If you’re just starting out, or if you have been doing this for a while and you’re looking at your favorite guitarist and thinking to yourself "how in heaven’s name does he do that?" then you’re reading the right article. Fact is most of players are often at a loss when it comes to understanding how to get to the higher level of playing that they often see their guitar heroes display. There are many routes you can take, but they all have a couple of things in common. Grab a cup of coffee, or a beer, and sit down for this article because it might change the way you look at guitar playing. No matter what you're into, from classical guitar to metal guitar, you will benefit from this. Some things may seem very simple but don’t be fooled into thinking they are less important. Other things may require you to start churning that gray matter a little bit to get the hang of them.

First in line is work!

This is a no-brainer but it still has to be said. No amount of articles and knowledge will be able to compensate for the willingness to work... Do the words "hard work" make your hair stand on end? As a guitarist you must be willing to work at your craft. You must have the self-discipline needed in order to practice on a regular basis. Having said that though, it is important to note that working smart will always beat working hard. So it is very important for you to break down your learning process and to have a clear idea where you’re going and the steps that you need to take order to get there. Imagine for a second being in a jungle as you’re trying to find your way out. Now, you might put in a lot of effort and walk daily for many miles through the hard jungle environment in order to find your path out, but if you don’t use your head and figure out a clear way towards your goal you might find that you’re just walking around in circles. It’s the same way when studying guitar. You must set your compass so you know the direction of your goal and you must also figure out what steps to take in order to reach that goal. How do you do that? Simple: just sit down and plan it out, write it down and create a sort of map towards your endpoint.

Let’s say you’re just starting out and, as a singer-songwriter, your goal is to get your guitar playing up and running so that you’re able to use your guitar to write songs and play them live. You would then figure out the steps you must take in order to achieve this. If you’re a singer songwriter then you must learn chords, which are the basis of creation for most singer songwriters. But you’d have to break the "learning chords chapter" in two. This is because you need to learn what the chords are from a musical standpoint, meaning that you must learn their names, the notes they contain and the relationship between those notes so that you know how they relate to each other in a song. This is the theoretical aspect of chords (not to mention that you should take a look at scales first). Of course you must also learn the actual chords on the guitar, the frets and the fingers used to play them and exercise these movements on the guitar fretboard until you get to the point where you feel comfortable changing quickly from one chord to the other. Having complete control of the mechanical movements of your fingers on the fretboard is also important because as you will start to write your song you’ll probably want to sing on top of your cords, so the ability to change chords fast and to do two things in parallel, play guitar and sing, is something that will need a little bit of work. Obviously if your goal is to become a shredding monster, to play killer leads that peel the paint off the walls, then not only is the goal changed but also the steps that must be taken in order to achieve this goal.

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