When I was studying music as a kid, just the word “intervals” would make me groan. “Ah, crap… I get it. It’s the distance between two notes. Whooooo cares!?”
But the longer I played, the more I realized that my sight reading skills and ability to understand the construction of a song all thoroughly depended on what I’d learned about intervals. The longer you play, and especially on guitar, the more you’ll think in terms of intervals than note names.
By the way, if you’re not yet familiar with how to read all the notes on your fretboard, that will help to give you an even better understanding of the stuff we’re talking about here. Check out my easy fretboard reading trick here.