03/15/2024
The importance of our voice and how we take it for granted.
Recently I took an amazing trip to facilitate a workshop along side amazing colleagues and human beings for an incredible group of souls. As usual, I learned just as much as I poured out for my people, and in the process of the journey, my voice decided it was time to take a break from speaking. Not only was it excruciatingly painful to talk, but to drink, to eat… you get the point. Left me being very mindful of how I was using my voice box, and if I was going to use it, it needed to be important, specific, and really count, because I couldn’t say too many words, and every single one of them would hurt so much!
Then came the flight home, and not only was I voice challenged, but my beloved hearing was now submerged in a virtual water tank… I lost quite some frequency ranges all around it.
As days went by nothing improved, stayed just as painful and muffled, so the awareness exercise also got deeper.
I started to rely on other senses, to get closer to objects and people to feel the sound, and still make my words count. It made me so grateful of every bit of relief I’d get from the raw pain that kept tearing my throat into shreds (or so it felt), only to feel it strengthen again. It made me grateful for every tiny “pop” in my ears that would give me a couple decibels back… but funny enough, it made me more appreciative of silence too!
Silence, when I have had so much to say and process from the last trip, when I usually go straight back into life, when I have work engagements that depend on my voice being 100%, when a lot of my job gets delivered through my voice, when I have relied on making noise sometimes without being so mindful of the why…
Here I am, being grateful for silence… Grateful for spaces to process… Grateful for spaces to listen to the inner sounds more than outer ones. And plain out grateful for voices. And yes, being so much more aware of how I’ve taken it for granted! Our voices are always there and we forget how powerful they can be.
As a singer, you tend to be more aware of the voice not only as a body part, but as an instrument. You can consciusly bend it and shape it at will, because you’ve spent the time with it. But you also forget it can go away… kinda like an athlete getting injured on the court and having to sit it out for a bit, also knowing what it will take to gain the muscle strength back. Yeah… But then it comes back again, with work, patience, love, and a whole lot more awareness and wisdom!
So while I sit this one out, and mindfully choose the sounds that come out of me during the healing process (especially during my 5 year old son’s meltdowns), I invite you to look into the sounds and words you make every day. Are you saying what you mean? Are you saying things that count? Are you adding something nurturing to the conversation? Are you hurting yourself or others with your expressions just for the sake of being part of a word exchange? Is it worth it? Or more so, how are you using your silences? How are you using your moments to process? Are you really listening to yourself and others before you emit an answer? Remember, you do have all that power within you…
Much love, till we speak again…
Yeshiva~
"Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless." -Mother Teresa
