A comment or two from the student's perspective. Rick, you're absolutely right about trying to change ingrained bad playing habits. I started playing guitar self-taught in high school. After I dropped out of college I decided to take some lessons because I had "hit the wall" and couldn't get better no matter what I tried. The first lesson, my teacher showed me the proper way to hold the pick. I went through two frustrating weeks trying to unlearn the bad way and learn the good. For a while I couldn't do either. Finally I got it and it made a big difference, but I almost quit playing entirely.

Recently, I started playing the fiddle and took lessons almost from the start. I got really frustrated because I was always comparing my playing to my teacher's. It seemed like I would never get it. Then I went to Irish Week at the Augusta Heritage Center and took a beginning fiddle class. Amazingly, I was about in the middle of the class in terms of ability. I came home feeling much better about myself. I went back this past summer and took another beginning fiddle class with another instructor and, lo and behold, I was near the top of the class and was able to help a couple of the other students.

I think the lesson from this is you are neither as good or as bad as you think you are. There will always be people who play better or worse. Learn from the former and help the latter. You'll learn from that too.