If you want to master the drums, there’s a mindset that you absolutely must have in order to ever see success. This has nothing to do with any particular techniques, drumming skills, or hacks. Instead, it’s an across-the-board mindset that applies itself to everything you ever do.

I’ll share with you this mindset, which will help you out big time if you’ve ever felt like you lack talent. Then we’ll wrap up with 3 super key things you can practice right now to get the fastest possible results on the drums.

Here’s what the big mindset is:

You have to be patient.

Without patience, you’ll never reach the potential that you’re capable of. But I get it! Patience is hard when progress is slow and you begin wondering if you lack talent.

Maybe you’ve started late in the game, and you’re afraid you’re simply too old to learn the drums. (Believe me, you’re NOT. I have students in their 60s, 70s, and 80s who...

Why is it that some people get really good at certain things, and others don’t? I remember being in 8th grade and wanting so badly to get good at basketball, but I just never could. What were the other guys doing differently from me? They were all in better shape, more buff, and just seemed to understand the sport better. Even though I tried hard and even worked on my technique and my free throws, I just never became any good at it.

Then I got serious about drums in high school and quickly got way better at music than sports. Why did that happen? Why is it there are certain things we get good at quickly…and other things that just take forever?

Maybe you’re in that boat where you feel like learning drums is taking too long. You feel like you should have reached a more solid level of mastery by now, but time keeps ticking and you’re not sure you’ve grown as fast as you should have.

Well, in my personal opinion, there are 4 things that must...

“Yeah… he…um- definitely has some…potential,” the music store employee gingerly observed after I laid down my very first sick beats on a real drumset.

The only problem was, my 12-year-old beats were not sick. At least not in a good way. I had no coordination and no idea how to hold my sticks. I actually remember just hitting everything I could as fast as I could in my nervous excitement. After all, I didn’t know when my next opportunity might be. Getting a drumset was way out of my reach. I was already pretty involved with playing piano, which I’d been learning since 3rd grade. My parents weren’t eager to sign me up for a second instrument, and I doubt they wanted the noise around the house either. Playing the drums and becoming a drummer was a very, very far-off dream at the time. Getting a drumset wasn’t going to be a quick and easy process for me…

Everybody dreams of something. Maybe you dream of retiring so you have...

Here’s the big thing I’m alluding to in the title… the one thing you need to possess in order to succeed on the drums…

It’s curiosity.

What do I mean?

Think back to when you were a kid. (This has been a fun daydreaming exercise lately, seeing as how life seemed so much easier back then!) Remember when you had an interest in something. Maybe it was the drums… Maybe it was drawing… Maybe it was rock polishing… Maybe it was digging holes in the back yard. What was the driving force behind all of these activities?

Curiosity.

What does curiosity do? It drives you to try things, to experiment, and to explore. As a kid you were curious about everything. The whole world was new to you, and everything was an exciting adventure.

Think back to the first time you listened to a record you liked. I bet that was a huge adventure of an experience. Remember the first time you listened to music and were emotionally moved by it....