"You are allowed to make mistakes"

[jseth]

I have found that the fastest way to make mistakes is to think about NOT MAKING THEM!

Somehow, focusing on what I don't want makes that very aspect loom larger and larger...

A great quote I heard about playing golf would actually apply here very well:

"It's not about perfection; it's about skill development..." (A.J.Bonar)

[Nymuso]

I have been playing for over fifty years. In that time I have played exactly one perfect three hour gig, no mistakes.

Not being a perfect guitar player I have become exceptionally adept at covering up mistakes. I could give a seminar on it. Except I’d probably . . . well . . . . make some mistakes.

[rllink]

I started playing and singing in public early on when I started playing the ukulele. Probably before I should have, no doubt before I was ready. I got tricked into it and now it is an addiction. I love to busk for one thing. But the call of the wild is too much for me to resist. So a lot of my mistakes have been public. I've come through them unscathed. No one has ever booed me or thrown anything. In fact, some people have even foolishly complimented me. Every time I come home I vow to do better next time. And I do, most of the time. But I still make mistakes and I still have a long way to go. I'm chomping at the bit for some street festivals to start back up. Now that I've picked up the guitar I think that if I ever get out again it will be quite interesting. I'm pretty excited about that. Something new to screw up with in public.

[phcorrigan]

Originally Posted by rllink

I started playing and singing in public early on when I started playing the ukulele. Probably before I should have, no doubt before I was ready.

If you waited until you were ready you never would have done it.

When I was sixteen, I bought a used Stella for $5.00, learned three chords, and played and sang a song (badly, no doubt) at an open mic. I have no regrets.

[Bikewer]

Years ago (80s...) I was reading Guitar Player every month and they did an article on the “Chester and Lester” album which had just been released by those two lads... (Chet Atkins and Les Paul)
They said that when the two first went into the studio, they sat down with the tape running and and ran through a bunch of standards.

Paul began putting his guitar away...”That was great, print it!”

Atkins, the perfectionist, said... “I thought we were just rehearsing! What about all the clams? (Errors)”

Paul said... “People will think we’re human.”

Another one... When I was first painfully learning to play, Leo Kottke came out with his first “Six and Twelve String Guitar” album, which blew everyone’ mind a bit. A friend of ours, a very good player, tried manfully to learn some of these tunes, but was mystified by one particular sound on one of the cuts.
“I just can’t figure out what he’s doing there!”

Later, we realized that the mysterious sound was simply a string breaking, and back then it was easier to leave it in since you couldn’t “dub it out” as they do now.