Learning the guitar

I've been taking weekly guitar lessons for 9 months now and have progressed from muffled plunking sounds to distinguishable chords and strums. At several points I had wanted to give up, especially when I compared myself with classmates who seem to move nimbly and effortlessly between chords and rhythms and wondered if I was ever going to get there. But when I thought of how far I had come - from ground zero to being able to play simple songs and rhythms - I take heart. Now I am grappling with finger plucking and hammer-ons (it's creating a new and higher note by hammering down on an already ringing string on a new fret) and feel that I am standing at the foot of another mountain. Getting one finger to straddle 3 strings on a fret and pulling off a hammer-on seems an impossible task to me. I am learning about perseverance - maybe this time I'll get there sooner than 9 months!