Often times when playing or practicing feels tedious you refer to it as having lost your motivation. I found a very insightful post on Ultimate Guitar about this – and that the obstacle might actually be something else. What if you are actually getting scared? Scared of that you are wasting your time put into playing your instrument?
Sooner or later you start comparing yourself to your idols and realize that your playing sounds like crap in comparison. Maybe you’re frequenting a couple of forums where all the regulars are better than you think you will ever become yourself. I can say right away that I fit this profile exactly. It’s also not helping having started playing later in life than most – will I become good before I die? What was supposed to be a relaxing hobby is suddenly a competition with extreme performance goals…
The UG post has some good tips on how to fix this problem. The most important thing is to not lose faith in that practice actually pays off, the time spent isn’t wasted. One way to prove that to yourself is keeping a log of your progress. You will realize that even though you can’t play that difficult solo at 160 bpm you can do it at 140 now, not 100 like a couple of weeks or months ago.
When i discussed this with an insightful friend he told me, just make sure you are having fun playing and practicing. That way the time spent will never be wasted. I’m going to try and readopt that view on playing. But at the same time, it’s almost impossible for a competitive person like myself not to push yourself when you exceed your initial expectations (which was, when buying my first electric guitar four years ago, to be able to play just one song, any song).
