Motivation is the biggest key to learning how to play a musical instrument

Learning how to play an instrument is not that much different to learning how to do anything else. You don’t need a tremendous amount of talent, skill and ability. You do need proper motivation and an excellent teacher if you want to learn how to play correctly.

The biggest misconception about learning music is that children learn much faster than adults.

This is simply not true. Children tend to pick things up reasonably quickly, but remember they have no external stress in their lives. Most children are not concerned about making money, paying bills, investing money, looking after their family, booking a holiday and planning for the future.

Children are simply occupied with the task at hand. (It is actually a brilliant idea to imitate their behaviour instead of fretting about the future!)

The constant overload of information makes learning more difficult as an adult.

It’s not at all impossible to learn successfully, but proper motivation is needed, and that’s the job of your guitar teacher!

The Pareto Principle states that 80% of all your best results come from 20% of your efforts.

In learning music, I believe that 80% of your success comes from your state of mind.

Being motivated to take action and learn specific passages, fingerings or intricate compositions will make you understand the seemingly impossible much faster than anything else.

Without motivation, many people give up trying to learn how to play an instrument, or they stop as soon as they hit a brick wall.

What is the perfect way to be motivated?

That is the critical question!

This is where psychology plays it’s part.

Motivation in terms of learning music is so much more than just teaching music. It’s listening to the needs of the student, listening to the desires and even encouraging the student when he or she had an awful day at work.

Basically, if your state of mind is depressed, you will not perform well in anything that you do regardless of your best efforts. If your state of mind is motivated and lifted, then you will take that extra step forward that’s needed to help you learn a song, play with both hands in synchronicity, sing a high note or play chords on the guitar in perfect succession.

Motivation is, therefore, the most vital ingredient to your success in learning an instrument or for succeeding in any other area of your life!

With excellent motivation and coaching, you will become the musician that you’ve always wanted to be. For some, this might be to play basic chords on the guitar to accompany their singing for others it might be to play the most complex compositions on the piano.

It certainly doesn’t matter. What matters is that YOU achieve YOUR GOALS and DREAMS!

The only way to achieve them is with proper motivation and training. It’s not to say that it’s impossible to achieve this by teaching yourself, but an appropriate mentor will make you learn so much quicker and be that extra fuel that makes you go so much further (with less pain!)

Let’s recap: Motivation is key!

Yes, that’s right – motivation is crucial, and when you learn an instrument 80% of your success comes from your state of mind (motivation) while 20% of your success comes from the actual practising of your instrument.

Make sure you learn music with someone who can motivate and inspire you to learn and take your instrument as far as you choose to go!

Remember it’s about YOUR GOALS and YOUR DREAMS.

I hope this article will help you understand the science behind learning music (or anything else).

Whatever you do, make sure you have an endless supply of motivation!