If you’re an intermediate guitar player, you might feel as though you’ve hit a plateau of sorts. Maybe you felt encouraged by your progress in your first months or years of playing, but now you’re a bit stalled out. Where do you go from here, and what should you do to get there?

This post is all about helping you get to the next level if you’re an intermediate guitar player. So if you’re ready to knock on the door of advanced playing, read on! With any luck, at least one of the following tips will resonate with you and speed up your development.
 

If you can excel at the mental aspects of guitar playing, then the physical ones will soon follow. Conversely, if you’re most focused on the movements of your fingers and your mind is working against you, you’re going to have issues.

Thus, I highly recommend you start developing your mental game. There are many ways to do this, as guitar playing makes many demands of the mind. I’ll go into a few of the most helpful strategies below:

One of the simplest—and most effective—ways to begin is to pay more attention to your thoughts and feelings around guitar playing. Do barre chords make you feel upset or helpless? Do you feel self-conscious about your playing when you watch virtuoso technique? Are you convinced that you’re not a “natural” musician, or that your skill-level ceiling is relatively low?

Ask yourself these questions and more. Basically, you need to challenge any guitar-related narrative you have that’s holding back your progress. For instance, if you stop reinforcing the idea that you’re not a “natural” guitarist, you might actually practice more, get better faster, and begin to suspect that maybe you are a “natural” after all.

Another way to use your mind more deliberately is to be more intentional in your practicing. Instead of just picking up the guitar and jamming out, you want to go in with a game plan. If you have the goal of practicing a certain scale and you find yourself playing your favorite tune, you need to work on your self-discipline.

This work of building mental discipline extends across every moment of your life. So, in a certain sense, every time you have a “mind over body” moment (reaching for a carrot instead of carrot cake), you’re improving at guitar as well. Once you have a higher level of self-control, you’ll be able to practice efficiently, making more progress in less time. Who doesn’t want that?

For more discussion on how to practice mentally, check out Mental Practice for Guitarists. And if you really want to use the power of your mind to improve at guitar, take a look at The #1 Secret to Guitar Progress.
 

Your technique is your ability to physically execute all the skills necessary for good guitar playing. Technical work may target pull-offs, hammer-ons, plucking, picking, strumming, harmonics, percussive techniques, fretting, shifting, barring, tapping, chord changes, and so forth.

It’s worth noting that you can have excellent technique without being awfully musical. This is sort of like being able to enunciate a poem in a foreign language without conveying an understanding of its meaning. However, given that you probably grew up hearing music constantly, I’d wager that your musicianship is miles ahead of your guitar playing.

That’s where technical study comes in. Intermediate guitar players usually have lots of technical issues that aren’t being resolved. The reason for this is that pure technical work is really hard, and in at least three senses.

First, it can be hard to accept your own technical reality. Many players overestimate themselves or underestimate how much work they need to do to play the music they like. Second, it’s hard to discipline yourself to isolate technical issues without giving up or getting sidetracked. Third, technical work is often more physically taxing than normal playing.

Many guitarists think technical work is hard only in the third sense, but I actually see the first two senses as the hardest part. Think of going for a run: what’s often harder than the run itself is motivating yourself to get into your workout clothes, tie your running shoes, and step outside your door. The run comes together naturally once you get going.

My recommendation is that you concentrate on technique for at least 30 minutes a day. Focus most of your effort on your weakest yet most essential techniques.
This means you shouldn’t spend all your time drilling harmonics if your repertoire doesn’t include them. It also means you shouldn’t avoid barre chords if they’re in all your favorite songs.

If you want to learn fingerstyle technique, check out my new ebook, Fingerstyle Fitness. It offers 10 simple exercises to build your chops quickly and efficiently.
 

If you’re an intermediate guitar player looking to get to the next level, you should hit the books. One thing most advanced players have in common is a deep understanding of the guitar and of music itself.

You might be thinking, “A lot of great guitarists don’t know theory, so why should I learn it?” Well, I’ve realized that many guitarists know a lot more theory than they let on. I think they hide their knowledge because some people see the formal elements of music as boring, uncool, anti-creative, or even pretentious.

John Mayer is a pretty good example. I’ve seen him say in interviews that he doesn’t know much theory. However, he’s often talking in terms of scales, chords, progressions, music history, and so forth. Which is to say, he knows plenty. This makes sense given that he’s a professional musician; it’s all part of the trade.

Honestly, no one becomes as talented as he is knowing nothing about theory.
Another point I like to make is that learning music in a formal way isn’t going to hurt you. For example, learning to read music won’t make you unable to play by ear or vice versa. You can be good at both, so why not aspire to be?

Take Mozart, who most people agree was one of the greatest musicians ever. He could improvise, play by ear, read and write music, and he understood theory on a deep level. I’m not saying you have to be Mozart, but there’s no reason you can’t aspire to develop all of the above skills to a certain extent.

So don’t be afraid to learn some theory. If you could use some good book ideas, head over to my recommendations page to see the ones I’ve found most helpful.

My view is that the more you know, the better. Why compromise when you don’t need to? I mean, if anyone can learn what a Bm7b5 chord is and where it’s used, then so can you!
 

As soon as we’re no longer beginner guitar players, I think it’s easy to lose sight of what got us playing in the first place. In most cases, that’s our guitar heroes; the guitarists we can watch and listen to over and over again.

Intermediate guitar players have a lot to gain from focusing on their heroes. In a way, the transition from intermediate to advanced guitar is about closing the gap between you and your idols. It’s time to look squarely at the guitarists you love and ask, “What are they doing that I’m not doing?”

We’re tempted to separate ourselves from more advanced players, assuming they’re on an entirely different level. And in a way, they are. Yet that doesn’t mean you can’t 1) learn from them if you study them closely, and 2) approach if not meet or even exceed their ability.

I strongly recommend the following type of practice: choose a few of your favorite guitar players whose talent you’d have in your wildest dreams. Spend a great deal of time watching videos of them playing, and watch as closely as you can. Try to pick up on every element of their technique and musicianship.

Here’s the key thing. You need to watch with a productive frame of mind. That means, rather than watching your guitar heroes and thinking, “They’re amazing; they’re so gifted; they’re prodigies; etc. etc.,” try to think, “I’m capable of that given enough practice; humans can play guitar that well, and I’m human too.”

You’ll never be as good as your idols unless you believe in yourself. I don’t mean this in a banal or corny way. Actually believe in yourself.

You need to put yourself in your hero’s shoes. Imagine, as realistically as possible, what it would feel like to play as well as your idol. I know this may seem like a bizarre form of practice, and it’s certainly unconventional, but I’ve found that it really works. 

It’s not even that much of a stretch if you think about it. Most people have had influential role models whose habits, movements, or ideas they’ve picked up for themselves. We can do the same thing with guitar playing. You can think of learning from videos in this way as “monkey see, monkey do” with a complex set of movements. Just watch and absorb.
 

I know you’re probably an intermediate guitar player if you’re reading this. However, I think it’s time for you to become a beginner again.

Why would I suggest such a ridiculous thing? Well, ask yourself why you need to tear your muscle fibers in order to get stronger. I’m asking you to do the same thing to your guitar ego. Head straight for the guitar-related skill, style, or technique that makes you feel like a helpless beginner and work on it.

Let’s imagine you spend a lot of time strumming your favorite chords but have never played fingerstyle. Well, I’d say it’s time to set aside the pick for a little while. Or let’s suppose you’re a classical guitarist who doesn’t feel comfortable improvising. Why not get started today?

Basically, the best work you can do is identify your weaknesses and target them ruthlessly. The more you put yourself in the position of a beginner, the better. You’ll struggle to learn new things (just like a beginner), but you’ll always come back to the guitar ten times stronger.

The fewer undeveloped guitar skills you have, the more complete a player you’ll be. I think challenging yourself in this way is key to becoming an advanced guitarist. So learn fearlessly!
 

Every stage of guitar progress has its own pros and cons. As a beginner it’s easy to feel discouraged, but you also might feel full of potential for growth.

The intermediate stage is nice because you can probably play a bunch of songs you like, but you can also feel like you’re treading water. It’s definitely a mixed bag.

With any luck, this post has given you a few ideas to supplement your practice routine. I think my main takeaway message is for you not to underestimate the mental work I described above.

We all tend to focus on how fast we can rip through a scale, but that’s really only the tip of the guitar-learning iceberg. Take a mind over fingers approach and I promise you won’t regret it!

Best of luck with your playing.

Are you looking to upgrade your gear or browse some awesome guitar learning materials? Check out my recommendations page to see all my favorite stuff. 

Want to streamline your fingerstyle guitar progress? I just released my new ebook, Fingerstyle Fitness, which presents 10 easy exercises to quickly develop your fingerstyle chops. Grab it today!