As a voice coach, the question I am asked most frequently is … “How important is our voice?” My answer is: “Voice is not important. Voice is powerful”.
There are two ways for self-empowerment.
The traditional way is we work to improve our mind, so when we feel confident we will appear and sound confident. This is the mind-affecting-body approach. Many people have overlooked the other way and underestimated the value and power of the body-affecting-mind approach.
Think about yoga … it’s a way of influencing your mind through working on the body. Take a moment to watch the TEDx talk by Amy Cuddy on Power Pose who talks about body-affecting-mind approach.
So is voice … it is vibration and it is physical. Working on your voice is to change the vibration in your body. When the vibration is changed to its optimum frequency, you’ll feel empowered, just like it had done to me and many of my clients.
Voice is not a nice-to-have thing in your self-improvement tool-box. It’s a self-empowerment process. Within the sound of your voice are the keys to innumerable worlds.
Voice is not important. It is powerful.
It has the power to transform the way you sound and the way you feel about yourself. Not only that, but all of the voice problems you are experiencing can be solved for example a soft voice, a shaky voice, a high-pitched voice, etc.
The key is for you to work on changing the physical aspect of your voice and use your full body for voice projection.
When you start to use your full body, the vibration will be stronger and your voice will be fuller and richer. That’s the reason that I call your powerful voice the Full Voice.
Here are the three steps to developing your Full Voice.
1.Relaxation: Yes, I said relaxation because tension is the enemy of our voice. Like many of my clients, you have tension in your body that may be hindering your voice projection and you don’t even know where it is. To unleash the power in your voice, you must learn how to release the tension. Relaxation is not simply to get loose or flop. Neither does it require working too hard. It is a state of balance between freeness and effort.
2.Breathing: Breath is the power of your voice. It determines the quality of your voice. If your breath is shallow and weak, your voice will be shallow and weak; if your breath is deep and strong, your voice will be deep and strong. To have a better voice, you must learn how to breathe properly and fully.
3.Resonance: Resonance is the amplification of your voice through supplementary vibrations in your body. It’s the critical step to your full voice and is the key to transforming and empowering your voice and yourself.
Voice development is a progressive journey.
You cannot achieve resonance if you are not breathing properly. You cannot breathe properly if you are tensed up. It requires patience and presence which in turn trains you to have more patience and presence.
Commit yourself to the process and the process will reward you over your lifetime.
