Going All In?

When I ask this question, “Are you going all in?”, a lot of you would answer with an emphatic “Yes! Of course I am!”  You may be taking voice lessons.  You may practice on occasion or even perform with regularity.  But I’m going to ask it again personally and see if it really resonates with you.  Are you really going all in?  When it comes to improving your singing and really making a valid effort in practicing and fine-tuning your technique or learning that difficult song or setting up that audition, can you honestly answer that you are giving your singing your all and putting your best foot forward when it comes to crafting your talent?

I ask this question, because I know how motivation comes in waves.  I know how we can be so ON FIRE to do something great and be the best we can be.  I know how it feels to be inspired by another great singer who has accomplished amazing achievements and be driven to do the same.  We get serious.  For a while.  We may even land a gig during this wave of inspiration.  And then, out of the blue, something happens.  We get sick.  A friend dies.  Our car breaks down.  We get a new job.  We lose our job.  We move.  Our house is a mess.  Our finances are in disarray.  We meet someone.  We have kids.  A child needs our attention.  And then everything we were once certain we were supposed to be aiming for goes by the wayside and sits until we can pick it up and handle it again.  Months go by.  Sometimes years.  We wade through our days keeping ourselves busy with mundane tasks that don’t fulfill us.  We feel like something is out of sync, but we can’t figure out why.  And then it hits us.  We haven’t been singing!  That pursuit we once thought was WHO we were…what we were meant to do…has evaded us.  At one time, however, thought it was our life breath.  We knew we wanted to be better and hone our craft and eventually sing for the world to hear, and then life happened, and without even trying to do so, we put our voices on the shelf.

I know about the void of not singing all too well.  After years of honing my technique and working steadily at my singing throughout my undergraduate degree in Kansas City, Missouri, I moved to Europe to pursue singing as a career.  I went all in.  But eventually, after months of auditioning and working with coaches and voice teachers, the toll of brutal criticism, trying to survive in a foreign country and being broke and homesick just flat out wore me down.  Initially, I would practice religiously and never miss a moment to work on a piece of music or vocalize.  But auditioning and the lifestyle of being a singer was something I really struggled with emotionally.  Looking back, I had very few resources at my fingertips to overcome the weariness and fear-paralysis I was dealing with on a daily basis.  In the midst of trying to survive in Vienna, Austria and pursue my singing profession, I eventually found a full-time job at an American university that allowed me to obtain my work and residency permits.  This was a great thing!  And I was very fortunate to have found this position as it allowed me to stay in Vienna and pursue my goals.  And while working there, I eventually met my husband and fell over the moon in love!  All of this was so great, and I was so happy, and my life was coming into order (or so it felt), but I soon found that my time for singing was dwindling.  Where I used to have days on end to practice and sift through music, I now found myself working 10 hour days and spending my evenings with my new found love.  Days turned into weeks and weeks to months.  And gradually, without even noticing, I started to put my voice and career aside as I was falling out of the habit of singing.  Until one day, I just noticed I felt different.  Empty.  Strange.  Lifeless.  I kept thinking, “What’s wrong with me?”  I considered that perhaps that I might be depressed.  And then, one day, I finally forced myself over to my piano and began singing.  And to my surprise, it was like a balm to my soul.  It was the drop of water in the midst of the desert.  I had been needing this all along, but I was skimping on the one of the few things that fed me and gave me life and joy:  singing!

So I am asking again:  Are you going all in?  And if you say you are definitely going all in, what are you doing every single day to make it happen?  If not, what are some things you can do to guard yourself from losing steam when life happens or get back on track with your singing after you’ve been derailed?

I ask you these questions, because I really want you to have a strategy for singing success.  The world has enough so-so singers with no game plan.  What I want you to have in your pocket, however, is a fool-proof method that keeps you on track and doesn’t allow you to venture too far before returning to the practice room and finding your groove again.  For many of us, singing feels like a natural extension of ourselves.  We can’t NOT do it.  And when we’re in the thick of it and doing it, we feel exhilarated and know we can’t live without it.  Others have said this about running (although, I’ve never been able to relate to that personally!)  You may have chosen another profession to pay the bills and you may have chosen not to go down the road of starving artist, but I guarantee you, you do love to sing, and it brings something alive in you that nothing else, no place, no person, no thing could ever do.  When we briefly step away from our singing to deal with life, it can become a subtle breakup.  But it doesn’t have to be.  It doesn’t have to signal the end of something we love…where we carry the void of not singing with us for the rest of our lives like a martyr carries a heavy load.  We can work it back in and rediscover our joy and take our portion of that balm that heals our souls and fulfills us in a way that many other pursuits cannot do.

Before I sign off, I just want to challenge you and encourage you today.  I don’t know if you have been pursuing singing as a profession or as a recreation, or maybe you’ve never really pursued singing, even though you’ve perhaps desperately wanted to.  But I want you to put one foot in front of the other and just do it!  Make the time.  Create the space.  If you can’t do all the things you might have been able to do when you started, it’s OK.  It’s like riding a bike.  You don’t forget.  Just ease back into it and start singing again.  If you’ve never pursued singing and you know you need to, now is your chance!  You’re in the right place, my friend.  You’ll be a better person for it.  And the world will be better for being able to hear you!

Go all in.

xoxo,

Amy

Do you want to get my 8 Proven Strategies for Going All In with your singing? Sign up here, and I”ll send you over a free printable download you can hang up on your studio wall!  In addition, I’ll go into great detail with you about what I mean with each of these strategies via an email series.  You won’t want to miss it!!