Last night as I lay in bed a thought flashed through my mind - "if I know the notes of an open chord, I can find those same notes elsewhere on the fretboard and create the same chord (would it be in a different key, or called a different chord depending on the root note?). So today the first thing I did in my practice session was to look at the notes of the open C chord, move up 4 or 5 frets and find the same notes, place my fingers upon the appropriate frets (a different shape than the open C), and strum the strings - it was the harmonious C, but at a different pitch.
Another example of guitar theory becoming more clear in my head is my understanding of the open chords. I recently became comfortable in my knowledge of the open chords A-G when I realized that I did not know the B chord. I researched it and found that the B chord was not open, that it needed a bridge on the 2nd fret. However, I had been using the B7 chord for my practice of the E 12 bar blues, but I did not know it was B7 until I did the B chord research. When I sat down with the guitar I went through chords A-G and felt confident that I knew them better than I had a few months ago. It was this more lucid chord knowledge which led to the bedtime thought of forming chords using the whole fretboard.
When I began the guitar quest in January I knew nothing, the fret board a blank slate ready for my pen and paper scraps. At first things went halting and slow, but I was daily filling the void - sitting down at the kitchen table to draw a fret board with all the notes labeled; printing out 11 beginner lessons from the internet (currently on lesson 8); learning how to hold the guitar and the pick; having the desire to practice for hours, but my fingers complaining after 15 minutes, forcing me to stop; going to two private guitar instructors, and having both experiences go sour (the first teacher wanting to change how I formed chords, the second teacher dumping me because of my questions and comments); attempting to learn and memorize basic chords and the pentatonic scale; and the persistent sense that I was close to being overwhelmed with my ignorance of the subject.
Throughout the lonely, dark beginning, I knew that it was the perceived difficulties that I was experiencing which made the guitar quest worthwhile - upon reaching the threshold of mastery, learning new things would become infrequent, and making the guitar seem fresh would become the new task at hand. And so I embraced the quest and the long path ahead of me. I do not want to be anywhere near the end because the point is to work with something for many years, to learn it intimately, and then, upon knowing and loving it, to let it go.....
Yesterday was one of those timeless autumn days which attaches itself stubbornly to the curious eyes of my memory - the warmth of the fading season, the colored leaves falling through the still and quiet sky. I sat on a wood bench in the solitary woods playing guitar, reading, eating lunch. I breathed the scent of dried leaves, gazing at the sun, piercing the silence with music.
I currently am reading a book entitled "Transform your Life". It is written by a Tibetan monk and he lucidly describes the beauty and rarity of being born human. The ultimate quest is the spiritual one - to become intimate with the mind - to observe and calm it, become its master. It is like an art - without practice, the mind falls into all sorts of negative attitudes - anger, envy, hatred. Sitting in meditation is the way to peace, the way to quell the things which can blacken a heart.
I am thus going to attempt to transform my life, once again. In my early 20's I followed the spiritual path for 2 years, and I luckily found the way to peace. Instead of pursuing the life of meditation further, I abandoned it for art. While continuing meditation would have been the wiser choice, choosing art was not a bad thing. I should have simply continued with meditation while practicing art, but better late than never. I have decided to seriously resume my meditation studies, perhaps I once again will find the way into the light of peace.
