To make a long story short, I have picked up the guitar after years of letting them collect dust.  I never was a guitar player. I bought a couple 8-9 years ago, taught myself to play a little and then I had a tragedy strike that made me not want to touch a guitar.  Recently i decided to start again and remembered one of the things I was struggling with..barre chords.  How the f#$@% do you play them with any consistency? Does anyone know any tricks or tips for such things? 

I've always admired the ones who can use their thumb as a "workaround" (pressing the low E string with their thumb). :o) I've never learned to do it.
 
I think in many cases it's up to the instrument and strings. Strings too high or too thick can make barre-chords really, really difficult.
 
But otherwise, I think there are no tricks, you just learn it or you don't. Luckily I have slim and straight fingers and barre is no problem for me. Of course, it took many years to make them come effortlessly.
 
I'm sure they are hard if your fingers are short, thick, curved or have big joints.
 
 

Practice practice practice!  You need to build your hand strength up.  The only really good way to do it is to play as much as you possible can!!
 
Learn the CAGED system and you won't need to use bar chords as much too.
 
Keith

The kind of neck on the guitar makes a huge difference. Different manufacturers and models have different radii/radiuses.
 

LOL. I think it's simply a matter of strengthening the muscles and co-ordination (and callouses).
They're really not that hard to play once you've practiced and played them 374,668,472,848,814,000 times or so. :)
 
A capo on the first fret may help a little as it generally lowers the strings.
 

I kind of figured there were no real short cuts per say, but you never know.  It was like night and day when i learned I was pressing too hard on the strings

A couple tricks are simple...
 
   First, to get the "sound" start with just 2 fingers across 3 strings and build up from there. The root, 5th, and octave are used a LOT in music, and is a great place to start (and add the higher strings as you gain proficiency).
 
   Second... get the pattern of the Bm chord learned well... When the root is on the low E, it is a major chord, when the root is on the A string, is it a minor chord. That finger pattern is your best friend for barre chords (regardless of root).
 
   Major chords rooted on the E string are the Bm "pattern"... pull off the middle finger and is the minor chord.
   Minor chords rooted on the A string are the Bm pattern moved around, and can "cheat" to play the major chord by using 2 fingers on the middle 4 strings.
 
   As noted in previous posts, practice is the key element, especially the finger pattern of Bm... many barre chords used in music are not "full" chords but often take advantage of only the lower 3 or 4 strings. For the sake of simplicity and learning, I would recommend starting there, and build up as you go.
 
   Edit: Oh, and when learning... is easiest on the fingers on an electric guitar (by far); and if on an acoustic, closer to the nut (especially if the neck has any type of bow to it!)

Thanks to all so far, especially metelus.  I have an acoustic and electric.  I have been trying this mostly with acoustic but I think i will take your advice and practice on electric more for this sort of thing until I get used to it.

Most folks actually stop playing because of the pain to build up the callouses in the finger tips. Acoustic guitars are strung a lot tighter, and to fret them can be painful (and extremely challenging for your index finger in a barre chord).
 
Learning on the electric is highly recommended... you can focus on your technique, build callouses and finger strength, and not worry about anyone hearing you if you do not plug it in (that is actually a selling point for some by itself! )

dubdisciple
To make a long story short, I have picked up the guitar after years of letting them collect dust.  I never was a guitar player. I bought a couple 8-9 years ago, taught myself to play a little and then I had a tragedy strike that made me not want to touch a guitar.  Recently i decided to start again and remembered one of the things I was struggling with..barre chords.  How the f#$@% do you play them with any consistency? Does anyone know any tricks or tips for such things? 

Hey dub, how about I make YOU laugh?
 
I've got a pretty good musical track record....3/4 of which I never share with the forum unless I get asked specific questions or feel the need to explain something from experience.
 
That said, I suffer from the same thing you do. As a matter of fact, I suffered from barre chords so bad, when I was 12 years old, I sort of came up with my own way of tuning and to this day, it's how I play because I can barely play in standard tuning. So if you've ever heard me play, that's all done in a goofy tuning that would make you and any other guitarist laugh their butts off. :) I never wanted to be a virtuoso guitarist....I never wanted to learn theory....I never even thought I'd be interested in playing lead guitar and I NEVER though I'd have to learn crazy chords.
 
Well, I'm still not a virtuoso and don't want to learn theory, but I have become a decent lead guitarist with a nice arsenal of crazy sounding chords due to the goofy tuning I use. So some of the things I never though would happen, sort of happened....which has been a nightmare and a challenge.
 
I have always been a hard worker my entire life always trying my best to be as good as I could be with something. In that way of thinking, my motto has become "work smarter, not harder". My jacked up tuning is useless playing covers (unless they are rock chords etc) but it allows me to play barre chords with one finger. From there, because I have been at this so long, with my 3 remaining fingers, I can do things players tuned in standard cannot while playing a barre chord. My 3 remaining fingers can dance inside a barre chord voicing and get pretty technical while staying in the chord.
 
I don't know about you, but all I ever wanted to do was play what I heard in my head. I never expected to be where I am to be honest....I just wanted to be able to make....hmm...."noise that made sense" to me...and that's exactly what I do.
 
The object for me was to tune to an already made chord of my choice. From there, just moving that one finger gives you another chord voicing. If you tuned in barre chords you could play some cool things as well as barre chords with one finger. You could even do two finger power chords. All this stuff appears in 95% of the rock tunes of all time. You may have problems with heavy chord voicings like say "Diary of a Madman" by Ozzy or "Stairway" or something that has lots of open droned notes and crazy "conventional" chords. But if you want to make noise/music and don't feel like learning tons of theory or practicing barre chord forms until you can move your hands without your fingers losing position, pick a chord sound you like and tune your guitar to that chord and see how you fair. At the end of the day, if you're playing and getting the ideas out of your head, you're right where you want to be.
 
I've been doing this one finger barre chord thing for many years. I've won many guitar competitions and have seen thousands of people shaking their heads wondering what the hell I was playing. I've had guys come up to me and say "dude, I know that song and it doesn't look like that...are you faking it with a CD playing in the back somewhere?" and I've had teachers and colleagues tell me "it matters not how you tune, as long as you play the right notes."
 
So be creative brother...tune to something to where it makes things easier on you. It will be a nightmare for lead playing if you decide to go that route (I can play lead like a lunatic in standard tuning...the positions are soooo much easier than in my goofy tuning) but for chords, you'll be making music in no time.
 
I once had a lesson plan that I was doing years ago. I would bet any new student that I'd have him playing 5 songs in 30 minutes. I think it's too easy to get so wrapped up in theory and mechanics that it can push someone away from wanting to play. There are times when theory is essential, other times people just want to make noise and write what they hear in their heads. I started that way...then decided to pick up a little theory and just built on things from there. But give it a try....you may just enjoy things that way. Pick a chord and tune the guitar from low to high to that chord. Do it in E or low D. It's a blast...and the chords you come up with...will be hard for anyone else to cop in standard tuning unless they know how you are tuned. That's another cool thing about my tuning....only a handful of people know what the actual tuning is on each string. So when others see it, they are like a dog tilting his head sideways totally cornfused. LOL! :) Good luck man!
 
-Danny