On the plus side @Hann you’re 16 years ahead of me. So imagine how awesome you’ll be on bass by the time you get to my age.
The past is gone. The future is BASS 
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I am aware of it…
I’m just ranting a bit, because that’s the purpose of the thread 
I am glad that I started now and did not wait any longer (and I’m sure I would start sooner or later anyway, bass IS my calling)
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Correction: YOU ARE A BASS PLAYER!!! 1,000%
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You’re a bass player, period.
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Hann, you are a REAL musician, a bass player, because you want to be and you’re working hard to be.
It’s shameful behavior by your father, but many got little or negative support from their fathers. I got no support to learn guitar when I was a young teenager. I had to save every penny I could to buy a crappy $40 acoustic and a beginner book. And then I got nothing but grief from my dad for “wasting money and time.”
But I wanted to be a musician and I worked on that guitar until my fingers bled.
I knew I’d never be famous as a guitar player, but that didn’t matter. I was happiest when I was playing, by myself or with my friends.
Being a musician is a life choice. You have made yours. Be happy. You’re playing now.
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Thank you for sharing that. I think there’s a big pile of us that feel that way-me for sure anyway. I had a really bad experience with music as a child, and it really put me off even trying to learn.
There were many roadblocks ( Many of them were self-inflicted ) to me learning anything about music.
-still fail miserably at reading music
-giant sausage fingers
-lack of natural ability
-multiple sclerosis leading to hand numbness
-memory problems
-fear of failure and humiliation.
See, that last one is the real issue. That’s the bad one. Being afraid to let other people hear me play, or to play with other people in any setting- because not being able to play well/define chord structure/read by sight/remember what i was just doing is a very real thing for me.
I’m very lucky, i really am. I’ve gotten to attempt to do something i always secretly wanted to do, and sometimes it doesn’t even sound like it’s my first time picking up my bass-and that’s a huge gift.
But that doesn’t take away that fear, or the ways i can self-sabotage to cause myself to just give up.
Thank you so much for opening up. It’s always good to know that it’s not just me.
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Ha, I feel I have been an imposter for most of my professional life 
I guess, feeling like an imposter when you endeavor anything just means you have a conscience… and it likely also means “you are clearly not an imposter”, which just shows that most of this is a trick your mind is playing on you.
A lot of good input here! Let me just re-iterate:
- being able to and having the opportunity to play music is a gift we should cherish; no matter at which level, which genre, which instrument or with whom
- find the right people to play with - they are out there, whether you are 20 and trying to become a professional, or 60+ and just want to have fun
- immerse yourself into everything “music” as much as you want, or don’t. Trivia is fun, but there is no reason to know the names of all members of the Cure to play their music etc. No reason to learn all modes to have fun playing music (see threads elsewhere) and so on
- playing with others is the ultimate; but nowadays, almost everything can also be done from the comfort of your home/man cave/shed - ordering stuff, finding sheet music, finding backing tracks, sharing music, getting input, getting instructions, … so even if you feel shy, insecure, challenged by imposter syndrome - you can still enjoy music and playing music to the fullest.
About feeling insecure - this is still one of my favorite quotes:
No one can make you feel insecure without your consent (Eleanore Roosevelt)
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If people think you’re a font of wisdom and creativity, take that win because they clearly value what you have to say even if you don’t agree in the moment 
I had terrible imposter syndrome in my career many moons ago, and it was only until I was out of it and talking to a former colleague about how imposter-syndromey I felt the whole time, that he said to me “but you were really good at your job and the most helpful out of the whole team”. Then he told me he had imposter syndrome too, but to me he was great at his job!
It was only when I reached my 40s that I realised I had to take the wins, because on some level I did deserve them.
Every.single.person. I know who says they have imposter syndrome about something they do are actually quite good at, or extremely invested, or sharing what they know. Personally I prefer to be around this kind of person rather than the “I know everything I’m so amazing!” sorts who don’t share their knowledge or help people in a meaningful way.
I hope you have plenty of the good days
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I think this feeling is deep inside almost everyone with something. I relate to you my own struggle since I myself love music but was never encouraged to pursue it. At age 13 I wanted to play guitar but my parents stressed academics & for that I’m grateful because my engineering career has been great. But I feel I missed an opportunity or perhaps was denied an opportunity.
But I’m the type who won’t be denied a chance to try to do something I want to do even if I was never really meant to do it. So at age 52 I decided I needed to finally get my black belt in mixed martial arts & help my kids get theirs in judo. That has been accomplished and am both proud & grateful. Then at age 60 I said I will attempt to play the bass & if it’s not meant to be then I will have to accept that.
So I got the B2B course & it set me on my way. It laid the foundation to play & I am also taking some in person lessons. Now at age 62 I can play “somewhat” decent but have the rest of my life to improve because I love it.
I know I will never be great & I’m ok with that. My family likes to hear me play at times but I really don’t have the gift to write anything since it’s just not in me. There are great days where it seems I just can’t make a error playing & days where I just need to walk away because it’s just not working. The great days are far fewer then the days it’s just not working well.
Sorry to ramble but I guess my message is that nothing is beyond anyone & age really is just a number. Your past & the lack of opportunity is not a wall that can’t be climbed over or knocked down. Wisdom & experience in life as we get older does give us more determination, discipline & motivation with the things that really matter to us. I hope any of my own experience with music is helpful in any way for you.
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Your post reminds me a bit of Baz Luhrmans - Everybody is free to wear sunscreen. 
Age does bring wisdom and good to hear that you look back in a good way.
Keep on rockin’ da bass! 
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Hey everyone, I just wanted to say thank you for the overwhelming response to this thread! I’m glad it resonated with people.
I took a few days away from BassBuzz and bass in general to let the bad feelings pass (as they always do - that was the point I most wanted to make), and things have been going well since then.
Lots of quality jams with my spouse (new mixer with more space has really helped there), and I finally put together my first pedalboard!
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I love this post and appreciate your vulnerability, even if your topic is your heartache and frustration. I’ll tell you something I tell my 12 year-old (who, ahem, might take after me a little to much for his own good). And I’m sorry I couldn’t share this with 12 year-old you. “Perfect is the enemy of good.”
It’s admirable that you put so much respect on music. It’s awesome that you put so much intention into learning. But remind yourself that the entire study of music IS IN FACT the study of making noise and then asking ourselves if we liked the noise or not, and then asking ourselves why.
We didn’t evolve with music. We created it. By banging things together and plucking taut things and blowing through things until they made a sound we liked. Then we tweaked it and studied it and made more noises. And the most storied writers in music sure had a heyday talking about how bad synthesized sounds are. And the most storied reviewers have bubbled up literal centuries of bad takes on good sounds.
We set wishes and intentions for our children going through each school year. My number one wish for the aforementioned son is to “fail enthusiastically” through this school year. Try things. Make a dog’s breakfast of them. Be excited about them. And get back to learning and practice.
I’ll close with a thought I spare for myself any time I’m frustrated in my own bass practice:
Many of my favorite bands published their first record with VERY little idea of how to make a great record. And in many cases, I prefer that record to the more technically proficient work that followed. Consider, for example, The Cure.
You’re doing great. You’re worthy of creating and hearing noises that please you. Continue to fail, and be enthusiastic about it. Fail joyfully, if you can, too. 
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I respectfully must disagree that we didn’t evolve with music.
Yes, we created the instruments with the materials at hand in a given region (e.g., peoples from forested areas initially would beat on fallen tree trunks, hunters of big game would blow the horns of their prey, and plains dwellers would pluck the hide sinews of their bows, etc.).
But musical instruments were only a means to an end, tools for expressing the sounds mankind needed to voice. And those instruments and sounds evolved alongside mankind’s need to express more and more.
Musicians still gravitate to certain instruments that fulfill their expressive needs best. And multi-instrumentalists are multi-lingual in that regard.
But we have bass. So, yeah.
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Jesus, Mike. Sorry.
What i should’ve said from the beginning is “We didn’t evolve with the musical knowledge that we, as a species, currently possess, from day one. We created it as we evolved.”
I’ll be sure to use more words in the future so that my point is semantically buttoned up from every angle so that we people who generally agree on the intention of our posts can’t poke holes in it pedantically.
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As I said, I was just respectfully disagreeing with one statement in your thoughtful post. I apologize if that offended you.
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I admit I’m a little puzzled by your response here. You raised some good points in your response to me; Mike added others / went in a different direction & sussed some things out in the process. From where I’m sitting, his counter-point seemed like a contribution, not a criticism. Social issues & cultural history/prehistory are a heady mix; understandable that not everyone’s going to come at it the same way; hopefully this isn’t an impasse. 
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Not gonna lie. I had to use a dictionary search, but I appreciate @tcabeen adding “pedantically” to my vocabulary.
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When I was in junior high, I fancied myself a pedant, but I misspelled it regularly - as peNdant. Precocious little know-it-all calling herself a necklace.
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Easy now @booker_t, I think by using the word pedantic, you are at risk of being pedantic yourself 
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