To play "Simple Man" by Lynyrd Skynyrd on acoustic guitar, the song mainly uses three chords: C major, G major, and A minor. The progression of these chords repeats throughout the song. Beginners should first practice transitioning smoothly between these chords. The typical picking pattern for the song involves arpeggiating the chords, playing individual strings in a steady pattern rather than strumming all at once. For example, the arpeggio pattern for the C and Am chords involves playing strings in the sequence: 5th (A), 3rd (G), 4th (D), 5th (A) strings, and so forth. The G chord picking pattern varies slightly but follows a similar finger movement. For beginners, it's helpful to practice the chords with simple strumming before advancing to the arpeggio picking patterns. Also, the song is often played in standard tuning, although the original is slightly down-tuned. Overall, a good practice approach is to cycle through the chord progression (C, G, Am) repeatedly, first with basic strumming and then incorporating the fingerpicking/arpeggio pattern slowly, increasing speed as comfort improves.

If desired, a simple tab or a tutorial video can help visualize the picking and chord shapes. Would a step-by-step tab or video recommendation be helpful?