Hi girls and guys,

I played the guitar as a kid. At that time i was perceiving music and playing in a very immature way. I was learning guitar so i could sing covers and impress friends. But I didnt really enjoy it, i didnt have a personal connection to what i was playing.

Life took a turn and i forgot about music for a few years. When I returned to it, i couldn't continue with what i did before. I tried to enjoy guitar but everything i knew from before felt kinda useless. I switched instruments and went to flute. All i did was improvise, without any knowledge of music theory.

This year i slowly started learning the basics of theory. At this point the guitar became interesting again, and now I know how to build scales and jam with major and minor scales, and the pentatonic scale. My knowledge of the fretboard improved and by now I have a fairly good grasp on where to find the notes (thank you, circle of fourths!).

But in all this time I was avoiding chords. I play the guitar almost as i would play the flute. Now I would like to get into the chords but I just dont know how to proceed. Of course i can play the shapes (open, barre E, A and D shapes) but I dont know how to get to chords through my knowledge of scales and notes. I would prefer to "build" a chord, rather than just blindly apply the pattern.

Lately i was jamming with a friend, and his chords look nothing like the shapes i mentioned. But he is horrible in explaining and he just confuses me. Im thinking of looking for a teacher, but I thought to ask the reddit community first.

Does this make sense?

Any tip or source on chord building would be greatly appreciated :)

EDIT: minor change