Nollaig Mac Sheoin: 2020

What black hole is a mental block, in Guitar Practice? Is anything else my bigger...ehrm...Problem?

Are you a point, or a line? Can I scratch your hole for a black sky? But, not even if I oppose and negate all 'non-white' neon lights, might I make the black sky count, somehow? But, what if I'm a melodic tripper? San Fran all-the-way? "But, Haight-Ashbury, we go way back?" Market rates. But, Musical Enjoyment and Enlightened Learning are Human Rights?

Should I beg failure of the pursuit of happiness, elsewhere? Retard & homo. But, what if 'audio & video' cortices overlap, while tripping? Can I also tickle your toes, if, say, I can't cause, sooner, your third-eye to go cross-eyed? News. Can I steal Christ's spider, wrap eagle's eggs in poison, and, tempt a dog to chase bumblebees -to make Boris Johnson seem, at least...Lawful?

Should the opposite of zero be infinity? Is it even law-like, at all, though? Or just being nice. As pie. What auspices in learning wouldn't rather 'give-up' black holes, if it wasn't "no-thang", and, yet, WOULD seem to CARE:- IF it's pupils ought learn NOTHING -but, to steal-on-the-clock-and-calendar-on-repeat, while, MERELY *marketing* time, rather than *knowing*, expressly, the way? As the Beat goes on...

Through inductive learning become enlightened, musically. This is only a tiny problem. Moreso than the fear, "am I even musical?":- consider, instead of a singular, obsessive, 'Musicality' (e.g. players, instruments, stars, etc.), which is open to questionable attacks of self doubt, rather, 'Rates of Musicianship' (e.g. progressions, sequences, curves, etc), and with safety in numerosity, ponder. Its' (the fear of being a-musical's) questions' answers lurk within.

If there is even a day-to-day progress report, is there even a problem? Days-in-a-row progress disappoints, as it seems to go backward; implying every-day-rates incur doubt.

You know one end of the strings from the other. You know how many nuts ought be on the machine head. But do you know every Song you know on Electric compared to Accoustic?

When you learn a new trick -a Lick or a Riff- it doesn't apply across the board, to a rising tide, as if by method learnt, rather than rigmorole or gruelling?

The take home from each daily Lesson doesn't apply itself to each previous thing known to Improve. When I know each Song, in each Key:- I'm proficient. Yet, if I learn, firstly, a song in A, and,then, a song in G, and separate either lesson from itself: 'Compartmentalisation' rather than 'Application' is going on. The lesson of each new day must be applied, if to act as a Skill gained rather than an Ability merely demonstrated. You should wish to be of Proficient Application in Skillful Daily Learning, instead of compartmentalising each rigmorle and gruelling exercise in standalone features.

You probably haven't explored 'Scratching Strums', 'Tapping Beats', and isolating 'Harmonic Notes' to include in any the songs of your Set yet.

If you resolved to Play one turn until one of the strings needs replacing, you'd certainly improve at a Rate, determinable.

The Origin of this Problem is simple to reveal, and the constraint upon Learning can be identified, as probably nothing needed associate negatively with Music or Guitar Playing.

Is your 'Style' rigid and mechanical, or 'Freely Flowing' and 'Expressive'? Can you keep up with your own need to make active Motions, or does it seem frustrating to keep in Measure with the Beat, as you Play? Practice at a slowest pace, until how its measured is best:- once all of the Notes and Chords can be recalled, or followed along with the Manuscript as you Play.

If there is awkwardness in keeping a Beat that it bores you, then practice artificial Rhythms. If there are four down Strums for every Bar in 4/4, try to play it in 3/4, and alternate in Practice Style so that when you return to Performance Style in 4/4 it then seems easier. Meanwhile, if you ever skip a Beat, then:- you are Well-Practiced in returning to Form, and, so, maybe frustrate yourself less.

If you learn one song in a book of 50 tunes daily, and go back to the start every time you expend the list, then this 'Monotonous Complexity Rate' could bore. Yet if you learn each of the lyrics in turn firstly, then each of the Chords, then each of the Solos, etc., it allows room to improve. It needn't be the case to course through so many songs to achieve this standard of growth, yet understanding the scope of improvability nonetheless may be key.

'It makes me feel gay' is why I put it down, not 'I'm boring myself not learning anything'. Maybe not entirely different an obstacle of pick-and-choose moods: Discipline, nonetheless, yet is involving in either such imaginary problem. If must one scale completely in order to learn, and not, say, learn one scale, per half-hour, instead:- then my sense of discipline stumbles distinctly, and yet that as soon as I can say 'this seems gay', I would put the guitar down in frustration. Yet, "this half-hour isn't as 'gay' as the next half-hour" is also possible to relate. The association with its frustration can be teased for good or bad, hence.

Universal learning achieves generally, best. One whole song compares better with another, rather than the 'chorus' from this and the 'verse' from that. 'Like' with 'like' allows, and comparable Rates of Improvement, then amass.

Take yourself back often, by willful memory, to when you knew how to make sound only with guitar strings, and how you distinguished musicality from all the noise. How when just strumming open strings as a child -or when you first encountered playing, but to consider the Simplicity of the love of the sound of it's note and chord. How much more is sound than noise? How much more than noise is music? How much more than a string is a note, how much more than a note is a chord, and how much more than a chord is a melody. How much more is the man who can play start to finish a whole song, verse and chorus, than the child who strummed perhaps the upright rested guitar as it lay against the wall in a friend or neighbor's house?

Don't associate negative words, alone, to heart. Learn the possibility of 'good' and 'bad' playing and prefer 'good'. Know the reward in good learning is merit, in good practice is skill, in good playing is praise, and in good performance is accolade. "I like how I sound today" is only a duality of 'good & bad' away from thinking- you might sound "bad" otherwise. Yet like with like and through a scheme of Complexity learning achieves to grow. I am sounding bad in plucking, but I'm good in note. I am sounding bad in chord, but good in multiples of notes. Bad in strumming, but good in chords. Bad in overall rhythm but good in strumming part. Bad in overall performance but good in rhythm and melody, besides. GRADUATE your learning achievement. And don't bring yourself down! Optimism is only half of it---there is also astuteness in the moment, counts critically, as key to this.

Am looking in the right place to seek the key to my black and white problem with sound holes? I can play each Beetles song I like, I'm bored. I can play each Elvis song I like, I'm already such a drag. Yet can I play an arabesque on guitar? Can I play in each genre one song, e.g. Reggae, Country, Rock, etc. Can I depict the music of each culture on earth, by country, so called? It would seem I had an extensive REPERTOIRE until considering a woman's work is maybe never done, and yet tomorrow is another day---there is always scope and room for improvement.

Like for like, standards can improve. COMPLEXITY-level of the General Learning-scheme considers a curve, rather than a straight line, if to achieve. Learning rates comparable, the associable complaint can be tabled, as a motion, to debate, internally, or written down, and the board accrue it's lesson in terms of General Learning. This avoids complaining as such: I am tired: music is crap - a false complaint! Rather instead, I am tired: I'll learn more tomorrow.

Learning tires, practicing bores, performance drags, etc. Don't get them mixed-up in cheapened false association with scornful self-mocking wordplay! As then, avoidable is the false complaint- stacking upon itself- that all music would either seem a lullaby -or else be unpalletable in it's arguments. This is so false! I learn, I tire, yet to the subject's name I return, as interest abounds. I practice, I bore, yet I soldier-on. I perform, it's a drag, yet some nights are better than others. This instead of: I'm tired, music is crap, I'm bored, music is crap, I'm a drag, music is crap, I'm crap. I'm crap at music---a false learning scheme of misassociation. When I learn harmonic open strings, then, I don't aim to bore, yet achieve to excel and exceed!

When you play what you like as to like as you play, are you looking or listening? Is the stance enviable? Is the riff recognisable? Is it audio or video needs directing? Ask yourself often and when you notice, so forgive yourself, and associate the constraint in the least not the most.

Do you at least sing along with yourself? Do you also tap your foot? Can you play each song standing or sitting down, by choice?

Do you practice on the clock or on the calendar? Regardless, to practice somehow is better. On Saturdays before choir is perfectly acceptable to state, if once weekly, only. Yet EVERYDAY is integral to pride an improving rate with quality assurable. At lunchtime is the best hour in an urban environment to find the sweet spot on the clock when suits best. If I only played at night I'd miss the chance to add singing, with neighbors each side, hampering opportunity.

Take it in your stride to play an-hour-a-day, each day, rather than eight-hours-in-one-day, not to return to it for another whole week.

Projection of association to avoid, acquiring skills and learning terms to pursue. Market association of self-worth, disparaging, avoid, skillful learning---knowing the way, purposefully, pursue.

Jonesy-NMS is Male, 43, Lives in Dublin, Ireland. Making alternative/experimental music in own mini-studio at home in Tallaght.