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by Amy | Jun 21, 2017 | singing
Raise your hand if you’ve ever stopped singing and felt the emotional or even physical pain that comes with the void you felt (or still feel) in your life. Maybe you’ve stopped singing because you no longer felt the love you once had for it. Or it could be that you’ve had physical issues that caused you to stop singing for a period of time. Or it’s possible you’ve struggled with your technique or some aspect of singing or performing and just couldn’t shake the issues you were facing enough to keep going. Or perhaps, life just got in the way and even though you loved singing, it just didn’t fit in anymore.
Well, I stand here with you raising my hand, because I also stopped singing for all of these reasons…plus a couple more. As I’ve stated before, singing just became too painful for me because I no longer felt like I knew why I was working so hard and sacrificing so much to do it. I simply wasn’t getting anywhere and finding the help I needed in order to have everything in place and singing well just seemed beyond my capacity. I was out of bandwidth. Then, as the years went by, life just happened and it became easier and easier for me not to sing than it was to make time or room for it. So I stopped.
If you’ve felt any of this before or are experiencing it even now, I know this feeling all too well. I’ve lived it time and time again throughout my career and then again as a mother to 3 young children. I still continue to go through periods of time in my life where singing is just not my top priority and has to be put on hold. But over the years, I’ve realized that I can’t let myself go too long, and I believe that it’s important to clearly understand the consequences you inevitably face when you put your singing on hold for too long or give up singing altogether.
For some, identifying the specific pain that comes from not singing is just as important or perhaps even more important than discovering your initial why for singing. We can know that singing brings us great joy, and we can pursue it and know why we sing. We can feel all the feels and experience all the great experiences singing has to offer. But there will inevitably come a time when singing also brings us great heartache. It’s like a marriage of sorts. We can marry the love of our lives, but until we know that this person can and most likely will deeply hurt us and we can deeply hurt them, we can’t fully understand our commitment to making it work while making the conscious, intentional choice to stick with it and ride out the storms.
So what’s your pain point? What does not singing do to you? And when is enough enough? Do you ache inside when you hear someone else singing and using her talent while you sit on the bench and know it could be you? Do you secretly wish someone would ask you to sing for some event so you would have the excuse to work your voice back up and come out of your shell? Does a tinge of pain hit you when you hear of someone else’s success when you should be excited and celebrating too? Perhaps you even feel the pain physically and notice that when you do attempt to sing, your voice just isn’t doing what it used to do anymore. It’s out of practice. You don’t sing with the stamina or strength you used to have. Perhaps you’ve lost your top or your support has dwindled. And that hurts.
Whatever your pain points are, they are real and they are trying to tell you something. We typically feel pain in our lives when something has changed or needs to change. And if you love singing and are not engaging in the activity of doing it regularly, may I suggest that this is something that needs to be addressed ASAP? I know it’s sometimes easier said than done. After all, if singing were simple or fitting it into our already busy lives were easy, we wouldn’t be in this predicament, would we? But my hope with this series is that you see that you were meant to be singing, and you need to find a way to reconcile your life to making it work. Because living without it is much more painful!
My hope is that this series is just the nudge you need or just the fire lit under your proverbial behind to get back to singing again. This week, I’ve included a free printable download for you to continue doing your inner work and discovering where your priorities are and where you eventually need them to be again. As I’ve said over and over again, it’s OK if we temporarily need to take a break, but we just don’t want it to be a long one.
So get this printable and if you haven’t already, go back and read my introduction to this Getting Back to Singing series and Part #1 – My Why so you can catch up!
Happy Singing!
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by Amy | Jun 16, 2017 | singing
If you read last week’s blog post entitled, Getting Back to Singing, you’ll know that I am starting a 4-part series that guides readers through a very important initial step in getting back to singing again after a singing hiatus.
Today is Part #1 of this series and it’s all about MY WHY, because I think it’s so important to be a detective and really get down to the heart of why you want to sing in order for you to put your first foot forward, start singing again and get some serious traction!
So what’s your why? Why do YOU want to sing?
I’ll tell you a little bit about my why in hopes that it helps you think more about yours:
I’ve always loved to sing since I was a wee bitty little thing. I remember holing up in my room listening to and memorizing all the lyrics to my favorite songs and gathering up my sisters, friends and cousins every time I got the chance so we could “perform a concert.” I remember that music and singing were always such a huge part of my life, and listening to singers sing solos at church was so awe-inspiring for me. I remember a family friend singing, “We Shall Behold Him” by Sandi Patty at my Aunt Georga’s funeral and realizing that I needed to learn to sing that song too. I also remember getting a hold of that Sandi Patty cassette tape (I know that dates me!) and listening to it over and over again while trying to sing the high notes like she did. I didn’t do it very well, but I was passionate and I was determined!
As I grew, I remember wanting to join the choir in middle school. And then again in high school. And then majoring in music education with an emphasis in vocal performance in college. I remember having a good deal of success singing and getting positive feedback for how I was progressing. But then something happened…
Somewhere down the road, singing became hard. It became painful. I received harsh criticism. I got rejected. I had teachers whose motives weren’t the purest. I had competitive singer friends who were out for their own gain and weren’t encouraging about my attempts at success. I started questioning everything I was doing. I developed paralyzing stage fright and an unrelenting anxiety around singing.
While I continued singing off and on through the years, I could never really shake the internal, paralyzing fear I couldn’t shake and the feelings that singing brought up for me. The wounds were deep. It became easier for me to do something else that I wasn’t so attached to…something I wouldn’t receive so much criticism for. Something that wouldn’t bring up so much pain.
In the meantime, I had 3 beautiful children. It was really easy for me to just dive deeply into the role of motherhood and forgo all of my past endeavors and passions in order to give all I had to my babies. So that’s just what I did. And for a while, it worked. I have loved being a Mommy more than anything else I’ve ever done in my life! But something was missing. Something began to gnaw at me. I missed singing.
Gradually, I started sitting down at my piano again. I started getting out art songs and hymns and then eventually, I started dusting off my arias. I remembered a time where I was fortunate enough to have a voice lesson with the great, Canadian tenor, Ben Heppner, while living in Vienna, and I’ll never forget that lesson and what he said to me:
If you’ve lost your joy of singing, you’ve gotta go back to your roots. What made you love singing at the beginning? What were those songs that inspired you and made you want to sing? Sing those songs. You’ve gotta find your joy again.
I share this story with you to get your wheels turning about YOUR story. What is YOUR WHY? What were the songs or the singers that initially inspired you to sing? What was or is the part about singing that you love?
Forget the critics. Forget the big ideas or dreams you wish you were achieving but aren’t. Forget the envy you may have of others who are doing what you always wanted to do. You don’t know their story or their struggle. Forget the let downs and the pain you may have felt when someone rejected you or you didn’t get the recognition you thought you should have had for your vocal potential.
Now is your chance to find out that thing about singing that brings you joy. And get this…this is YOUR life! You get to decide how to spend your days and what you want to do. No one else can limit you and keep you from your dreams! If the worship team is full and doesn’t have room for another vocalist, find another worship team. If the choir you want to sing with says they aren’t holding auditions, find another choir. If you didn’t get that solo part you were hoping to land, there are plenty of nursing homes full of people who would LOVE to hear you! If no one calls you back when you send them your demo, keep on making and sending out your demos. Someone will eventually bite. And if they don’t, you still have that JOY that singing brings you. Sing for yourself!!!
Can you tell I’m passionate about this whole WHY thing? Because I’ve lived it. I’m still living it now. I’m not doing all the things I’d love to be doing vocally because being a Mommy of 3 little ones simply doesn’t leave room for all of it. I’m not singing at all the venues I’d love to be singing in or doing all the auditions I could be doing. But that doesn’t mean I can’t sing for myself. It doesn’t mean I can’t sing for my children or with them. It doesn’t mean I can’t engage in an activity that truly, deeply, brings me joy!
So find your why today, my friend!
I’ve included a free printable download you can get right here. This My Why Guide will ask you questions that trigger your answers and help you find your why for singing!
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Happy Singing!!!
xoxo
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by Amy | Jun 9, 2017 | singing
I love to sing, but my voice and my confidence level need a lot of work if I’m ever going to sing in public. I just don’t know where to start.
I suppose I really should find a good voice teacher and start working on my voice. I feel like I know the basics of singing, but I need a refresher to get back in the groove!
I’d love to sing more often and maybe do something more with my voice, like: audition for the worship team, sing with the band or in that choir. But I need help getting my voice back in shape.
I have fond memories of a time in my life when I was actively singing. I’d give anything to make space for that again in my life. I really miss singing! I’m just so busy! Where would I fit it in?
Sound familiar? If so, you’re in the right place, and I hope I can facilitate you in getting back to singing again as quickly as possible!
I, too, went through a really long season of not singing myself, so I can totally relate! And I majored in vocal performance and had already been singing professionally before I went on my singing hiatus! After having 3 children over a period of 8 years, however, the idea of trying to find time, space in my head and money to take voice lessons with my graduate professor all seemed like an impossible feat. And to be honest, it was impossible at that time. And in my mind, I thought I was OK not singing and devoting all my energy to my children. I mean, after all, I had had 30+ years of sowing my singing oats and now was a time I wanted to give parenting all my effort and take care of my babies. And I’m so glad I did that. I can never get those years back, and I feel like I spent them wisely and have no regrets. But there came a time when I started to feel like I desperately needed to jump back into singing again, and I deeply missed it — like I had lost a limb.
If this, too, sounds familiar to you, I want to encourage you. Being a Mommy or taking care of a parent or a sick loved one or any other time-consuming endeavor that could take you away from your passion is OK for a while. But we always want to return to what makes us who we are and find a way to learn and grow, despite all of our responsibilities — and in my case, little people, who depend on me. If we don’t find that time to develop our passions, we eventually start to become bitter and often wonder what is missing in our lives while swimming in a sea of chores and activities that bear little resemblance to who we once were or what we find joy in doing. Think of it like an oxygen mask we have to put on ourselves before we can be the best for others around us. Singing is our oxygen mask and it can serve us in so many ways that other activities cannot. It can also bless people around us, too. I never realized that, while depriving myself of singing, I was also depriving my young children of hearing me sing and enjoying music themselves in the way that I enjoyed it. Funny how that works.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll be deep diving into a 4-part series that will:
- Define My Why (Why Do I Sing?)
- Identify the Pain Points of Not Singing (with stable technique and confidence…or at all)
- Overcome the Challenges (of fitting singing back into our lives)
- Finding the Best Vocal Coach for Me
With all of these components in place, I am 100% certain that we can begin to understand why we need to be singing and begin restructuring our schedules (and budget) so singing can become a priority and a vital part of our lives again. I’ll take you step by step, so you don’t get overwhelmed, and I’ll help you find that sweet spot where you are singing again and still have plenty of time do take care of all your other life responsibilities!
Life is too short not to be using our voices and enriching our lives and the lives of those who hear us with singing!
So, let’s get started, shall we?
In the meantime, I’ve created a Sing! Sheet for you to begin to break down the importance of getting back to singing and help you navigate through this series with clarity and direction. So don’t miss out! Sign up below and get your Utlimate Guide to Getting Back to Singing CHECKLIST that you can download and print out.
Happy Singing!!
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by Amy | Jun 7, 2017 | business organization, mama work
You don’t have to spend too much time in your business to realize that you need to define who your ideal customer is. In online business, the prominent term for this is referred to as an avatar, and it refers to an all-encompassing term that includes several factors we need to consider when we are focusing on targeting and speaking directly to our ideal customer. Even though we might also reach beyond our ideal customer, and we may even eventually have multiple avatars for different segments of our business, it is crucial that we begin with one central avatar for our business and heavily focus our advertising campaigns on reaching that ideal customer with all our might.
There are a number of questions you will want to get super specific about when creating your avatar, but for the sake of simplicity and ease, I want to focus on the first two questions I personally feel are the most important when determining and creating your avatar. 1. Who are we? and 2. For Whom?
Who Are We?
As in, who is my business? What are we about? What do we look like? Feel like? Smell like? Talk like? What is our motto? What are we known for? What do we want to be known for? This may seem obvious, but it also may not be something that comes easy for us initially. When I think of who I am as a business, I think a lot about the first and lasting impression I want people to have when they see my brand. I also think about things like the kind of vibe I want to give off, the style of my website and logo and the unspoken and spoken authority my business has in its industry. This causes me to need to do a little research, and find out what I like to look at online and what the brands inspire and leave a lasting impression on me. And I’ve realized more and more that I need to do this often to stay current and see what others are doing in terms of demonstrating characteristics that I want my company to have. It may seem silly, but even font and graphic choices go a long way in terms of impression and demonstrating a specific idea in our minds. Sometimes it’s obvious and other times it’s very subtle. For instance, some fonts appear more authoritative, elite and chic while others may be crafty, cutesy or whimsical. Also, is the font too small or too busy to read easily? I don’t want to spend too long on this topic, but it begs a little bit of our care and attention, and I know personally what I think about as soon as I see the fonts on a website and read the copy in an ad. And so should you! To help me with this process, I’ve installed an app on my browser called “Font Ninja”. If I’m on a website and just really like the look of it and feel, I can turn on Font Ninja and it allows me to see which font they used. I love it!! I’m nerdy like that. 😉 Graphics are very similar. If I see an out-of-date graphic on a website, it causes me to question if the business is really serious and forward thinking or behind the times.
So, think about what you like to see. What leaves an impression on you that you want your customers to have when they see your brand? Get as specific as possible. Nothing you write down is stupid or irrelevant if it is truly what you want your impression to be.
For Whom?
This one may take you a little more time to figure out. I’ve found that my ideal client and who my clients actually tend to be are sometimes different people. Sometimes, we may start out with a broad idea about who are clients are (everyone), and then realize over time, with savvy advertising strategies, that we are able to niche down into something more specific (women in their 30s and 40s who live in rural towns). Play around with it. Create ads on Facebook or Instagram and start broad and narrow down after you see your statistics and who is responding. But the bigger and more helpful questions might be, “Who do I want my customer to be?” and “Who is like me?” or “Who can I help the most?” This is a great place to start, and testing out your ads and noticing who responds to your posts are great ways of identifying who you are speaking to. Businesses who take the time to carefully define their ideal client are more likely to become crystal clear with how they advertise and what they achieve with their advertising efforts.
More and more lately, I’ve been hearing and reading about business owners who identify their specific clients and even give them names. I heard a podcast the other day where a business owner was describing this woman in her mid-thirties who lived on a farm in California and raised goats. This woman made goat milk soap and sold it at her local farmers’ market. Anthropologie associates just happened to be walking through that farmers’ market one Saturday afternoon and they were interested in carrying her soap in their stores. She has to find out how to mass produce the soap and package it in a way that would sell to Anthropologie customers. This was her ideal client. That’s pretty specific right? That’s how specific we need to be. We need to tell our client’s story from start to finish, so we can begin to answer their questions and address their pain points from the gate.
When we ask these questions, we really get the ball rolling with our business and find out what we’re actually about. It helps us begin the process of fine tuning our business and understanding who we want to be as a business brand and who we are marketing to. And, truth be told, this is my favorite part of the whole process!
So, get to work, my friend! To make it easier for you, I’ve created a printable sheet you can download and fill out for your own business. And ideally, I’d love for you to print out this sheet and put it and the ones that will follow about your avatar at the very beginning of your business notebook. It really helps to think these things through! So enjoy! And if you get the chance, share with me what you found out by doing this simple exercise. If you’ve done it before, it’s OK. You can always do it again.
As always, please feel free to share this with someone else who may need it. And tell me how you liked it! 🙂
Grab your worksheet here!
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