I wrote these words about 2 weeks ago on someone else’s post on Facebook:
I keep thinking about this as I venture further into my singing lessons. I keep thinking about a documentary about the making of the Joshua Tree (I can't find it to watch it again... it seems to have disappeared...)... Anyway, there's this part where Bono has written the words for I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For and the music was already done. But he has to figure out HOW to sing it... BONO... right? And whoa... it struck me exactly this... he had NO FEAR of sounding AWFUL and THAT is why he can do what he does. So now when I'm practicing, I push like that... just like I would do in dance, of course, but singing for me has been such a fear thing that it's more tender and vulnerable... but I push like that... where can I go that it's BAD... because RIGHT AROUND THERE... that's where you'll find awesome hanging out.
I wrote that about 2 weeks ago, and since then, so much has changed.
So that little story — and this adventure I’m taking with singing — remember, it’s literal for me, but it’s simultaneously one giant metaphor for all of us, and it’s all about living life fully.
Over the last two weeks, because I’ve been willing to make ugly noises, to falter, to crack, to just sound like OUCH!, I’ve started to truly find my voice.
And under all that fear that I’ve lived with for so long, what am I finding?
That my voice is BIG and it’s sassy and ferocious and demanding.
It makes me think about my honest dance. I’m an aggressive mover when I’m fully in my body, so it’s no wonder that I’m an aggressive singer. (If the word aggressive makes you uncomfortable, sit with that because it’s my preferred word here and if it triggers you in some way, that’s your trigger to pay attention to. I stop to say this because over my life when I use that word, so many WOMEN correct me and say I mean assertive. No. I mean aggressive.)
I also don’t think it’s a coinkydink that once my singing lessons started, my shoulders reached new levels of healing. During a Peony Method class this week, I could feel my whole body connected in a way it hasn’t been for almost two years, thanks to a lot of factors, including Peony’s death and two frozen shoulders.
And they were frozen, for sure. The shots I got were totally necessary, but there’s some woo here, isn’t there?
Shoulders… how many times (if you’ve been in classes with me for long) have you heard me say, “Many women are weak in the shoulder area and that makes sense because it’s the connection space between heart and throat… how many of us are not saying what needs to be said and it’s stuck right at that shoulder level?”
I was obviously talking to myself.