The middle ground of skill acquirement is to joyfully experiment with little care to the outcome. Given a slight direction of where this practice is to go, and then to take immense heart and keep it away from identifying with slight failures in learning as a commentary on you as an persona. This playful state normally arrives when the self-imposed (or otherwise) stakes are less. This sets oneself up for flow and allows a childlike self to express across the whole time in doing so. The very backbone of our understanding and interaction with reality was born from the playful meddling of the child, if it worked then, it would work even better now. These mental blockades and pre-conceived notions of how one should be progressing are built from the homogenisation of the schooling and cooperate systems, it has its place, and that place is elsewhere from skill acquisition.
Meditate.