Oh hey, I know that feel. I'm spending about 4 - 6 hours on my days off just practicing my guitar chops now. I spend most of the rest of the day listening to music, watching video lessons, etc. I still put in about 2 hours even on days when I'm working. I finally got myself a nice guitar with my tax refund, but it weighs a ton, and I'm starting to get some minor back problems. Womp womp.

Have you ever read The Practice of Practice? I got it on a whim a few weeks ago and it sort of rocked my world - the actual practical advice is helpful and all and it's made my practice sessions more fruitful, but the big thunderbolt moment for me was the chapter (6) on talent.

He talks a lot about the research of Carol Dweck, whose main interest is the negative effect that praise and the perception of talent (or ability) as innate/fixed has on our growth and sense of self worth. This blog's summary is kind of new-age-y, but it was really well explained in the book, and took me down a whole bunch of pegs. The author basically had a laundry list of all my bad habits, self-worth issues, and excuses for not putting more of myself into my music, while also making me feel a lot more comfortable about where I already am as a musician. It lit a pretty big fire under my ass, but also helped me feel more interested in live performance again.

I've played music in public twice since I moved to Portland about 1.5 years ago - once was at an open mic a year ago, which I completely bombed, and the other time was at cgod's house a few weeks ago before D&D, just because I saw his guitar laying around and had some time to kill. The latter was quite nice, mostly because nobody was really listening that much, or expecting anything.

It's been a while since playing music for people was fun for me, mostly because my chops fell by the wayside when I started recording music and had infinite takes to get things right. I get really nervous when I play, especially if it's my own music, largely because I feel like my skills are never where they should be, or the music doesn't sound the same live as it does recorded. I finally realized that it does not matter one fucking bit what the recorded music sounds like, because NOBODY will have heard it in whatever coffee shop I'm playing in. The only one expecting the song to sound a certain way is me, because I'm the only one with an idea of what it "should" be, and what all the other instruments would be doing if they were there. It's helpful for me to remember that music is not at all high stakes, and most people aren't paying attention to me anyway.

Not sure if you play live music, so not sure what use this will be to you, but this combines both music and other people rambling about their emotions, so I figure it may be of interest ;).

I would definitely recommend the above book, if just for that chapter alone. It's on Audible as well, if that helps at all.