The best place for your hand when strumming the guitar.
This would have to be as close to the bridge of the guitar as possible, so that if needed, your palm could rest on the bridge of the guitar. While many acoustic guitar players have taken to strumming the guitar very close to the fretboard side of the guitars body, and no one can fault them for that, seeing as they have somehow made that technique of strumming work for them, there are some strumming and picking techniques that they're missing out on because of this.
Right hand guitar techniques such as palm muting and picking with a plectrum become very difficult for a beginner guitar player to master when the plectrum hand is held so far away.
The bridge of the guitar serves as an excellent resting place for the right hand, or left hand if you're left handed, from which to launch yourself into all sorts of strums, as well as give you added control over any other maneuvers you may want to try.
The correct strumming action.
The correct way to strum is to allow most of the strumming motion to come from your elbow. Perhaps a better way to explain this is to tell you how not to strum the guitar.
Strumming the guitar should not involve too much wrist action. While there may be a small movement made with the wrist, the bulk of the strum is initiated with the forearm. This way, the hand moves as parallel to the surface of the guitars body as possible.
The only time the wrist is used is when skipping strings while picking the notes of a chord, or when playing palm muted chords. Even with palm muted chords there is a fair amount of action at the elbow joint.
This guitar strumming technique may look like you have to constantly monitor yourself when practicing how to strum a guitar, but after a little while you won't even have to think about it. Once strumming the guitar is mastered, it becomes second nature.
Easier strumming by holding the plectrum correctly.
By holding the plectrum properly, you'll have an easier time with strumming. The plectrum is held between the thumb and forefinger so that only about a third of the plectrum is protruding past your fingers. What this does is make sure that the plectrum doesn't dig too deeply into the strings, so there's less resistance to the strum. It also sounds a lot better when you do it this way.
