I don’t know of any musician who will not cringe when you say they’re good.
What we hear is what they CAN play. What they hear is what they CANNOT play, but they’ll fight until they can. And that is a never-ending, very addictive cycle.
I think it was Horowitz who said, when asked why he was still practicing at age 93 “Because I feel that I’m improving!”
Ha!
I’d love for my mysterious skill level to maintain legendary proportions…
But just playing in the pocket.
Keeping the steadiest groove and not rushing the fill and hitting the next downbeat early.
Solid and clean and consistent 1/16ths when trying for the modern funk jams.
String crossing clean, especially at fast tempos.
And don’t even get me started on transcribing the mind-bending, crazy lines by the other stratospheric bass players of the world.
Finding the things to practice is never the challenge. Finding the things to practice that don’t make me feel like I should just pack it in - that’s the real challenge!
I feel slightly “R” word most of the time when I play. I certainly hope that goes away over time.
I saw a quote a few years ago by Pete Townshend who said he was finally getting good enough at guitar that he felt comfortable playing with other musicians.
Insecurities afflict us all
I’ve interviewed many world-class acoustic guitarists. Essentially, all of them can wow a crowd with their playing, but all of them wish they could play better.
I watched a great documentary about Bill Wyman, The Quiet One. All of the Stones considered him a tremendous bass player. Bill, himself, was humble throughout. He said he was lucky to be doing a job he loved, and happy to hang back with Charlie Watts as the other guys put on a show.
George Harrison said he never considered himself a real guitar player, not like he did Clapton. He said Clapton practiced all the time and was hardly ever without a guitar. George admitted he never played unless he was in the studio, and then, he would come up with the simplest fills or parts on the spot to get the job done.
Turns out, humans are human; we see ourselves as we see ourselves, while the world very likely can have a completely different perspective.
A tiny update since I posted this: I have done approximately 30 minutes of practice the last three days, which is basically one lesson and the three workouts per day. So far, I’m feeling pretty good in this routine. I have my alarm set for 7pm every day and it’s labeled ‘Bass Practice’, and I just stop what I’m doing and load up the next lesson. I think there was one lesson that tripped me up a bit, but I slowed each workout video down and just powered through and then called it good after reaching the fast workout. I’m going to keep this up and see what happens.
I still haven’t gone back to Billie Jean, though. I’m not quite ready to get back on that musical horse just yet.
I think you got this. Fact is, I’m so sure you’ll become a bass badass that I’ll buy you lunch if it doesn’t happen.
Well done! Keep it up!
I ignored the Billie Jean fast workout for about a year after I finished B2B, then remembered I never beat it, went back, took about 5 minutes.
Don’t give ignoring it a second thought, keep thumping forward.
One day I will face it, but that day is not in the near future haha.
I actually nailed Billie Jean on the first go through. So, feeling cocky, I figured the rest would be a piece of cake. WRONG! “Red Clay” and “Under the Bridge” kicked my ass so hard I felt embarrassed, not for myself, but for my new little wife that had to suffer through the indignity of listening to me. As I moved past those with my tail between my legs, along came the slap and pop lesson. Or as I play it, the clank and crap segment. I can get a good pop sound once out of every twenty or so attempts. And my pops are almost non-existent. BUT, I will keep working at it over time. Eventually, it will click and I will end up being the first fat, 59 year old, bald, spandex wearing, leather vest wearing, sweating, leader of a speed metal grind thrash country rockabilly funk power trio but with 4 members (cause I like living on the edge). I will pout my lips, swish my hips and talk with a lispy British accent when in public. I think our name should be something along the lines of Spastic Sphincter or Lorelei loves Lumpia…either way, I will get better
Ahhh yes, another section I’m dreading. I tried following along to the BassBuzz video Josh posted. I don’t know if it’s me (probably is, most likely), my bass, or a combo of both, but I cannot for the life of me get a good slap sound. So now I’m just putting it off until it comes up in the course, haha.
Haha, I wish you luck with this endeavor!
And I will do it with pouty lips
Better than ducky lips.
Always playing more difficult music IS how I keep motivated 
I slow the piece down however slow I need to play it through well, it could be 50% for a fast piece that has a lot of movement between strings and then I gradually speed it up until I can play it at full speed. That could take 10 mins or an hour or several weeks! I also play other stuff at varying difficulties so some is easy and some is challenging but I can still play through it cleanly at full speed.
Also I don’t really get frustrated with things so that probably helps… my biggest problem is saying “ok, just one more time” for an hour when it’s 2am and I need to go to sleep 
When I first did the course, I could not get a good slap tone out of my bass no matter what I tried! I skipped it and came back later after I bought a Jazz bass that was significantly easier to slap on. I rarely play slap, I have other stuff that keeps me busy for now
Slap is a different animal entirely, i struggle with it. I actaully like playing it, but i stink.
I think the motivation to practice is getting some success. That is often easier to say than do.
When I would run into a lesson where I couldn’t do the jam, I would solve the problem as I always do. I’d break it into pieces and solve the pieces. Josh makes that fairly easy as that’s how he teaches each jam. So I’d go through the first part he taught and then go offline for a day or so just practicing that.
I’d get to a point where I could do that fairly confidently (though not necessarily super fast) and then I’d learn the next piece. Eventually I could put them all together and do OK on the slow workout. I could survive the medium workout and hit a few of the notes correctly for the fast workout.
The great thing about Josh’s course is you can go as fast or slow as you want. Some lessons may take a week to master. There is no pressure to do it at any specific speed. Take your time, try not to get frustrated and take joy in the small achievements.
I had my first moment of frustration when I got to Billy Jean section. Apparently not the first person to experience this. I think I started too late in the evening. I have no doubt I can play it - I’m close to playing the riff anyway - but I also need to know sometimes I will have to work at things for a bit before I feel good about it. Will work on it again this evening.