Hey everyone! I've started the journey of learning guitar again. Something is different this time, and it's going great! I definitely have Guitar Tricks and disciplined practice to thank.

Attempt 1:

In 2007 I bought my first acoustic guitar at one of those buy and sell places. I didn't know anything about anything and randomly purchased a Takamine Jasmine S43C because it was the only guitar they had there (turned out to be a decent guitar for a beginner though!). I didn't try very hard and just tried to jump straight into trying to play songs using guitar tabs that I found online without mastering any basics. Gave up quickly.

Attempt 2:

In 2017 I wanted to give it another try, and took the Takamine Jasmine out of the hard case for the first time in about 10 years, and signed up for Guitar Tricks! I started the Guitar Fundamentals course, and stubborn impatience got the best of me and I went back to my old ways and tried to jump straight into songs again. I gave up again.

Attempt 3:

In early August 2019, I was listening to some tunes with some beautiful guitar and was inspired to try again. This time, I told myself I would seriously be disciplined and not become impatient and stubborn again. Let's just say I used to play violin when I was age 10-13 and have not looked at music notes or played an instrument since.

I used one of my boyfriend's 4 guitars to practice at first (a Squier Stratocaster because it felt the most comfortable), and a combination of Guitar Tricks, Guitars for Dummies, Music Theory for Dummies, and-- unless I'm having an extremely busy day or on vacation-- DAILY practice. I eventually bought a Yamaha APXT2 because I found the size the most comfortable to start with... I went through a "my hands are too small" phase and decided I could only play partial or 3/4 sized guitars.

Fast forward to September 29 2019, and I am SO loving learning this time. I finished Guitar Fundamentals 1 and am most of the way through Fundamentals 2 (just got to barre chords, and decided to pause on that and learn acoustic fingerpicking and I'm on the second beginners fingerpicking course now).

I am also finding that now that I've built strength and more flexibility (still want more) in my fretting hand, it's a bit more comfortable and less straining to play the full scale length guitars. FYI I have a hand span of ~165mm according to the instructions on this website. I was also put to shame after watching this YouTube video of very small North Korean children playing acoustic guitars and also using barre chords.

I am looking forward to finishing Guitar Fundamentals 2 in the near future, and learning more songs from the gigantic song list! Thank you SO MUCH for existing Guitar Tricks!