As a you boy I had a lot of interests at the same time. Reading, sporting, playing piano, playing chess, a lot of more things and, of course, playing guitar.

I developed a habit to always have my guitar laying on my bed. Always as I walked into my room my guitar was laying there waiting for me. It was very easy to sit down on my bed starting to play because of two facts:

1. I could see the guitar as I walked into my room which immediately reminded me of how fun it is to play.

2. The guitar was easily accessible. The only thing I had to do in order to play the guitar was to grab it and start playing.

This made it possible for me to play a lot on my guitar in spite of all other activities. All other things I did was interwoven with my guitar playing and my musical experiences connected with it.

This way of working with my guitar was not a conscious plan to maintain energy and motivation to practice. It just happened to be that way. These moments with my guitar became a part of my personal development.

When I sat there playing guitar I also had time to digest life as it proceeded. It way a form of meditation because as I played on my guitar I allowed my mind at times to wander and I remember that some important decisions in life were made as I sat there playing.

Enough talk about myself! What can you learn from my experiences?

Let's apply my experiences to the art of learning to play guitar and see if we can find principles that are applicable to all guitar players.

Here are some thoughts and suggestions:

1. See to it that you have your guitar as accessible as you dare to. It will be a reminder for you that playing guitar is fun. I have sometimes reminded my guitar students to pull out the guitar from the hard case or gigbag as soon as they come home from the lesson and start to play something connected with their homework. Otherwise there is an imminent risk that they will not open the case until the next lesson is at hand.

This is how humans often react. If it is a little effort involved in starting to do something we want to do there is a risk that we will procrastinate the activity until it is too late.

2. If you have set goals or have homework to do on your guitar I recommend that you also have these sheets or written down goals handy. No use to have goals if you are not reminded of them on a daily basis.

To facilitate all things that can be facilitated is one way to accomplish more of the important things in life including playing guitar.