What do you want to sound like?

The answer that moved me...

…was unexpected. Over the years, I’ve heard:

“I wanna sound powerful… angelic… gritty.” Sometimes it’s a desire to sound like someone. Like “Adele… Celine… Whitney…” Most often it’s “I wanna sound better… like I have confidence.”

I started teaching as I was taught… what needs fixing? What could be better? 

It took many years for me to see there wasn’t a right sound. 

I grew up in a world of black and white, right and wrong. The grey area wasn’t an option. It was unknown; scary. 

My own quest to know myself in these last 10 years has shown me what I’ve been missing when there are only 2 choices, instead of a hundred, a thousand; really, the nuances of choice can be endless. Especially when it comes to art, and the sounds we make.

What is Better?

Looking to be better, sound better, has been around a long time. Over the years, I’ve found there are a handful of reasons people have sought out voice lessons: to learn how to sing, to sing with more confidence, to recover from fatigue, to maintain or gain strength, for fun even. The most common reason…to sound better.

I’ve spent years cultivating questions to get to the heart of what “better” means. All of the other ones are more clear cut; “better” is nebulous.

We would investigate textures of sounds; listen to voices they loved and would analyze what sounds they made; play with different voices if they were willing (sometimes that feels silly); dove into emotional expression to see what influences of sound came from there. 

Most of the time, doing some strength-training alone would help them hear their voices a little differently, and would give them a little boost of confidence to start singing out more. 

But there are always those folks who, no matter what we do, still hate the way they sound; even when I could notice changes. 

Power of Self-Acceptance

I don’t know why I was surprised. If I’m honest, I was pretty self-critical too. For all the solo work and praise I got from a kid on up, I was often terrified that I would “mess up” or would not be liked, or someone would “be better”. Singing seemed like the one thing I had going for me, and I didn’t want anything or anyone taking it away from me. I lived in a world of scarcity; never enough. I didn’t know that all voices could be welcome and appreciated, and loved.

Maybe it was when I stumbled into self-acceptance and self-compassion work a few years back that I started accepting my voice even more. My relationship with my voice became more secure as I began to accept my body more too. I learned to appreciate and love myself, and love of my voice followed.

I now understand I have value as a breathing human, no matter what I sound like. I know there is enough to go around. Because I love one person’s voice, doesn’t mean that I don’t love others. This awakening will do wonders for the soul (the psyche, really!)

Being Courageous is Being Yourself

In all the different forms my approach has changed over the years, I settled on “be courageous with your voice” a few years ago. That summed up a “good” voice for me; everything else is like toppings for your ice cream (sprinkles, candy, cookies, fudge?). And, maybe the ice cream alone is good enough.

These days, in addition to strength training, I encourage my clients to explore and play with a variety of sounds and colors, practice some self acceptance and compassion, welcome all sounds and lean into enjoying their voice. 

More and more I’m getting clients who are looking to unblock their voices, find healing with their voices, searching for their authentic sound. This is the work that I love and I believe is crucial for being courageous in our lives, even outside of music.

Even for myself, I’ve had “I wanna sound like…” moments over the years. Like a hot potato, I dropped that list when I heard this gem from Diego, a couple of months ago.

We’d been strength training this year, leaning into acceptance and play, and when evaluating one gig he felt good about, and one he didn’t, he landed on this… “I just wanna sound like I wanna be here!” 

His words struck me right in the heart. It felt so true. Yeah, I wanna sound like that too. 

There’s no way that intention doesn’t make impact! That’s a sound that will be enjoyable!

When I sing, whether I’m in the mood for it or not (bad days can fall on gig days), I wanna sound like I wanna be there.

How does this sit with you? What do you wanna sound like?