It is very good to see that guys/girls over 40 pick up the guitar for the first time in their lives.
Like I did.
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It is a no brainer to decide who plays the guitar better, Justin or I. 
I trust what the Master (of puppets) says.
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Hello @Victorius and welcome to the Community.
Every beginner has a chord that kills them. A may not be your last.
But, as in the arcade games, you havenāt really been killed, you just put in a coin and start over with a new life to try again. And in time, maybe with some more coins in the slot, youāll get to the next level.
Hope that helps.
Cheers 
| Richard_close2u | JustinGuitar Official Guide
For anyone who finds it hard to sound good I thoroughly recommend watching the Nitsuj practice videos. They show even the best can struggle and also gives you a yardstick of when itās ok to move on. Everything is a work in progress and it doesnāt stop you from progressing as long as you keep revision as part of your practice to hone your skills
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Hi Richard,
I came home from the office and grabbed the guitar. The very first thing I picked was an A chord then a D chord. A-D change.
They both sounded crystal clear. Wow, I told to myself, this canāt be true, A chord I have struggled with no way the very first pick of the day is a perfect A chord. I canāt do that, I thought. But I could. And it felt very good.
So there is hopeā¦
Practise makes perfect.
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Glad to hear it Viktor. Happy day!
ps
One of Justinās oft-repeated mantras ā¦
Practice makes permanent.
Perfect practice makes perfect so practice perfectly.
That is not to say never allow yourself to make mistakes but do be mindful of mistakes and do not over look them when you are undertaking a practice item whose focus is improvement and doing it right such as āchord perfectā practice.
Cheers Richard
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Playing the Wild Thing song helped speed up this process immensely. Probably not the right way to do it but my strumming improved too. The extra time on chords gave me confidence I would be able to do quicker anchor changes. Try it
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Iāve only just watched through the lesson, and I wanted to say thank you right from the top. So many teachers fail to quantify goals and expectations. Being able to know when a level has been reached is so encouraging to me. I will always have my own subjective belief that I am improving to one degree or another, having the means to know when itās time to move up/on and when proficiency has been attained will save so many wasted hours. Moving up too soon or holding back too long can be just as devastating as anything else, yet it seems to be often overlooked. I truly appreciate that you have not overlooked it or made it the ephemeral āyouāll just knowā, basically, from the very beginning. Also, giving the exercise appropriate weight in the grand scheme: donāt worry so much about the sound of the chords, rather focus on the pulse of the changes and speedā¦ the sound will improve over time as other exercises bring everything together. Having failed to learn guitar in the past (more than once), for me, this is pure gold. Thank you so much.
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I found that having a metronome going was pulling me along quite nicely. I didnāt have to count either. Just set it to what you think you can do and gently increase it. Counting the changes with a timer used to drive me crazy as I found I was constantly losing my breath and miscounting after I stumbled.
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Hi all, new to this group - having a blast.
Question - do you look at your fret hand during your change exercises - or try to learn the changes without looking? I think I learn faster by trying to memorize the positions - but I make a lot more mistakes.
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Welcome to the community, a little tip - sit in front of a mirror while youāre playing, you donāt have to look at the fingerboard, it causes bad posture.
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Working my way through Grade 1. Iāve got no problem with playing the chords themselves and Iām up to 45-60 changes a minutes on all of them so far (just starting Dm). But they are sloppy. I remember Justin said thatās okay in an earlier module but for how long? Will chord perfect practice and 60 second change practice kind of meld into more precise finger placement during changes at some point or should I slow down and focus more on precision? Iām just afraid Iām developing bad habits by doing the fast but sloppy changes. Appreciate any feedback.
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Welcome to the forum @danmcmartin
Your donāt count the sloppy ones. So if your doing 60 changes
a minute and 30 of the are sloppy your count is 30.
Practice sloppy changes and your learning sloppy changes.
Your goal should be 60 perfect changes with a few sloppy ones.
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Slow yourself down for a bit to tidy up the changes, youāll be amazed how quickly you can later speed up again
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Hi and welcome, definitely slow down first. Donāt focus on doing it as quick as possible, focus on accuracy! good luck.
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Dan, you want to strike the balance here. If you are pushing too much speed then youāll ingrain errors which is not good. If you slow down too much, then effectively you may be doing Chord Perfect cycles back and forth. The idea of OMC is to push for learning to make the changes quickly, but donāt over do the speed.
Depending on what you mean by sloppy it may either be wise to slow it down a little to improve accuracy or perhaps spend a little more time developing the muscle memory to make the chord shape.
An interim exercise to help with that is to make the chord shape, do the strum-pick-strum, and then lift your fingers off from the strings, then again make the shape, strum-pick-strum etc. Initially you may lift the fingers up just a little, maybe a cm, over time lift the fingers further and further until you can lift off, touch your knee and replace in a fairly smooth rhythm.
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Personally I found that once I got to the 60 or so per minute range I was starting to focus on the quality naturally anyway. Justin actually covers this a bit later on when introducing the Perfect Fast Changes exercise.
Certainly donāt beat yourself up about some sloppy chords, so long as your fingers are in the right frets etc. Practice is your friend ao enjoy!
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Ha! I was same. I seem so good at nailing the chordsā¦but as soon as that timer started, i think it stressed me and i lost my accuracy. So i stepped back, took some deep breaths and just put the āgoalā out of my head. Competing with a timer wws my problem. Now im in good shape with good changes.
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Same here. I end up having a hybrid of One Minute Changes and Chord Perfect. Often Iāll intentionally slow down and pick out each string just to confirm that everything is ringing true before I speed up again.
These exercises for me are all about muscle memory. Once your fingers have learned where you want them to be then the speed is established and quality will increase throughout the process.
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I have noticed that. Fewer muted string, less missed string, etc. Making the changes isnāt as overwhelming as it was at first so I can focus better. Justin said sloppy was okay for now and it sounds like he addresses this later.
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