malcolm Gladwell, it is claimed that the secret to a higher level of proficiency, or “success,” is a simple equation of repeating a certain task for about 10,000 hours. Now, if that number makes your jaw drop, consider the fact that Steve Vai talks repeatedly about his 10+ hours a day he would spend practicing. If a person could dedicate just ten hours a day every day for a year that would amount to 3,650 hours. So in less than three years, a person investing that much time would achieve the 10,000-hour mark. Of course, you still have to practice in a way that is actually productive rather than goofing around in front of the television for ten hours a day.
Organize Your Practice Routine
You gain several benefits by organizing your routine. First, you are able to keep yourself focused on actual practice due to cutting down time wasted trying to figure out what to practice. Secondly, organizing your practice allows you to arrange your routine more efficiently. You can arrange exercises that are easier to play at the beginning to allow time to warm up to more difficult work. Referring to Steve Vai once again, I read an article where he broke down his current ten hour routine to 1-hour segments. Each segment was designated for focusing on specific exercises. For example, he had an hour dedicated to scale exercises, one dedicated to chords, and another dedicated to sight-reading. To make sure he always had something to work on in each of these areas, he used a filing technique I’ve read of many guitarists using.
The idea is that you define what subjects you wish to group materials into. You might have Techniques as a group for anything to do with exercises focusing on playing techniques. You may have a group called Songwriting filled with information for improving your own songwriting. It doesn’t matter what the groups are. That is up to you. Once you define the groups, you need to create a folder for each group. Despite the Internet being so prevalent in obtaining information nowadays, you will want to have physical folders as well as some folders on your computer. If you do not have computer access in your practice space, then do not worry about the latter. Now, you simply go out there and grab articles, lessons, tips, etc…. If you buy one of the guitar-oriented magazines with lesson articles in it, then tear the good ones out and file them in your new folders. If you find something online, then either save it on the computer in the folders you created, or print it out for your physical folders.
What will happen is you will eventually gather a significant collection of lesson articles and such. Then when it is time to practice Scales, if you do not already have a specific scale you know to work on then you just reach for the Scales folder and pull out an article. You do this every practice routine. Always something new unless you know you need to work on something specific. Then once you feel you have confidently mastered the contents of an article, you toss it out. This gives you new material to study all the time so you should not get bored, and ensures you expand your horizons.
Learn Something New
As mentioned with the folder system, you need to get something new on a regular basis. Otherwise you memorize all your exercises and monotony sets in. Try to include at least one section of your routine designated for learning something new and random. You may already be working on sweep picking exercises, but you can still go on Youtube and find a video demonstrating a lick that you have not been working on. Or you might just decide to go and pick a music video so you can try learning the song by ear. It doesn’t matter what you do as long as you do something new. This helps in keeping things fresh so you don’t get bored out of your mind practicing the same things over and over in order to perfect them.
Put Your Training To Use Young Padawan!
Sorry, but I had to get in the one Star Wars reference since if you are reading this, then you are most assuredly working towards becoming a guitar “jedi” so to speak. One thing that a padawan did on the way to becoming a jedi was to get actual field experience. So we should be doing the same thing. After all, what good does it do you to be able to play a scale extremely well if you never actually use it in a performance setting. In the end, what matters is not the technique itself, but the application of the technique.
Now this doesn’t mean you have to join or start a band. You do not have to put yourself in front of an audience just yet to use what you are learning. The simplest approach would be to jam over a song or jam track. You can find free jam tracks to use at GuitarJamTracks.com for starters. Take some time each day to use what you are learning in a performance-like setting.
Be Creative!
Beyond just using what you learn in an improvised creative way, you can also create your own exercises. After all, your needs as a musician are unique to you. Take time to notice anything with your playing that you feel could be better. If you have trouble with a certain technique and none of the exercises you have saved for it are helping, then try coming up with your own. This will not only exercise your hands but your mind as well. It will make you more closely examine what you are doing, and of course keeping your mind busy will make practice less boring!
In Closing…
Not all of these methods may work for you. In fact, there is a chance that none will fit your practice style or the way you think. Everyone is different. The best thing to do is to take one suggestion and try it for a while. By “a while,” I do not mean 30 minutes. Try a new approach for a few days or even weeks to make sure it will or will not work for you. Sometimes you just have to give your mind sometime to rewire itself for a change in routine to work. If you try one suggestion, and it really doesn’t work in the end, then do not sweat it. Just try another. And another. Continuing to try new things is one of the main points of this whole article. Not all ideas will work, but the ones that do will unlock new capabilities you didn’t previously have.