[Enjoy the Ukulele Even More!] For Those Who Don’t Have Time to Practice

Hello, this is Conservario.
You've bought a ukulele, you've got a lesson book, but you're just too busy to practice...
Time can't be bought with money, so it's a tough problem.
However, even if you can't buy time, anyone can "make time."
Here, we’ll share how to create practice time and introduce exercises you can do even in short periods.

■ For Those Who Don’t Have Time to Practice!

Let me start with the most important point:
“Even if you only have one minute, even if you don’t have your ukulele with you, you can still practice.”
Change the way you think about practice.
When it comes to practicing an instrument, it’s easy to assume there are lots of complicated steps involved.
Keeping your nails trimmed, taking the ukulele out of its case, attaching the strap, tuning it, opening your sheet music, preparing a YouTube lesson video...
Many people think they can't practice the ukulele unless they follow all these steps perfectly.
Of course, all of those steps are important—but it’s totally fine to skip the hassle.
You might be thinking, “Is that really okay!?” or “Won’t I stop improving?”—but don’t worry.
Rather than letting the hassle stop you from playing altogether, you’ll definitely improve more by playing every day, even if your tuning or form isn’t perfect.
Even just pressing a chord and strumming once—that’s enough.
The key is to make touching your ukulele every day a habit.
Once it becomes as routine as brushing your teeth, improvement will come in no time.
Still thinking, “But I really don’t have time…”?
Do you truly not have even a single second of free time?
“If that’s the case, then stop reading this column right now and start practicing!”
If you followed that advice, congrats—you just made practice time!
Of course, I’d love for you to read to the end, but what matters most is that you improve.
To those still reading… thank you so much.
We’re only about halfway through this column, so I hope you’ll stick around to the end (haha).

Now, let’s flip the perspective for a moment.
“If you had plenty of time to practice, would anyone be able to get better?”
My answer is no.
Spending hours on meaningless practice yields very little result.
It’s not completely wasted, but it can be inefficient—or worse, even make you play worse.
Specifically, practicing things that are too easy or too difficult isn’t effective.
I don’t recommend beginners diving into complex "Jaka-solo" styles full of tension chords and wild fingerboard movement.
That path often leads to messy playing—both in sound and form.
On the flip side, it wouldn’t make sense for an advanced player to spend 8 hours practicing super simple songs or chords either.

Of course, reviewing the basics is important—even for top-level players—so doing it once a year or every few months is definitely worthwhile.
However, it shouldn’t be the main focus of your practice.
The best approach is to have a decent amount of time and tailor your practice to your level and interests.
Doing a bit of both singing while playing and solo ukulele is probably the safest, most balanced way to go.
Of course, it’s totally fine to focus on just one, but these two styles aren’t completely unrelated—they can complement each other.
The chord shapes you learn through singing while playing can be used directly in solo ukulele.
Likewise, the arpeggios you pick up through solo ukulele work just as well in singing performances.
If you’ve only been focusing on one style lately, try adding just a little of the other into your regular practice.
I don’t know who your musical heroes are—but chances are, they can probably do both.
To wrap things up, here’s a list of practice ideas you can do in just one minute.

• Try pressing a new chord (Even without your ukulele—just form the shape in the air)
• Practice a new strumming pattern (Again, no ukulele needed—just move your hand in front of you)
• Look up a major scale (In a book or online)
• Learn how chords are constructed (Books or online resources are great for this)
• Listen to a professional performance (On YouTube or live)
• Watch a professional performance (On YouTube or live)
• Look up a new technique (like hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, etc.)
• Listen to a song you love (doesn’t have to be related to ukulele at all)
• Read one page of a lesson book (Skip any sheet music you’re not in the mood to play)
• Visualize the kind of performance you want to give (mental practice is powerful!)

Here are 10 recommended practice ideas.
And honestly, you could probably come up with even more!
Even if you just do one of these every day, in a few months—or a year—you’ll have improved a lot.

■ Summary

We’ve covered a variety of ways to think about practice and different practice methods—did you find something that suits you?
With the right mindset and a little creativity, you can make time to practice—and you can get better.
What matters more than how long you practice is how focused your practice is.
Mindlessly noodling around can actually be worse than not practicing at all.
That’s because it leads to the mindset of, “Well, I’ve been playing a lot, so I should be getting better, right?”
So, make your daily practice meaningful—even just a little at a time.
Thank you so much for reading to the end!

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