Zen Guitar Lessons

Level: Beginner to Intermediate

Building Confidence Through the Subconcious

by Velma The Fischwire

One of the main problems with learning the guitar, or actually anything new, is a lack of confidence. When something negative gets entered into your subconcious, especially at an early age, it can stick with you your whole life an limit your abilities to succeed.

I recently went to a singing workshop, where the lecturer asked the question, "How many of you think you can sing?" When she got no answers she went on to ask why we thought we couldn't. Everybody there was able to trace back to a time when they used to sing as children or even adults and somebody told them to be quiet because they couldn't sing, or made some other remark about their abilities.

While most of these comments weren't meant to be rude or limiting, our subconcious mind picks them up that way, and we remember it. And from that point on, our belief in ourselves goes down and our negativity toward singing goes up.

If you ask a child if he or she can sing, dance, or draw, almost 100% will say yes. The same question put to teenageers and adults goes down to 0% for people who think they can do all three, and only 10% who think they can one. Why is it that as children we can do all three, and as more experienced adults, we can't. It's because at some point in time we lost confidence in our natural ability.

The first step toward rebuilding your confidence is realizing you are being limited by your own mind. Try this exercise: Get out a blank sheet of paper and write down the words "I can play the guitar." Write them over and over again until the paper is full, then turn it over and fill the other side.

If you are having trouble with a song write, "I can play (song title)". Or with an exercise, "I can play that exercise."

When you write, write from your hear, with full faith that what your writing is the truth. Though it might not seem like a lot, it will affect your subconcous in the same way other people's words and actions have.

Then when you go to play the guitar, that song, or that exercise, before you pick up your guitar recite the words aloud 20 times. When you say it aloud you will hear it and your subconcious will pick up on it. And after a few days you will find it easier to express yourself through music.

--Velma The Fischwire (vtfisch@gateway.net) plays guitar and lives in Osceola, Indiana.

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