How to stay motivated while teaching your self how to play the guitar ?

Question:I have been teaching my self on and off for almost a year now , but i can't stay motivated , i keep thinking that i am not getting any better . how do i stay motivated?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I have been teaching my self on and off for almost a year now , but i can't stay motivated , i keep thinking that i am not getting any better . how do i stay motivated?

I recently started learning to play bass guitar (2 years now). I ran into this problem pretty quick and the way I dealt with it was to identify areas of music that applied to playing bass but were different enough to make me feel like I was doing something different rather than the same old same-old. For example, some nights I ran through finger exercises, or tried to play along with a song from CD. Some nights I read music theory books. Some nights I played my acoustic guitar and made my own chord charts. I also experimented with the sounds of the strings and became familiar with the relationships between their notes and their lengths (literally. I noticed that notes on one string were exactly one third or one quarter of another string.) Even if you can't play two notes in a row, you can pluck away and come up with your own songs - you know what you want it to sound like, so go find the notes on the fretboard. It will get you familiar with the instrument.

Pretty much all time you spend messing around with music will help you learn. You don't always have to drill finger exercises and scales all the time, but enough to get your fingers strong, fast and accurate.

Just think of how much fun it will be when you can hang with a band and just crank out good tunes for an hour straight. Imagine yourself being able to make the guitar sing. Think of the coolest riffs you know and what it'd be like to be able to just cruise through them like silk.

Cheers.

It took me awhile to feel like I got any better. The key I found for me was to alternate learning a song and then experimenting. Doing my own thing with chords and notes helped a lot. Plus I keep the guitar handy and just pick it up as often as I can. I think if you learn to relax and experiment it might help.

Listen to music. Take a break from most of your playing, because you've had too much. You could just be feeling over it, but if you leave a thing you love you'll definitely come back.
if not, maybe it's just not for you.

Think about your goals and aims in music, and focus on those to keep you playing (if you decide against taking a break).

Learn a new instrument. Playing a different sport can help the sport that you actually do play, so this applies to music as well. You have the music skills and creativity to be able to pick up a new instrument for a while.

Find a teacher. But not a boring teacher. Find a hippie, or a punk or a one of a kind music teacher to help you find inspiration. Where there is inspiration, there will be motivation.