Messing Up on Guitar (and Why It Doesn’t Matter)

Sometimes when we’re ripping some licks on guitar, we can get caught in our own heads and psyche ourselves out, causing mistakes in our playing.

While this is obviously not the desired result, it’s something even the best guitarists deal with.

There’s one simple thing that separates great guitar players from good ones, however. Playing with passion and fervor is your express ticket to the top of the guitar-playing mountain.

We’re human; we make mistakes (even Guthrie Govan). The ability to push through those mistakes and even turn them into intentional notes validates the mindset of Miles Davis where “There are no wrong notes.”

Of course, you should practice and try to become the best guitar player you can be; I’m not telling you to just hit duds all the time. Beethoven said, “To play a wrong note is insignificant. To play without passion is inexcusable.”

Don’t keep a mistake-o-meter in your head. Just pour your soul out on the strings and you’ll find a much easier path to reaching your potential.

Tyler Larson is the founder of the guitar-centric brand Music is Win. His insightful, uncomplicated guitar lessons and gear demonstrations along with entertaining, satirical content about life as a musician receive tens of millions of video views per month across social media. Tyler is also the creator of the extremely popular online guitar learning platform, Guitar Super System. A graduate of Berklee College of Music, Tyler has been teaching guitar for over a decade and operates a production studio in Nashville, TN.