I have been avid fitness enthusiast for about as long as I’ve been a guitarist. I started learning about strength training when I was about 13 years old, learning from my brother and have always seen a strong parallel between the approach taken to building the body versus build guitar playing abilities.
Here are 9 lessons that I’ve learned from bodybuilders, powerlifters, and fitness trainers that translate directly to the guitar and will help you to push the envelope with your gutiar playing.
1. Have a Clear, Definite Goal
Bodybuilders know what they are trying to achieve when it comes to training – they are after a physical aesthetic, a particular look. Anyone who has achieved a significant change in their body didn’t do it by accident; they had a clear idea of what they wanted to achieve or look like.
You must do the same thing when it comes to developing your skills as a guitarist. If you don’t know where you are going or what you want to achieve as a player, you won’t get it and will more than like end up wasting time.
Core Lesson: Set a clear, definite goal that is measurable and that has a specific and realistic deadline.
2. Reps and Sets
Bodybuilders cause their muscles to grow by lifting weights in reps and sets. Reps or repetitions are the number of times the weight is lifted in a row without rest, while sets are groups of reps separated by a period of rest. For example, you might lift 25 lbs. for 3 sets of 10 reps; you lift the weight 10 times, rest, lift another 10, rest, and then a final 10 reps.
As long as you put in the required reps and sets, you will eventually reach your goal. Your body will continue to grow as long as you do the work that is required.
This doesn’t just apply to weight training – it works for anything you want to improve including playing the guitar. Try playing a difficult riff or lick at a comfortable pace 50 times and then tell me that you didn’t get better. Nothing comes for free and you absolutely must put in the time.
It is important to know that the reps and sets you perform shouldn’t be mindless and must challenge you. If they are too easy, your mind will have no reason to learn and get better.
Core Lesson: Be prepared to put in the repetition that is needed to improve your playing, but make sure it isn’t mindless.
3. Progressive Overload
This is one of the most important concepts that bodybuilders use in weight training. Put simply, if lifting a certain amount of weight becomes easy, lift more.
Your body is an amazing thing. When put under stress and given time to rest, it will not only recover, but it will grow so that it can better handle that same stress the next time. This is why muscle grows when you lift weights and why you have to keep lifting heavier and heavier weights to keep growing.
Believe it or not, your mind works in a very similar way!
When put under the stress of learning to do something new, your mind will recover and compensate so that it will be easier to do the next time. This means that you must continue to increase the challenge level of your guitar playing as you improve, otherwise, your development will stop.
Core Lesson: Keep challenging your mind with what you practice. If it is frustrating, that means you are being challenged and will grow.
4. Grinding It Out
A strong work ethic is the foundation of any great bodybuilder. They have to be in the gym training nearly every day, for hours at a time. They learn to love the process of training to achieve what they want and focus on completing each session, striving to get as much out of it as possible.
This daily work is known as the Grind.
Life is the grind. You must learn to love the grind if you want to achieve real success.
As a guitarist, you must work through the grind as well – you must practice to improve. Just like the idea of reps and sets, you have no choice but to put in the time needed to become a better player.
And, no one else can do it for you.
You can’t pay someone to make you a better player, they can only give you the tools. It is up to YOU to earn your skills.
You have to grind it out every day, gaining as much from each practice session as you can. After you have done this for a few years, you’ll be able to look back and see just how far you have really come.
Core Lesson: Learn to embrace the grind. Your guitar playing wil thank you for it.
5. Build Mental Toughness
Lifting heavy weights is hard work. It doesn’t just take a toll on the muscles, tendons, ligaments, and bones, but it is also extremely hard on the body’s central nervous system.
Bodybuilders must become mentally tough in order to be able to work through the pain and discomfort that comes with building the body.
As a guitarist, you must develop another kind of mental toughness. Physical pain is never a good thing when it comes to the guitar, however, you must become resistant to the mental challenges that come with practicing – these can include boredom, apathy, laziness, and frustration.
These may not seem as much of a challenge as actual pain, but they can be just as deadly to your development as a guitarist.
Core Lesson: You must learn to focus your mind and discipline yourself to work through the tough times. Remember, iron is forged in fire.
6. Know When to Rest
Bodybuilders know that muscle doesn’t grow in the gym, it grows when you are resting. Lifting weights will stress the muscle and give it a reason to grow and get stronger, but it won’t be able to do that until it is given a break so that it can rebuild.
Developing your skills as a guitarist is actually similar to the process of building muscle. The deepest, strongest learning process of the mind doesn’t happen when you are practicing, but when you are resting, or more specifically when you are sleeping.
At night, the conscious part of your mind shuts down, but the subconscious goes into overdrive. The subconscious works through all the information it has gathered over the day and decides what to do with it. The nice thing about the mind is that it can recover much faster than your muscles; your muscles might need a few days to recover before training again, but the mind may need only a few hours.
Be careful. You can’t push your mind beyond its limits all the time. It is important to give it time to rest and organize what you’ve learned. Try to get 7-8 hours of high-quality sleep every night to improve the absorption process of the subconscious. Meditation can also be helpful as it will calm your mind and allow it to recover even faster.
Core Lesson: Give your mind time to absorb what you’ve learned from practice. Get plenty of sleep at night.
7. Monitor Your Progress
Bodybuilders pay close attention to the results that they are getting.
Building a better body is a very slow process and if you don’t keep an eye on the direction you are moving, it is very easy to get off course.
The best bodybuilders will log specific stats like body weight, body fat percentage, diet, body part measurements, and even take pictures for photographic evidence. All of these different pieces of information will let them see clearly if they are on the right path.
You can do the same thing when it comes to developing your guitar playing skills. Improving as a guitarist can also be a painfully slow process; it can take years to achieve significant results. You need to keep track of the results you are getting in a way that will allow you to actually see the progress you make, especially when it is slow going.
Using a metronome is one method as it gives you a clear number to measure your playing skill; a bigger number means you are playing faster and have therefore improved.
Audio or video recordings of your playing are also a great way to listen back and hear or see how you are doing. You will want to record yourself over time so that you can go back and compare your playing after longer periods.
Core Lesson: Keep an eye on your results by using a log and making recordings from time to time.
8. Adapt, Adapt, Adapt!
If it isn’t working, something needs to change and bodybuilders have become masters at varying the different methods that they use.
Some will even build their entire training program around the idea of shocking their muscles with different training styles. This, in turn, forces the muscle to continually adapt and grow.
Once you have been tracking your results, you can start to see if you are improving. If you are getting better, great! Now, can you improve at a faster rate? Is there a way to take your results and make them even better?
However, if your results are stalling or you seem to be moving in the wrong direction, it’s time to make some changes.
Something you are doing isn’t working and you will need to change it to get yourself back on track.
What is specifically not working can vary quite a bit, so you will need to break down what you are doing and experiment with different approaches.
When in doubt, get some advice from an expert – someone who has already done what you are trying to do and who has already had success in helping other people do it too.
Just because your buddy can play the guitar like an ace doesn’t mean he knows how to teach you to do it, too. Find a teacher that has taught other people to play well.
9. Get a Training Partner
The best bodybuilders train in groups. They work together not just to make sure they don’t drop weights on their heads, but to encourage, motivate, and challenge each other.
There is a camaraderie aspect to bodybuilding – everyone helps each other out to learn and grow. You push each other to lift more or to do more reps than before. You try to outdo each other and this, in turn, helps everyone to get stronger.
You might consider getting a training partner when it comes to your guitar practicing. Now, this doesn’t mean you have to have someone who sits in on your practices and yells at you to play faster. Instead, you should have someone who holds you accountable to your practicing. They check in with you on a daily basis to help you keep going when you are frustrated or to try harder. They don’t even have to play guitar! I’ve actually had training partners in music who were drummers.
Beyond this, the greatest out there had rivals – someone who was competing against them who would force them to push themselves to be their very best.
I myself have had a number of rival guitar players over the years who have always forced me to play better, and never let up even when I push ahead in skill; they catch up and force me to keep growing.
If you can find someone to be your guitar playing rival, someone who you are competing against to be the best, then you will both become great players.
Core Lesson: Find a training partner and rival – each will push you to play better in different ways.
Summary
Training to become a great guitarist is a lot like becoming a champion bodybuilder. Knowing this, learn from what the best bodybuilders do by setting a clear goal, doing your reps and sets, applying the principles of progressive overload, grinding it out every day, building your mental toughness, resting appropriately, keeping track of your results, changing things up when needed, learning from a master, and getting a partner to hold you accountable.
Follow these lessons and you will be ripping up and down your fretboard in no time.
