I am practicing one lesson that involves inside picking and I have been really struggling. I have probably practiced that for a month now or even more but everytime I play, its not clean. I have sat down again and again trying to analyze and I play slow and it sounds clean. The moment I play on tempo, its the same old story. So, for a few days, I got busy recording my music and what not and completely didn't touch the guitar for probably 2 days. Last night, my baby woke up at 2am and I had nothing to do. So, I sat down, grabbed the guitar and played slow without my funky right hand technique, trying to mimic what I see. I practiced quite a bit and my hand started to ache (it never happened). Then, I got tired and probably half a sleep but my fingers were still moving, slow and steady. Then I slept.

Woke up in the morning and played the lick. Suddenly, it felt my left hand moved faster and its much cleaner! Don't know what happened but this is the EUREKA moment. I have had this before but this one is so totally different.

I am sure you have had the same experiences.. Would love to hear yours?

Sometimes one is just 'ready' to do something.
I'm a painfully slow learner as far as incorporating new things into my playing goes. But it almost always occurs in the way that you related. I try and I try and I try ... and then one day I just get it (and I never lose it). I assume it's just the culmination of a lot of hard work finally coalescing.

*If you ever have kids, you'll see that all the time.

This happens me a lot with compositions, if the concept is also applicable. There are some songs that seem that has no direction, I try and I try and I can't find how to resolve them. But one day suddenly appears, sometimes in dreams, sometimes waking up, sometimes just travelling on bus... or at the bathroom.

Totally been there myself and I can relate to every story here - I think that the moment when it clicks, is that moment when your brain is not occupied with the tension appearing out of the 'oh God, I can't play this right' - it is the result of the empty mind..

My worst nightmare is when i record something as a first take and than try to make things "better than they can be done"...So I play...and play, and play over and over and...after a 10 takes I realize that the first one is best and I have no idea why after hour of practicing it I can't even get close to the first, natural, spontanious way I played before any warm-up and concentration about being precise