S.H.A.P.E. Your Guitar Playing

Spirit

We experience music as spiritual or metaphysical element

 that transcends the mere natural world. It's a common gift to all

mankind of uncommon power on our souls.

Heart

Our hearts are pulled towards enjoyment and participation

 of making music as recreation or vocation. 

Ability

We take practical steps to improve, expand and strengthen

our abilities by study, practice and perseverance.

Personality

A musical identity, style or sound develops.

Emotion

An emotive and dynamically quality

add vitality to the musical performance. 

Many guitar players and students never seem to S.H.A.P.E. their playing into something

 unique, special or dynamic. They remain happy with having what I would call a "S.H.A." 
and stopping at the ability part of the "S.H.A.P.E." an acronym" and never finding a style 
or dynamic to their playing. A culinary example of this would be like forgetting to add the yeast
to the dough - everything then tends to come out flat. 

To journey through music being a beautiful gift, (spirit) to dreaming of playing, (heart) and then on to participation (ability) is a good thing, but music is a dynamic and subtle language in need of added elements to communicate the spectrum of sounds and rhythms necessary for a meaningful interaction.

In plainer words: we love bands like U2 for their unique style and sound (personality) and the way their concerts excite the listener in a screaming, fist-pumping, dancing state of euphoria (emotion).

The solution for a musician is to go beyond a S.H.A. by adding some personality and emotive qualities to what they do on their instruments. You can start this by trying to add some unique or quirky qualities you see in some of your favourite artists, and by emoting some of the lyrical or dynamic content of the song in the way you strike or pluck the strings; bending your thoughts toward these things as you play will alter the music even without feeling much of a tangible difference.