i have been playing all day long. i enjoy it a lot and time flies when i play and practice. but man!for some reason i just could not play something that ive been able to play consistanly, i keep missing the beat over and over in the same spot and i keep trying to get it right, weird cause i didnt have this problem with the same tune ive been playing for days. guess my ears and body dont want to co-operate today, and i should chill and not force it just to not get anywhere

just about everytime I practice, something will be bugin.I think the same thing,yesterday I was playin this fine, of course, the riff I wasn't able to play yesterday , I am playing today

I've found that when I take a break, for a few days on something, when I come back the muscle memory kicks in and what was not working before starts working more naturally.

Also, when playing something over and over, you are mentally focused on it, and for me, it's the mental aspect that screws me up more than anything - if I have time to think about what my fingers are doing, or will be doing or are supposed to be doing, then I have time to mentally screw up what they should be doing. Of course all that is part of the process of learning and committing anything to muscle memory.

It's sort of like being mentally fried at the end of a full day of work. Sometimes after work when I get home, my brain is so tired I can barely put a cohesive sentence together, but after a good nights sleep I'm completely refreshed.

There is a solo I wrote for one of my own songs that I worked nonstop on, just like I am doing now with this Wasted Years solo. Then I got to where I would only play it when I was practicing the song all the way through. Some days I would not practice the song, and now I rarely play it at all - but now I can burn that section of the solo up that was giving me such extreme difficulty, even jumping it to another position where I thought the notes sounded better on the G and B strings where originally I played them on the B and E.

This post has been edited by Spock: May 21 2014, 11:28 AM

If I'm not feelin' the guitar then it will just be a waste of time, an aimless noodling. I find it best to put it down at those times.

Some people are able to sidestep the dodgy areas and still find something constructive to work on.. I think these people are rarer than most !

Ever heard the term "on fire" or "in the zone" applied to someone playing soccer, football, etc.? Same applies to any activity by people. Our body goes through a natural "up and down" both physically and mentally through the day. Sometimes we have "off" days, or off "times of day". It's just our natural metabolism doing a shift dance on us.

The seasoned veterans of any activity recognize this and are able to overcome it because they recognize it for what it is, and so they strive for consistency when they hit the down curve. They apply themselves to achieve "on fire" mentally as much as they can, because that is the high point of their ability, however their main focus is maintaining their median because that is the "normal" zone in which they operate in.

So it is quite natural to one day be able to play (anything), and the next day experience inability to do the same. When it happens, realize you are not in the "zone", and slow down to accommodate that fact so that you're not practicing bad technique, or move onto another activity you feel more comfortable with.

Having been a college/circuit volleyball player for upwards of 20 years, this is the biggest hurdle of all athletes - overcoming inconsistent performance from day to day, and adjusting for down days, while reveling in the "on fire" days.

Chris!

Well said! Some days you will just be a bit "off". On those days, you gotta adjust. your instinct will be to focus on whatever bit is suddenly unplayable. However, this is not always beneficial. Sometimes it's better to just switch to something else and come back later. When you do come back, play the bit as slow as humanly possible to find where the flaw is.


Some other bit you learned may have created a small muscle memory thats now getting in your way. It could be anything really. Just go slowly through it and if it's still iffy, skip it entirely for the day and work on other stuff.


At some point, you may be playing a show and realize you are probably going to botch your upcoming solo. In that case, you gotta adjust on the fly. E.G. Play something that sounds similar, but that's been adjusted so that it's something you can play. Even touring musicians have off days

Good point here

I usually pick up my acoustic and sing/play a nice tune which I like - that makes me feel very good and if I am in a bad mood because of something technical that doesn't quite work out, this little procedure helps me get over it and come back to practicing with a fresh spirit Otherwise, if I don't feel like it, I just let things cool for a while and pick the guitar up the next day.