[Maggie]

Rocktopus! Love the name 🙂

Everyone has moments of discouragement. There have been times where I haven’t touched my guitar for weeks for various reasons! Frustration, time, feeling sorry for myself… we are humans and all of this happens and is normal ❤️

For me, the most important thing in moments like these is a shift in focus a little bit – to find something that brings me JOY. Like I need a joy infusion lol. When it all comes down to it, it’s that feeling that keeps us doing things. That’s what keeps our head and our heart in it.

And yes, hard work and discipline can and will be a part of learning any new meaningful thing. But it’s okay to take a break from that part of it if it’s not also giving us the joy of progress.

Doesn’t mean you have to put the guitar down though. One tool that I have used is to look up some songs with chords I know well (the good ‘ol 3 chord tunes are a good start!), and then search YouTube for live versions or some good covers and then just play along and have some fun with ZERO pressure of progress or anything like that… literally just for fun. And it can be as on point or as “horrible” with missed notes, losing places, etc and it doesn’t matter. There’s something about the video thing that helps to smooth out our own mistakes and it carries the song even when we ‘mess up’.

You can strum, experiment with some picking… follow what feels fun 🙂 Don’t forget that the guitar and music making is there to serve us and not the other way around ❤️

At least that’s what I believe 🙂

Have fun!!! 🙂

Maggie

[Maggie]

Congrats on the channel, Bill! Exciting stuff… and a good step toward the goal of playing in front of people (I know this journey well! I have a funny story about my first open mic maybe I’ll share for another day – but it all was/is awesome and worth all the hard work!)

Subscribed!

[Maggie]

It’s a beautiful thing! Welcome 🙂

[Maggie]

ooh I love this one too, Loraine! Your cover song list is next level!

[Maggie]

well even the scale is pretty! Thanks for sharing 🙂

[Maggie]

I love this song, Loraine. Thank you so much for sharing ❤️ You’ve brought smile and some peace to my soul 🙂

[Maggie]

This is such a beautiful song and you definitely did it justice. All the feels 🙂 Thank you for sharing. ❤️

[Maggie]

This is very sweet and awesome 🙂 Bravo!

[Maggie]

I haven’t been on here for a little while, but wanted to say that I share this sadness and that I also think that it’s a fine place to share such a sentiment. 💔 Music is such a force (both powerful and gentle)… and those who create the stuff that moves us do leave their mark in the best way.

[Maggie]

Oh, Kurt. Your performances are so so very lovely. Please never stop.

[Maggie]

Huge win! Well done and congrats. Don’t wait too long before doing it again! 🙂