Singing is the pathway to healing + Podcast
June 27, 2020
I dream a lot. One of the things I often dream about is standing on a stage. The lights are bright on me and there are thousands of people in the crowd. Everybody is waiting in anticipation for what's going to happen next. And then everything becomes quiet and the music starts. I open my hands and I spread my arms and I look up and start to sing. The most beautiful voice comes out of me and my body tingles from toe to head. Whenever I wake up from that dream I always feel really happy.
Now I'm about to get all spiritual on you, so brace yourself…
I am far from an expert on the subject of chakras, but I know enough to be dangerous – for those who know the basics of how the chakra system works, there’s a chakra at the base of your spine – the others follow, rising up. The path follows on its way up through the abdomen, the chest, the heart, the throat and then into the third eye area and on up to the connection to the source.
The pathway is a journey.
I am far from an expert on the subject of chakras, but I know enough to be dangerous – for those who know the basics of how the chakra system works, there’s a chakra at the base of your spine – the others follow, rising up. The path follows on its way up through the abdomen, the chest, the heart, the throat and then into the third eye area and on up to the connection to the source.
The pathway is a journey.
Something else the chakra system does is work its way up through the colours of the rainbow – Red at the base, Orange, Yellow, Green at the heart, Blue at the throat, up to Indigo at the third eye, all leading to the Purple beyond our physical self.
While I'll leave it up to the Yogis to explain the intricacies of the whole and their relationship to each other and us, I'll be a little bit naughty and just pick out one.
Like most pathways, both physical and metaphorical, there tends to be a catch, a blockage, a bottleneck, something that is stopping the journey's progress. In the body, it is in the area where a uniformed shaped torso (where everything has had free-range), narrows after the shoulders, at the throat. Coincidentally, or maybe not so coincidentally, the colour at that point is blue.
While I'll leave it up to the Yogis to explain the intricacies of the whole and their relationship to each other and us, I'll be a little bit naughty and just pick out one.
Like most pathways, both physical and metaphorical, there tends to be a catch, a blockage, a bottleneck, something that is stopping the journey's progress. In the body, it is in the area where a uniformed shaped torso (where everything has had free-range), narrows after the shoulders, at the throat. Coincidentally, or maybe not so coincidentally, the colour at that point is blue.
Blue is the colour of healing. This is a place where things need to move past the obstacles to heal. Issues, challenges and blockages heal and dissolve, and move through this place.
I’ve always said that singing is the most healing thing – opening your voice and expressing yourself purely and truly helps remove the blocks, the things that are standing in our way – and quite often when we sing or speak or even moan and sigh, it is these vocalisations that help heal us, by chipping away at the hurt, the anger, the sorrow, the frustration, the grief, the resentment and many of the unsupportive emotions that bind us – these things need to be discarded.
The way we do this is by saying beautiful words and singing our hearts out – literally singing our hearts out, and sending the power of love (yes here I go) out into the world via our voice waves.
If we look at the archetypical mother – when the child has a fall, she sweeps it up in her arms and sings. The child doesn't care if she is out of tune, or has a nice tone or is hitting the high notes at full volume. The child just feels the love – feels better – feels healed by the power of its mother's love, that is channelled through her voice. Learning to love your voice is healing.
Ok, I'll stop there before I start on unicorns…
I’ve always said that singing is the most healing thing – opening your voice and expressing yourself purely and truly helps remove the blocks, the things that are standing in our way – and quite often when we sing or speak or even moan and sigh, it is these vocalisations that help heal us, by chipping away at the hurt, the anger, the sorrow, the frustration, the grief, the resentment and many of the unsupportive emotions that bind us – these things need to be discarded.
The way we do this is by saying beautiful words and singing our hearts out – literally singing our hearts out, and sending the power of love (yes here I go) out into the world via our voice waves.
If we look at the archetypical mother – when the child has a fall, she sweeps it up in her arms and sings. The child doesn't care if she is out of tune, or has a nice tone or is hitting the high notes at full volume. The child just feels the love – feels better – feels healed by the power of its mother's love, that is channelled through her voice. Learning to love your voice is healing.
Ok, I'll stop there before I start on unicorns…
Do I need a Singing Teacher? + Podcast
June 19, 2020
People often think that only professionals or school kids take singing classes. Learning to sing is like any other skill - cooking for example… – you can do it at home to nourish yourself, – you can entertain your family and friends at a dinner party, – or you can open an à la carte restaurant. So, do you want to nourish yourself, entertain your family and friends or go all the way?
…But do I need a singing teacher? Of course you do!Seriously though, needing a singing teacher depends what you want for your voice and how you want to nourish yourself.
There are as many reasons for wanting to improve your singing or speaking voice as there are people, and I suppose it’s like a lot of things, it depends what you put value on. Do you value your voice? (If not, I'd have to ask why not!)
If you are wanting to be a professional singer, then yes, singing lessons are a definite must. If you are wanting to have fun with your friends, then maybe taking singing lessons WITH your friends is what you need to do – it would certainly be fun and you never know, you might end up with your own garage band!
If you’re curious about your voice, that’s another great reason to have a singing lesson. If you’ve grown tired of taking French cooking, needlework or Spanish classes, then maybe singing lessons are the next thing you should try.
The thing about singing and singing classes are: they are meant to be fun.
If you were a child whose parents sent you off to piano and the teacher sat there with a ruler wrapping your knuckles every time you got something wrong, that’s not fun. Competitive singing is for very few people, so unless that’s the path you want to take, then singing should just be fun and enjoyable and make you feel good about yourself and make you feel good about your voice. I want you to LOVE YOUR VOICE.
If you want to be competitive – that's great – singing teachers can be very competitive, make no mistake about that! (insert evil singing teacher laugh here)
So the answer to the questions is, if you want any of those things, from fun to The Voice, then yes, have a singing lesson.
There are as many reasons for wanting to improve your singing or speaking voice as there are people, and I suppose it’s like a lot of things, it depends what you put value on. Do you value your voice? (If not, I'd have to ask why not!)
If you are wanting to be a professional singer, then yes, singing lessons are a definite must. If you are wanting to have fun with your friends, then maybe taking singing lessons WITH your friends is what you need to do – it would certainly be fun and you never know, you might end up with your own garage band!
If you’re curious about your voice, that’s another great reason to have a singing lesson. If you’ve grown tired of taking French cooking, needlework or Spanish classes, then maybe singing lessons are the next thing you should try.
The thing about singing and singing classes are: they are meant to be fun.
If you were a child whose parents sent you off to piano and the teacher sat there with a ruler wrapping your knuckles every time you got something wrong, that’s not fun. Competitive singing is for very few people, so unless that’s the path you want to take, then singing should just be fun and enjoyable and make you feel good about yourself and make you feel good about your voice. I want you to LOVE YOUR VOICE.
If you want to be competitive – that's great – singing teachers can be very competitive, make no mistake about that! (insert evil singing teacher laugh here)
So the answer to the questions is, if you want any of those things, from fun to The Voice, then yes, have a singing lesson.
Someone said I can't sing + Podcast
June 10, 2020
One of the most common things people say to me is 'my mum (dad/brother/sister) said I can't sing and I always hear that in the back of my head when I try'
Family: can't live with 'em, can't kill 'em – now you KNOW I am joking, but…
You won’t find many people in this world who when they were young didn’t like the way their mother sang – It’s usually the first voice you hear and it’s the voice many of us have in the back of our head when we’re trying to make decisions.
Even if she was out of tune and off the beat, when we were kids, we loved it.
The downside of this is, we often listen too carefully to what that voice has to say, and if you’ve been a parent yourself, you know that sometimes you say things to your kids to keep them quiet, to distract them, or you’re so busy with your own stuff, you’re not even listening to what you’re saying to them – and certainly often, not careful enough how you say things.
The other thing that happens with the voices in our families is, when we’re in trouble, when we are ashamed, when we are unhappy, and when we’re getting advice or a good 'talking to', that is also the voice we hear when we are stressed, sad or blue – so all the nuances of those family voices expand in our minds and our hearts and we become overly sensitive to the negative aspects of them.
So, sometimes when we sing, a spectrum of sounds come out of us which provoke things in other people, and even though you might have a nice voice, a tone or a pitch might trigger something in someone else even if they don’t know why it gives them a negative feeling.
It’s mostly nothing to do with the voice but more about the feeling that tone triggers.
I would love to go back into everybody’s youth or childhood when the family member told them that they couldn’t sing, and see what was actually happening in the home and family at the time – and I think you’ll find there was a lot of other stuff going on.
My advice would be – ignore that inner voice and get a second opinion.
The downside of this is, we often listen too carefully to what that voice has to say, and if you’ve been a parent yourself, you know that sometimes you say things to your kids to keep them quiet, to distract them, or you’re so busy with your own stuff, you’re not even listening to what you’re saying to them – and certainly often, not careful enough how you say things.
The other thing that happens with the voices in our families is, when we’re in trouble, when we are ashamed, when we are unhappy, and when we’re getting advice or a good 'talking to', that is also the voice we hear when we are stressed, sad or blue – so all the nuances of those family voices expand in our minds and our hearts and we become overly sensitive to the negative aspects of them.
So, sometimes when we sing, a spectrum of sounds come out of us which provoke things in other people, and even though you might have a nice voice, a tone or a pitch might trigger something in someone else even if they don’t know why it gives them a negative feeling.
It’s mostly nothing to do with the voice but more about the feeling that tone triggers.
I would love to go back into everybody’s youth or childhood when the family member told them that they couldn’t sing, and see what was actually happening in the home and family at the time – and I think you’ll find there was a lot of other stuff going on.
My advice would be – ignore that inner voice and get a second opinion.