Ahem! Clearing My Throat
I have been on a journey these last few months .... and probably longer, to unlock my voice. I'm not exactly sure when I shut it down except that it feels like a very long time ago.
The throat is an interesting part of our anatomy. Not only is it one of the most vulnerable spots in our body, it is the conduit through which the sound that we are in the world emerges. The sound of our voice is distinct, even with its infinite variations in tone and volume. Our sound is part of what makes us uniquely "us".
What I find peculiar with my voice is the dichotomy that exists for me between spoken and written word. I carry considerable fear in my body about saying the "wrong" thing. Some of this resides in what was instilled from my early years about good manners. Much of it comes from surprising and undesirable results created when I "spoke my mind".
I recall a game my grandfather used to play with me in which he would joke and tease me, twisting my words and being witty. While it felt like a fun game and it certainly increased my vocabulary and capacity to be succinct - it also left me feeling frustrated, misunderstood and perpetually wrong.
It wasn't until recently that I made the connection between my current fear of being misunderstood and the familiarity of all the sensations that used to arise during my word matches with my grandfather. I know he had no malicious intent, it was simply his love of language and of me that sparked this game Because I didn't have the maturity then to make sense all the feelings that would arise, this memory has been lying latent in me, affecting me to this day in how I choose to communicate. Breathing deeply and relaxing into the sensations still there all these years later, I have been discovering that they no longer trigger the automatic censorship they once did. When I do find myself censoring, I am much more aware and curious about it rather than it being my habituated way of communicating.
I have also noticed of how often my throat feels congested and I am aware of how often in life I have swallowed the opinions of others, spoken the party line and regurgitated what was expected and accepted. That was then and this is now. I am uncovering my capacity to say what is means something to me. It may not always be what someone expects to hear and I'm not invested in being right - only in adding my opinion to the mix rather than swallowing my thoughts on the subject in order to be nice and likeable.
There have been the times in my life, as I suspect there have been in yours when I silenced the scream, the anger, the rage because it wasn't pretty, or nice or safe. Strangling my sound and choking it back so that if it was heard at all it was a little, ineffective squeak that never conveyed the full measure of what I was feeling.
My voice in the world reveals me to the world. Although many have told me I am an eloquent speaker, I know inside myself that I struggle with incredible internal censorship which allows only the bare facts to emerge, revealing only a fraction of what I have to share. My role as a secret keeper and confidante all these years further contributes to shutting down my throat. Somewhere deep in my belly the warning bells begin to ring signaling "DANGER!" when I speak in a group. Discovering a sense of safety, connecting to who I am now and NOT who I was then, relaxing into my body as I speak - have all been effective in creating more and more room for expression in my life recently. And there is always more! The "more" becomes easier to claim as I stay awake to it.
In writing, my voice on the page allows me to bypass much of the physical device of voice and I notice that I do very minimal editing and that thoughts arrive complete, full and with a distinctive voice. Writing offers me an outlet and a place to discover the many varied thoughts that pass through my awareness without them feeling tight and constricted. It doesn't bother me that written words have a permanence to them where the spoken can dissolve as they are uttered. It is where I discover what I have to say in this world.
Writing returns me to the child-like innocence of speaking for all to hear....And I don't think the full reclamation of my speaking voice is far behind!
The throat is an interesting part of our anatomy. Not only is it one of the most vulnerable spots in our body, it is the conduit through which the sound that we are in the world emerges. The sound of our voice is distinct, even with its infinite variations in tone and volume. Our sound is part of what makes us uniquely "us".
What I find peculiar with my voice is the dichotomy that exists for me between spoken and written word. I carry considerable fear in my body about saying the "wrong" thing. Some of this resides in what was instilled from my early years about good manners. Much of it comes from surprising and undesirable results created when I "spoke my mind".
I recall a game my grandfather used to play with me in which he would joke and tease me, twisting my words and being witty. While it felt like a fun game and it certainly increased my vocabulary and capacity to be succinct - it also left me feeling frustrated, misunderstood and perpetually wrong.
It wasn't until recently that I made the connection between my current fear of being misunderstood and the familiarity of all the sensations that used to arise during my word matches with my grandfather. I know he had no malicious intent, it was simply his love of language and of me that sparked this game Because I didn't have the maturity then to make sense all the feelings that would arise, this memory has been lying latent in me, affecting me to this day in how I choose to communicate. Breathing deeply and relaxing into the sensations still there all these years later, I have been discovering that they no longer trigger the automatic censorship they once did. When I do find myself censoring, I am much more aware and curious about it rather than it being my habituated way of communicating.
I have also noticed of how often my throat feels congested and I am aware of how often in life I have swallowed the opinions of others, spoken the party line and regurgitated what was expected and accepted. That was then and this is now. I am uncovering my capacity to say what is means something to me. It may not always be what someone expects to hear and I'm not invested in being right - only in adding my opinion to the mix rather than swallowing my thoughts on the subject in order to be nice and likeable.
There have been the times in my life, as I suspect there have been in yours when I silenced the scream, the anger, the rage because it wasn't pretty, or nice or safe. Strangling my sound and choking it back so that if it was heard at all it was a little, ineffective squeak that never conveyed the full measure of what I was feeling.
My voice in the world reveals me to the world. Although many have told me I am an eloquent speaker, I know inside myself that I struggle with incredible internal censorship which allows only the bare facts to emerge, revealing only a fraction of what I have to share. My role as a secret keeper and confidante all these years further contributes to shutting down my throat. Somewhere deep in my belly the warning bells begin to ring signaling "DANGER!" when I speak in a group. Discovering a sense of safety, connecting to who I am now and NOT who I was then, relaxing into my body as I speak - have all been effective in creating more and more room for expression in my life recently. And there is always more! The "more" becomes easier to claim as I stay awake to it.
In writing, my voice on the page allows me to bypass much of the physical device of voice and I notice that I do very minimal editing and that thoughts arrive complete, full and with a distinctive voice. Writing offers me an outlet and a place to discover the many varied thoughts that pass through my awareness without them feeling tight and constricted. It doesn't bother me that written words have a permanence to them where the spoken can dissolve as they are uttered. It is where I discover what I have to say in this world.
Writing returns me to the child-like innocence of speaking for all to hear....And I don't think the full reclamation of my speaking voice is far behind!
posted by A at 2:10 PM
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