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In a seated position, move your dominant leg slightly forward and bend your knee to place your foot flat on the floor. Place the guitar on your thigh, orienting it so that the strings are facing away from you and the head (the small tip of the guitar) is pointing in the opposite direction from your dominant side.  Keep the guitar upright and hold the back of it close enough to you that it touches your stomach and chest while resting on your thigh. Use your non-dominant hand to hold the neck of the guitar. The neck is the long piece of wood that connects the head of the guitar to the body. If you have trouble balancing the guitar, attach a strap to the guitar and place it over your shoulder to make it easier to keep the guitar upright. Form a “V” shape with the thumb and forefinger of your non-dominant hand and place the guitar neck in that “V” to stabilize it. When you want to play the guitar, press your thumb flat against the back of the neck and use your fingertips to press down on the strings.  Avoid hooking your thumb over the top of the neck, even if it feels more natural to grip the guitar this way; doing this will cause you to grip the guitar with too much force and will limit the reach of your fretting fingers. The flat side of the neck is called the fretboard because it’s inlaid with metal frets that indicate where to put your fingers to play specific notes. the names and numbers for the different strings of the guitar. In order from thickest to thinnest, the strings of the guitar are named E, A, D, G, B, and e. The strings are also numbered from thinnest to thickest so that the e string is also called the 1st string and the E string is called the 6th string.  The strings descend in pitch from 1st string to 6th string, so the E string is the lowest in pitch, while the e string is the highest. It’s important to remember the names and numbers of your guitar strings to be able to read tabs and talk about specific notes. Try using a mnemonic device to remember the guitar strings, such as “Eddie And Debbie Got Brown eggs.” with a firm but comfortable grip. A pick is a small piece of plastic used to strum the guitar or play individual notes. To hold the pick, grip it between the thumb and index finger on your strumming hand and orient it so that it’s perpendicular to your fist. Your grip should be firm enough to hold the pick in place while you’re playing, but not so tight that it’s uncomfortable.  Your thumb and finger should cover about ⅔ of the pick, leaving a little more than ⅓ of it sticking out of your hand. You don’t necessarily have to use a pick to play the electric guitar, but you should definitely hold the pick in a comfortable and proper way if you use it. Use your strumming hand to strum all 6 strings at the same time in a downward stroke and do this until it feels natural. Once you’re comfortable with downstroke strumming, practice strumming all 6 with an upward stroke as well.  If you don't want to be too loud while practicing your strumming, you can simply “mute” the strings by lightly touching them with your fretting hand so that no sound is produced when you play. Strum the guitar by moving your wrist up and down rather than by moving your whole arm up and down. This will make your strumming more energy efficient and reduce your risk of injury in the long run. Once you’ve gotten the hang of performing downstrokes and upstrokes individually, try strumming the guitar in a downstroke-upstroke-downstroke-upstroke pattern until you’ve gotten the feel of it. To play a note on the guitar, press your finger down between the frets on the fretboard; this is called "fretting the strings." While pressing down 1 or more strings with your fretting hand, strum the guitar with your other hand. This will help you get used to doing 2 separate things with your hands at the same time.  Don’t press down on the frets themselves, as this will produce a buzzing sound instead of the note you were trying to play. Only press down on the strings as hard as is needed to produce a clean note. If you press down too lightly, the string will buzz. However, pressing down too hard will only put more strain than necessary on your fingers. Don’t worry about playing chords yet; just focus on getting the basic movements down first! Although your fingers will definitely be sore when you’re first starting out, this pain will go away after enough time. Use ice water or rubbing alcohol treatments to minimize finger pain when you experience it. Remind yourself that the pain is only temporary to avoid letting it discourage you from continuing to play guitar.  Your fingertips will eventually grow calluses that make playing guitar a lot less painful. Calluses usually take at least a month or 2 to grow, so don’t feel discouraged if they don’t grow immediately! Apply rubbing alcohol to your fingers 3 times a day for a week to encourage calluses to grow faster.
Balance the body of the guitar on top of your dominant thigh to hold it. Grip the neck using your thumb and forefinger. Memorize Hold your pick Play the guitar without fretting any strings to practice your strumming. Practice strumming and fretting the strings at the same time. Dip your fingertips in ice water or rubbing alcohol to manage finger pain.