Your Voice Tells a Story Long Before You Ever Say a Word: what is your Vocal Autobiography?

Welcome And The Power Of Voice

SPEAKER_02 0:22

Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. I am Anne. And today we're talking about something that we all use every single day, but very few of us truly understand the importance of how we use it. Our voice. Not simply the sound that comes out of our mouths, but the voice that carries our identity, our pain, our joy, our purpose, our leadership, and our humanity. Our guest today is Barbara McAfee, author of Vocal Intelligence, Leading with Vitality, Presence, and Impact. Barbara has spent more than 30 years helping people reconnect with their voice as a powerful tool. And I have to tell you, as a neurodivergent woman who spent much of my childhood struggling to express myself, struggling to communicate how I felt, how I often did feel misunderstood. This book spoke my language because Barbara doesn't just teach us how to speak better. She teaches us how to become more fully ourselves. And one of my favorite moments in the book referenced Shakespeare's famous words, all the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances, and one person in their time plays many parts. I found that really profound because this book really asks us to think about the many roles that we play throughout our lives, and perhaps more importantly, who we are while we're playing them. At the heart of this book is one profound question: who are you going to be while you do what you do? And perhaps another part of the book, woven throughout all of it, is whose voice are we using? The ones that we've taught us to use, the ones we've created to survive, or the ones that is authentically our own. Barbara, welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Ann.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

I'm tickled to be here, and thank you for that great introduction.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

You know, I have never thought about a book like this before. This is probably one of the most unique voices on trauma and neurodivergence. And because I did look at it through that lens, I think you could look at it through any kind of a lens, really, for someone hearing the phrase for the very first time.

What Vocal Intelligence Really Means

SPEAKER_02 3:00

What exactly is vocal intelligence?

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Well, there's a lot that's been made of emotional intelligence, you know, being able to figure out what to bring, what's going on. And I think it's particularly challenging for folks who are neurodivergent. So how to read the room or not read the room. I have a number of relatives who are, you know, dealing with that issue themselves. Great. However, the part of emotional intelligence that gets ignored is the part that lives inside of how we sound when we're saying what we're saying. And we've all, I think, received the apology that sounded like I'm sorry, or or actually given it. And when the tone and the words are at odds, people are gonna believe the tone. Right?

SPEAKER_01 3:49

Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

So it may, I think it behooves us to think about our tone. And I don't know about you, but I I heard as a child, don't use that tone with me.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

Oh, absolutely. All the time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:01

And I think sometimes I want to say that to people who are speaking to me as well. It's like I'm confused, I'm offended, I'm lost. I don't know what, you know, the words might be perfect, but the if the tone is off, it's not good reach. So that's what vocal intelligence is. It's to just be able to have enough flexibility and awareness in your voice that you can actually connect with another human being through what you're saying.

SPEAKER_02 4:30

And I really got out of your book that the voice has to match the room, basically. You know, your audience, the person in front of you. You write that it's one thing to think and feel deeply, but it's another thing entirely to give those thoughts and feelings shape and sound. You know, those are really two completely different processes. So can you talk about how we can connect the two and use our voice the way that we need to?

Breaking Out Of The Voice Box

SPEAKER_00 5:00

Well, I think the first step is to kind of get out of the voice box that we all live in. And you alluded to this in the introduction. We are walking around using a voice that maybe was created out of a mishmash of trauma and cultural norms and something that you said to us when we were seven, or fill in the blank, uh, illness, anything, you know, and so the voice gets more and more confined and less flexible. And it kind of reminds me of yoga, the yoga practice. You know, you like if you just sit still and hunch over your computer all day long, like I have been so far today, um, your body will reflect that. And likewise, when you live in a small part of your voice, it gets constricted and doesn't uh doesn't move in the way it's designed to move. So I like to start with getting people out of their speaking voice, even out beyond their singing voice, into sound, which for me was a revolutionary discovery after being, you know, shushed and um hushed and told to blend with the alto section and the choir and sit still and be quiet in in school and church. Okay. And, you know, and so having someone say, give me all your sound, high, low, cracked, wild, primal, was like, what? I didn't even, no one had ever even asked me for the sound I had. And I had so much. My my voice when I first met my teachers in my late 20s from the Roy Hart Center, had it here, which is not that high, especially for a young woman, which I am no longer. And uh in that first weekend, I went here.

SPEAKER_01 6:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:49

And this I couldn't go back into my story after that. I it it it shattered. I thought, oh my gosh, I I had a story and it was wrong. And all of us have stories that are wrong. Every I still have a story that's wrong. You know what I mean? It's like it's there's always more outside of who we think we are. And so the sound was the door into that. And so I think that's the you know, sort of the magic uh first step. And to pretend you're someone that someone else, a character, an archetype. I didn't, I I couldn't do that, but a bird could, a big raptor. I was a big bird.

SPEAKER_02 7:28

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

A Healing Lineage Born From War

SPEAKER_02 7:30

And I do want to talk about the origin story behind all of this because it's remarkable. I mean, it the work didn't simply appear out of nowhere. I mean, this traces all the way back to a World War I German Jewish soldier. So can you tell us that story and explain how his journey eventually became the foundation for the work that you do today?

SPEAKER_00 7:56

Yes, I think of him all the time. His name was Alfred Wolfson, and he was a stretcher bearer on the Western Front in World War I, which is was basically a hell of mud and blood and mustard gas. And here he is, 18 years old, carrying stretchers of shattered, wounded, and dying men. And you can imagine he came home, shattered himself. He had what we would now call terrible PTSD, which uh included auditory hallucinations. So he would literally hear the men screaming in his mind. And uh tried, you know, back then there was not a lot of resource. There's, I think, sorely inadequate resource now, actually. But at the time, he just couldn't figure out how to become more himself. He felt abandoned by God, he said. So yeah, so he started just making those sounds himself. He had done some opera study before the war, so something about his voice and singing, but he just started making these extreme sounds himself, and it actually set him free. Those auditory, you know, he kind of leaked that sound out through his own body and voice, and it it left him. And his physical body never quite recovered. You know, he had he'd been mustard gassed, he had lifelong um physical issues, but spiritually and emotionally he returned. And he fortunately escaped Germany before the rise of Hitler and settled in London, where he just started working with other people, ordinary people, actors, singers, anybody who wanted to work with the voice in this way. And one of his pupils was a South African Jewish man named Roy Hart, who was an amazing actor, Shakespearean actor. And he uh took the work into a more theatrical direction, created a company, an avant-garde theater company, and eventually migrated to uh emigrated to the south of France with a group of, I think of them as a group of dirty hippies. They had two cars and a few sacks of lentils, and they went to this falling down chateau. Oh, wow. And uh a few months after they settled there, they were on tour, and Roy Hart, their very charismatic leader, his wife and another company member were killed in a car accident. And so there they all are without their fearless leader, and they decided to keep going. And one of the people in that company was the person who took me on that voyage back in Minneapolis in the late 80s. His name is Shaol Ryan, and we became friends and colleagues taught together for over 20 years. And uh, so that's that's my lineage. And I also have to throw in um Jung as well, because Jungian psychology was a big influence on Wolfson, and also has been on my own work, the idea of the archetypes, the collective unconscious, and the importance of letting the shadow have its say.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 11:17

Gosh. Well, you know, I mean, this teaches us about the connection between trauma and the body and how it can root itself in the voice. I mean, you talk about that, that's just so interesting.

How Trauma Lives In The Throat

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Yeah. Yeah. And and I mean, I had my own. We all have trauma. Sure. Hello. Yeah. Everybody. And I, one of my jobs in my little family story was to keep the secrets, right? A lot of us get designated as a secret. Me too. Yeah. Me too. That impact that impacts your voice in a big way. And I've had uh I had surgery on my I had my tonsils removed in my twenties, um, and they were chronically infected and huge because I think all the things I couldn't say had to go somewhere. Right. And so I think they just lodged there. They took them out and I started singing jazz prof, you know, semi-professionally right after that. So isn't that interesting? And then it is. Oh, and I started therapy around the same time also. Hmm. Hmm. And then I stopped singing for a relationship. Like the woman who would make that decision is so long dead now in me. But I stopped singing and then I grew a nodule on my thyroid and they cut my throat. I have a scar. This is my war. They cut out half my thyroid, the other one's chugging along fine. I'm on no medication whatsoever. Uh, but the only possible um side effect, besides just surgery, was they could nick my laryngeal nerve and I would be horse the rest of my life. I believe this happened to Julie Andrews. Okay. It did not happen to me. So I made vows. That was almost 60 years ago. And I made vows that I wasn't gonna do that. I wasn't gonna stop ever again because no more knives.

SPEAKER_02 13:11

That's quite the story, you know. And I too, as someone who spent years being quiet and small and afraid to be seen, I spent a great deal of time reclaiming my own voice while becoming stronger and healing in the process. And it's fascinating that this entire movement was born from pain. One person's unimaginable suffering eventually created a pathway for people all over the world to reconnect with themselves. What do you think that says about our voices being used as an instrument of healing?

SPEAKER_00 13:48

Oh, so much. And I mean, I talk to Alfred Wilson in my mind all the time and say, Yeah, you know, it's still alive. And I'm training people in my work now. I've got another nine set up to come in to become trainers to just learn how to present my work and carry it around in the world. And they're going to bring the number of people carrying that work close to 100 now. Um, and so, you know, I love, you know, the wounds that we carry are not just like our own little personal tragedies. They are. No one deserves to suffer ever. And I would not be the passionate purveyor of vocal freedom if I hadn't felt so confined myself. Both as a teacher and an author, but also I'm I write songs, I sing, and and I know that when I sing, I've had people say, you know, when you sing, it's it's more than just pretty. I can feel something, I can feel something underneath it. So I think if we can transmute whatever those wounds are into a force for healing and beauty, maybe that's what this whole school that we're living in here on earth is about, is to transform whatever comes our way into something useful and generative in the world.

SPEAKER_02 15:16

You know, going back to that person that was sitting there, not able to go past another note. I mean, you describe yourself in the book as somebody that is not sitting across from me right now. I mean, it was some you were shy and awkward and all the things, and you weren't confident in your voice at all. And your voice, like you said, I mean, you stopped at a certain note, and beyond that note, there was just nothing but silence.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:48

And then you were taken on that vocal adventure, and it led you to the top of the piano. I mean, it just shows us how we are holding ourselves back. Could you talk about that exact moment when you hit that note and you the story that brought you to where there were no limitations?

Permission To Play Past Perfection

SPEAKER_00 16:12

Well, I couldn't believe it was happening, first of all. And uh, I when I walked into that workshop, I said to myself, if they're mean to me, I'm leaving. I was so afraid. I was just shaking in my boots. And the only reason I went is that the voice teacher I had trusted with my voice, the first one as a no, yeah. Mostly I just cried in her presence. I'd start to sing and I'd just blah and then I'd write her a check, and then I'd come back in a week. But she suggested I go, and I think there was something in me that was like, we're going. And the rest of me was going, like, I don't want, I don't want, I don't want, I don't want to go, I don't know about it, you know, yeah. And so I ended up in this small group with this showel person who is a British guy with a Hebrew name who lives in the south of France. And he is, uh, we are still connected. He's 80 now, almost 80. And his way of teaching, I was so tender, I was so terrified. And he is gentle and playful and deeply kind. And the British thing didn't hurt either because on my voice, and on the way, on the way up there, my voice would do like, oh, you know, make these awful noises. And the perfectionist in me, the singing person, was like, oh no, and he'd go, hmm, lovely, or oh, interesting. And I'd be like, Oh, yes, I think it is, you know. So there was he was the right person for me because he was so kind. And uh I could, I had I went, I worked with other teachers from the center over time that were a little more forceful, and I was ready for that. But at that moment, he was the right person. Uh so that I I just kept I felt like my mind would get blown, and then my mind would get blown, and then my mind would get blown. And I opened up my mouth and my body so wide, so big. Uh, and I remember like my knees are bent, and I'm using every bit of physical energy I have. And I opened my mouth so wide that I pulled, like pulled a little muscle under my tongue here. You know, there was like a little boink. Oh, yeah. So it it it feels like it literally changed the shape of me, my physical shape. Oh, okay. And my vocal shape as well. And I was so, so happy. And that was just one part of it. You know, I also went very low. Um, I made a lot of quote-unquote ugly sounds. And what a relief. You know, we spend all of our time trying to be like smart and attractive and appropriate, and then just to be invited to be like vulgar and shrill and fierce, um loud. Uh that's like, oh, thrilling. It thrilled me, and now it's a part of my work too. It's just, I think sometimes the voice is the like becoming a better communicator and or singer and or speaker is part of like the aim we're going for. But also I think there's a therapeutic aspect where you can express things that aren't normally welcome and have a cheerful person saying, That's great.

SPEAKER_02 19:41

Oh my gosh. Well, there's a vulnerability in this. I mean, and it was about not being perfect anymore. Exactly. I'm you pretended to be, I think it was a giant hawk. And from that experience came these questions that you put in your book, like, what else am I wrong about? Where else is my story too small? And that feels so much bigger than voice, because I think so many of us spend our lives caring stories about who we are, what we're capable of, and even what we're allowed to become. So, what do you think giving ourselves permission to play, because that's what you were doing, instead of striving for perfection, can unlock something so profound. It's such a relief.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

It's such a relief. I've grown through a lot of good hard work. I'm a good miniature, German, Scots, Irish, raised by depression-era parents. I know how to work hard.

SPEAKER_01 20:45

You know?

SPEAKER_00 20:45

Yeah. And it's still astonishing to me how much I've been able to grow and foster growth in others through being playful, silly, ridiculous, and inappropriate. You know? I love it. So often people, uh it's just, I get to watch again and again people come to life because so much of what's unhapped in us, it lives in the shadow. That's the Jungian stuff. It's going to express one way or the other. You know, your shadow's gonna have its say. So whether you have a car accident or you snap at your family member or go into some road rage, my personal favorite, um, or you know, somehow injure yourself, get sick, it's going to have its say. And so I've noticed that when you give it voice, then it it will leave you alone the rest of your life. You it's it's expressed in a safe and joyful and often terrifying, vulnerable way. And so there's one one woman I worked with who was just very fiery. She just had so much energy. And she kept getting. Into arguments with her spouse and her colleagues at work. And uh so we got her singing. She's she loved to sing, so that was easy. I usually try to get everybody to sing if they will. Such a great way to get a little bigger in your voice. But we got her singing that um wonderful Edda James hit, Ad Lest, my loves, come along. You know, she got to really let that loose. So we got her singing song, a bunch of songs like that. And she came back after a couple months of practice and work with me. And she said, you know what? My husband was just telling me, you know, it's just so much more peaceful around the house. Don't come home talking about all this trouble at work. And she was like, Oh, be darned. I I was just, I had all this fire, so it was just leaking out everywhere because it had to get out some way. Yeah, music, that singing, the vocalizing it let the rest of her life calm down. So fascinating.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

Surprised me. It it really is fascinating because we don't even know that we're doing that and how it's

Writing Your Vocal Autobiography

SPEAKER_02 23:15

affecting us. You actually you begin every workshop with a question.

SPEAKER_03 23:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 23:20

What is your story about your voice? I found that so interesting because I have never been asked that before. And you encourage people to write their own vocal autobiography. So I did.

SPEAKER_00 23:37

Oh, great! What'd you discover?

SPEAKER_02 23:39

Well, you know, you asked the questions, what are your earliest memories? What turning points shaped your voice? And were there moments of pride and loss and growth or silence? And I just started writing. I found it so interesting. I do I'll share.

SPEAKER_00 24:00

Please. I would love to hear. And I sure I'm sure your listeners would too.

SPEAKER_02 24:05

Yeah, I mean, my earliest memories are that I had a hard time talking and I was silenced, like you said. And I think that was part of our generation. You know, you we had to be the quiet ones in the room. The adults were right. We didn't speak up. And I was told not to tell family secrets, like you said. And I was also neurodivergent, and I used others to speak for me sometimes because I had selective mutism. And in certain situations, I just would not talk. It was really a big deal to me, my voice. And I would just go mute. And the turning points that shaped my voice was when my dad died when I was 11. And how it was handled with my mom and my family, and I was silenced. And there were other things that happened because of it that also created family secrets that I just was told you don't tell. And the good though was I became a journalist. And I'm so smart. I went from not from even needing to drink a little bit to make myself feel comfortable to be in a room with other people to not needing that at all. And I would carry a tape recorder around with me when I got the job. And I learned how to have conversations and how to interview and be interested in people's stories and wanting to tell their story. And I used writing as a young person and even a young adult to help me communicate. So I took that skill with me because I would write down everything and hand it to them. Like I would just give people notes instead of use my voice. And I know it really seemed strange, but as I started to use my voice, you know, I didn't need to do that anymore. But then I could take it to print when, you know, I work for newspapers and magazines and now that I do this. And now my voice, which was my weakest part of me, is becoming my platform. So I mean, there you go.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

Great story. Oh my gosh. That's fantastic. Wow. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 26:33

Yeah, I mean, I couldn't wait to tell you because I was just like, you know, and I never really was asked that and I never really thought about it, but it's amazing how much our voice really does control who we are. It is so much.

SPEAKER_00 26:50

Yeah. Yeah. I think so often about when my first kind of professional client, I was an organizational development consultant. No, no education in that at all. I just fell into it and actually was quite good at it and did it for 12 years. Um, while I was doing that, on the other side, I was developing my own vocal approach and my own voice and singing and writing songs and all that stuff. And I had two lives, basically. And my colleague Patrick came to me once and said, Oh, Barbara, can you please work with this client of mine? She's brilliant in every way. She has everything she needs. She's a rising star in her company. The only thing in her way is if she sounds like this. She has this kind of voice. Okay. I'm exaggerating. It was, and I just was like, oh my gosh, of course I'll work with her. And I, it was a tragedy that opened my eyes to other tragedy, right? Um all the people in this world who have huge gifts, as she did, as you did as a young person, right? And they can't get out because people can't either they can't speak through selective mutism or some other, you know, I've worked, I had a dear friend who never spoke. Um, she typed, she had a uh disability, and her mom stabilized her hand and she could type, and she became a very great teacher of mine. Um yeah. And uh so I just think of all the people who are like in a prisoner of war camp or being trafficked or fill in the blank or locked in a detention center somewhere, or you know, who don't have access to their own voice, therefore their own gifts. And then those of us who maybe have a, you know, a bit more privilege, we still can't get to it because of something somebody said to us or did to us.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 28:48

That kind of get that keeps me doing this work and training more people because I want all the voices free.

SPEAKER_02 28:54

Because that's how the gifts get out.

Voice As A Map Of Belonging

SPEAKER_02 28:56

Yeah, you said that the voice is the living mirror of everything that you've lived through and everything that has shaped your sense of self. And I loved your example of echolocation as babies, as you know, that we cried, we giggled, we, you know, there were sounds that we made, and the response that we received shaped our sense of safety and belonging. So, does that mean that our voices become a map of everything that we've experienced throughout our lives? Of course. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:27

The gifts and the curses and everything in between. And then also, I think beyond our lives as well, because now they're talking about epigenetics.

SPEAKER_01 29:38

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:38

And uh all the women I know are standing at the, you know, at the at the end of a long line of silenced women. I mean, my grandmother was not. She was an exception. She was the governor's executive secretary of Iowa. Okay. Yeah. She uh she loved politics. And I was about in college when people got the women got the vote. So she was a force, you know, but ended up with three kids in five years, didn't really like kids that much, went back to work, you know, bless my mom's heart. She survived some of that negligence. But um, but I just feel like uh I'm not just healing my own voice. I feel like I'm healing back through time. And more broadly, to all of the people, uh, I think we're all connected in some way. And when one of us finds our voice, all of us find a little, find it a little easier. So that's pretty cosmic, and I feel it to be true in my bones.

SPEAKER_02 30:40

That's what I loved about this book, too, is that it started with one man's healing that led to generations of healing, which led to you, which are leading, it's leading to more people being healed. And you just don't realize how one person's healing can pave the path to others being healed. I love that about your story.

SPEAKER_00 31:07

Yeah. And, you know, we may never know what we're doing, what the impact of what we're doing in this world may not be our job this time. You know, I sometimes think we're all just planting orchards and someone else is gonna eat the fruit.

SPEAKER_02 31:22

Right. And we don't need to know.

SPEAKER_00 31:23

No, we just need to do the right thing. Exactly. I just had I did get to eat some fruit recently, though.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Which was huh, thrilling. I'm in addition to doing all this waste coaching stuff, I'm a song leader. I get like to get people in groups to sing, whether they feel like they're able or not, whether they can read music or not, no performance, no perfection, just the joy of being together singing like humans have forever. I did that in the Twin Cities for decades. I built an infrastructure of community singing there that has continued on. The next generations have shown up. And last winter during Operation Metro Surge, my, I don't know, descendants, mentees or whatever were leading, I don't know, 600 people in the streets singing for their neighbors who were afraid to leave their houses for fear of getting abducted. So um there was this whole now worldwide singing resistance movement uh that was generated in that town by people who would call me their matriarch. And so I'm quite blown away by the fact that I got to see that as the grandma, you know, of and they've taken it, of course, into directions that I that I would never think of. So that's been quite amazing.

SPEAKER_02 32:51

Well, you're bringing you're bringing truth to people's voices, and you say that in your book, that your voice often tells the truth. Yes. So what truth does our voice reveal?

What Your Voice Reveals Instantly

SPEAKER_00 33:07

Well, when I was researching my first book, Full Voice, I was digging into all kinds of really interesting stuff about the voice, you know, because it's just hidden in plain sight. We think about it like we hear ourselves on a recording and go like, oh God, is that me? Exactly. Right. But but most of us just don't know much about it. Like it formed and developmentally, where does it go? And I came across all this amazing research about what is revealed by the sound of our voice that includes things like, of course, maybe gender, class, education level, what region, you know, original language, maybe regional differences, uh, physical health, emotional state. Uh, the people who know us well know us when we're not doing well. I used to take care of my sweet mom uh till she um she died at almost 95. And so I would pick up the phone and I'd call her up and I'd know by the low of hello, whether it was a good or bad day for mama. And so, uh, and then chemical, you know, if we're on chemicals of various kinds, the the guy who crashed the Exxon Vel D's they determined that he was drunk by the sound of by the way he sounded in the room. So we're leaking gobs of information about ourselves unconsciously, just by the way we sound.

SPEAKER_02 34:38

It really is interesting.

Making Room For Neurodivergent Speech

SPEAKER_02 34:40

Uh and one of the reasons that I also wanted to really dive into another part of all of this was because of my neurodivergent lens and everything that we've talked about so far with identity and trauma and authenticity and learning to trust our own voice feels especially important for people whose brains process the world differently. And I'd love to just talk about this just for a few questions here. How can understanding and developing our voice help neurodivergent individuals communicate in a world that often wasn't made for them?

SPEAKER_00 35:21

You know, I've worked with so many different kinds of people. And I think what is I'm not a specialist in neurodivergents, except that I just love a lot of people who are. Yeah. Right. Um and I think I'm somewhere in the spectrum of somewhere. You know what I mean? I think we're all like what's normal? We all have something. We all have something. Right. Yes. So uh what I know to be true is that the more choices we have and and the more we can cultivate attention to what's happening in us and what's happening out there. And then become more intelligent about like if something's not working, we can try something else. Most of the time, when something's not working, I don't know about you, but I just get like, oh God, it's not working. And then maybe I'll persist in what's not working. And so I like to give people more choices vocally through all these sounds of earth, fire, water, metal, and air, like these different sounds that dry out, live with, and make their own. So you get bigger, I think bigger than any label. I feel like when I'm in these kinds, this kind of voice, I transcend my personality. And I can be a man, I can be a crone, I can be a witch or a goddess, I can be a beast. Um, and having a larger sense of yourself, I think allows you to interact with the world in a more holistic and flexible way.

SPEAKER_02 37:03

Well, it does sound like you take on a character, somebody different than yourself, which then maybe you can become that uh with more practice. And, you know, many many neurodivergent individuals, we struggle because it's not that we don't have thoughts or feelings or things to share. It's just that that there's that gap between the processing internally and being able to express it externally. So, you how can we bridge that gap? Is that by maybe being more playful, maybe taking on some of these roles and taking on these more choices that you're talking about in order to express ourselves?

SPEAKER_00 37:40

You know, I just want to live in a world where you can just take all the time you need. I work, I've worked with a lot of introverts who have the same issue.

SPEAKER_01 37:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:48

Do you know? That's like I process more slowly and inside. And, you know, I'm right in the middle of introversion and extroversion, so I feel like I'm bilingual.

SPEAKER_02 37:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 37:59

Um a lot of both, apparently. Um so I I get that self-expression and interaction for many of us is kind of like a second language, right? It's never going to feel as innate for an introvert to express like an extrovert or a neurodivergent person to express like a neurotypical person. There's a there's going to be a little bit of a mmm to get there. Like I just did a podcast with a woman who's um interviewing me in her second language, or maybe her third or fourth. Who the heck knows? She had an absolute. And so the amount of thinking that she might have to bring to our interview would maybe be different, or the kind of thinking than someone who is working like yourself, I'm assuming, in your mother tongue. So I think it's a possibility to acquire some skill in expanding your vocal choices, but also not being afraid to speak up and say, give me a minute. Or I need to process that just a sec. Hold on. Because I think a lot of times we lose our voice because we feel like we have to keep up with uh whatever norm is running. And so that alone would be, I think, a huge gift to just have enough voice to say with clarity and you know, strength uh to be able to stand for yourself and in your difference instead of always trying to compensate and become like the whatever norm is.

SPEAKER_02 39:34

Yeah, I like this because there is such a narrow, I think, definition of what effective communication looks like. And we are all so different and we all process so differently. And I think if knowing the other person doesn't mind how I'm presenting or how long it takes me to answer, I think it would really create a better uh connection between the two people.

SPEAKER_00 40:04

Yes. And this is just one difference because a lot of the people I'm working with are working with international teams and very diverse groups. And they're all stressed out beyond their, you know, they're like going a million miles an hour, and they have to somehow connect with each other. It almost feels like there's a heavy metal band playing in the background. And good luck to you, you know, you have to find each other in the midst of the tornado of life right now. And so one of the things I've found is that one of the gifts of my introverted friends is a gift of listening, right? And deep thinking.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 40:49

Instead of really thinking before they speak, what an idea. And so I do feel like in order to listen more deeply, uh, that's half of communication. And so if you're list being able to listen, not just to the words, which are often confusing, but the um the tone. Like what's going on there? What might that say? And having sort of the decode, I think of it as the decoder ring for the the different tones and what they might be saying about someone might be helpful for somebody who can't maybe read faces or get the emotional tone as quickly.

SPEAKER_02 41:30

Yeah. It's I it would be really nice if uh there would be more room for people to just be.

Shadow Work And Exiled Gifts

SPEAKER_02 41:40

You you do talk about the shadow work, you've mentioned it a couple of times. What's in the basement? I mean, you say the parts of ourselves that we've worked hardest to suppress often contain our greatest gifts. And one of the things that we say on the podcast all the time is how our struggles and our gifts can live right next to each other. So can you talk about that from a voice perspective?

SPEAKER_00 42:09

Well, I'll tell my own story about that because the reason I didn't have any sound beyond that note was that I had like put a lid on what I like to call my air voice. That's that light, soft, breathy kind of quality. I am six foot two and a formerly brunette person, uh, from the Midwest, you know, practical. And I couldn't, I could not have carried out, carried off the the little girly, girly, girly thing. You know, that was just I just never. So I just slammed the door on that. And it it also I slammed the door on childhood, like many of us did, got the hell out of here as quickly as possible. Sound we make when we're little people, if we make sound at all. And so that part of me made me incredibly uncomfortable and made my skin crawl when I make the sounds, and also when I heard other pe when I heard other people talking up here, you know, I just had all kinds of judgment about what airheads they were, which is completely not proud of it. It it it may not have anything to do with my judgment. It never does. So when this voice started to come back, I started, you know, I blew the doors off when I, you know, did that big change, and then I kind of try to move it up and lighten it up. And, you know, I have a naturally deep voice. I come from people who sound like me. But there that doesn't mean that I don't get the rest. So I started lightening up the voice. I started singing, you know, more like you know, just like yum yum. And uh lots of tears came. Lots and lots of tears. Years because there was this feeling of being like not in my body protected. There's a vulnerability. It's so it's so flimsy and childlike and sweet. And uh brought a lot of healing along with it and changed not just my voice and how I sing, it also shifted a lot in my sense of spirituality. I felt like suddenly more connected to the divine feminine, for instance. Okay. You know, and I started to move differently and dress differently, and I was like, oh, I feel like I've been a fake boy a lot of my childhood. I was a tomboy and I still have a lot of masculine energy, and I'm not throwing that off the end of the bust. You know, I love that part of me. But there was this other part that just didn't feel expressed, and it feels like it is now. And I love her. I love her. I love that elegant, light, tender, relaxed, dreamlike person.

SPEAKER_02 45:06

She's I'm so glad you got to connect with her.

SPEAKER_03 45:12

I am too. She's so great.

SPEAKER_02 45:17

I mean, you're you're kind of talking about that one part of your book where you say what parts of yourself have been exiled in the name of being good. And, you know, maybe sometimes we're taught not to be too loud, too emotional, too sensitive, too angry, too curious, too passionate, too different. You know, but what stuck with me is this idea that some of those very things that we've learned to suppress might be the most beautiful part about us. Our sensitivity may become empathy, and our intensity may be passion, and our stubbornness may be perseverance, you know, and our curiosity may might be creativity, our loudness could be leadership, and our differences could be our superpower. So, I mean, it's just so beautiful. It's it really is about perspective and not exiling that beautiful part of who we are and who we can be.

SPEAKER_03 46:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:23

Yeah. How can we begin using our voice as a tool for self-discovery instead of simply just talking to people?

The Five Elements Of Voice

SPEAKER_00 46:34

Well, I have a couple of easy entrances. Um, I love to work, I mentioned the elements. This is five elements framework was kind of spot all the things that I was learning about voice from my extended range, vocalizing and jungian psychology, leadership development, yoga, it all kind of mushed together into this framework, which is at the heart of both of my books and all the work I do with the voice.

SPEAKER_01 46:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 46:59

And so there's a TED TED talk, it's probably going to be in the show notes, uh, called Bringing Your Full Voice to Life. And it's just a really great tour of all the earth, fire, water, metal, air voices. And so you can just sort of think of it as like taking your voice to the dog park. You take it off the leash and you swat it on the backside and off it goes, you know, whoa, whoa, whoa, you know, out playing in the realms of voice we'd never get invited into through using characters. So I think that's a really fun, uh, also maybe a little scary way to just step outside of your voice box. Yeah. Right. So that's a great way to just open up and notice, like, oh, what parts feel like really at, you know, comfortable I feel at home in these, and which ones feel a little bit like, ugh, you know, that's right.

SPEAKER_02 47:53

Oh, yeah. I instantly connected or was ooed. You know, I mean, the the framework of uh the five elements is very fascinating to me because you and you also bring in questions for everybody to kind of, you know, look at themselves and connect and try to figure out where they are on this spectrum, I would say. And Earth, what does Earth teach us about groundedness and authority and gut instinct? And who, you know, who needs more earth?

SPEAKER_00 48:28

Well, I think we all need earth, especially in the chaos of this time.

SPEAKER_01 48:33

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 48:33

The world is trying to make us go faster all the time and contend with more input. And I feel like the earth voice is the voice of calm. And I love the word gravitas because it just it's about gravity, you know, keeps us, keeps our feet on the ground, helps us solid in a storm, calm, you know, it's a it, you know, these sounds don't just work on other people. We're working on our own nervous system all the time. So just doing a low, deep sound just settles everything down. So I think of the earth as just being bringing us back home to mama. Okay, okay. And to our our primal selves.

SPEAKER_02 49:28

Okay. Fire was really interesting, you know, the passion and the visibility and physical vitality. Why are so many people afraid to be seen and use their fire voice?

SPEAKER_00 49:41

Oh my goodness. Well, a lot of us get like punished for doing so. Um, this is my dominant voice, especially when I'm doing something like this, teaching or speaking. Uh, it's also kind of my nature. I have a lot of fire, a lot of passion, a lot of energy. And uh so often when I would invite people into their big fire voice, a lot of times I'll have them pretend to be Italian opera singers. La Sagna! You know, people started talking about. Uh I used to teach mostly in person, and they'd say, Oh, somebody gonna call the police. And I was like, Really? That is just human exuberance, right? This is just joy, ferocity, aliveness, vitality, and it's illegal. Hmm. I think I I think that's why sporting events are so popular.

SPEAKER_01 50:38

Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:39

Rock concerts. Those are some of the only places outlet, yes, really yell our heads off in the company of other human beings and not have it feel dangerous or wrong. Um but uh I love the I'm like kind of a word geek. And the word enthusiasm, which I think of as this voice is so much, it's like tigger, you know, in Winnie the Pooh, who is so enthusiastic. The etymology of that word, enthusiasm, means to be full of the divine. That's not how I was raised. No.

SPEAKER_02 51:19

No.

SPEAKER_00 51:20

No. So I do think it's it it can really bring us to life. And this is partly why I love to get people singing, because that is a way that you can really let that sound. Right. I mean, I like to get people singing in all of them, but this one that feels so illegal for so many of us, we may not be able to speak there, but we might be able to sing along with Bonnie Raid or Mick Jagger there.

SPEAKER_02 51:46

Water is where I think I connected the most.

SPEAKER_00 51:50

Well, definitely. That's your that's your gift.

SPEAKER_02 51:54

The the compassion and the apology and warmth and empathy. I mean, that, yeah, that's where I live. And you say sometimes that finding our voice means reclaiming what was once silenced. You know, this is where I'm not silenced. And it feels good to live here. Can you talk about water?

SPEAKER_00 52:18

I would love to talk about water, and I just want to say it's such, you know, I I get that what your work is is about healing. And it's such a great voice for doing that. A lot of people who are healers use the water voice, and who knows which comes first. You know, is it that they're healers and or that the, you know, it's just useful for expressing anything that the heart might want to say. Um, and it makes people feel safe and seen. A lot of counselors, social workers, chaplains um use this voice. And one of I talked, I think I tell this story in the book about this rabbi client of mine who was what has a wonderful water voice. And every time he would come to my house, he'd say, Hello, Barbara, how are you? And I'd be like, Oh my God, I just want to talk to you for a whole hour. You know, I felt so loved and seen. And that was nature. He was such a love, he still is. He's my he's my friend to this day. However, he couldn't be heard by his aging congregants because water voice doesn't carry very well in a loud place.

SPEAKER_01 53:27

Oh my.

SPEAKER_00 53:29

Or with people who are hard of hearing. And so it's so perfect, like all of them, until it's terrible. Right? And so the water voice that makes people feel safe and seen and like they want to confide in you might be terrible if it's a loud place, or if you really aren't in the mood to hear everyone's problems. Right? Sometimes it's if you have to set a boundary, this is not your friend.

SPEAKER_02 53:56

That's true.

SPEAKER_00 53:58

Can I get a witness?

SPEAKER_02 54:02

Yes, you can. Um, that is true. Uh, but I can have different voices. I am a parent. I am a parent of five, and I have many voices. They're not all water, and they can actually go into fire. So yeah. Um, metal is another one, and that one kind of like cuts through. I mean, you know, but it's difficult when people do mumble or speak too softly or struggle with confidence. So you want them to kind of like, you know, use some umph behind their voice.

SPEAKER_00 54:43

Yeah. Metal was added later. I at the very beginning, many years ago, I had the four earth fire, water, air. And I overheard a woman in a restaurant talking in this this kind of voice. You know, I, you know, where I live here, uh, there's that real strong Minnesota accent, you know. My my sister-in-law has this one, you know. And I you never you never have trouble hearing her in a in a room, ever, ever. And my friend from New York City. Honestly, she talks like this, you can hear her everywhere. She's always laughing, you know. And Boston, you know, I have friends from the East Coast who are tend to be a little more uh nasal and laughing. Yeah, right?

SPEAKER_01 55:29

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 55:30

Carrie. So it's it's effortless to make a lot of sound without any vocal strain. So when I was taking care of my mom and she would lose a hearing aid, um, I could talk to her like this all evening and not be hoarse at all. And a lot of sports coaches use this sound, you know, because they're working outside. Um, Broadway singers, there's no business like show business, you know, they the early ones anyway didn't have microphones, so they had to like use the microphones that are in their face. Um, I also really like this one for um, I was just doing a podcast recording with a guy who is a speaker and does couple day trainings with people. And he's oh my voice gets so worn out. Well, talk down here in this earth voice, which is one of the hardest ones to project. And he'd just do that for two days, and he'd just be I part of it is he'd just use the same voice all the time, which is like repetitive stress injury.

SPEAKER_01 56:32

Right.

SPEAKER_00 56:33

Happens to your body, happens to your voice. But he was down here the whole time and trying to project, and uh it was a little bit of this can uh take the strain off and give you a lot of noise for a little bit of a little bit of breath. So that's Matt all.

SPEAKER_02 56:51

Well, I'll tell you the one that really ewes me, and that is air. And that might not surprise you because you said that was for you, and it was, I think, I can't. If somebody turns Enya on, I instantly cringe, and I'm like, get that off. And I love music, I can listen to just about any kind of music except for Enya.

SPEAKER_00 57:22

So funny. Isn't that interesting?

SPEAKER_02 57:25

I mean, it makes my skin crawl, and I'm just like, turn it off now. So I found that so interesting. The air is imagination and storytelling and spiritual connection, but it is also because somehow connected to childhood pain.

SPEAKER_00 57:42

Yes, it is for many of us. Because that's how we that's how we sound when we're little, right? Right? It's like if if we're if we're making sound at all. And yeah, this one I think has been co-opted by cultural caricatures. Okay. Right? Marilyn Monroe, right? Like how you're supposed to be as like a real, like a real girly, girly person or something. And it has so many gifts for us. And so, this is often the hardest sell. I do this work in a lot of organizations, uh, which is where my organizational development stuff comes in handy. I can make a business case for this, a leadership case for this. And this one is often the hardest sell. You know, people are like, oh no, uh-uh, never, never, never. And then they say, Well, you know, so many people who are in some kind of leadership role are understanding the power of story. And so I can be talking along in my regular voice, and then I can say, Let me tell you a story about that. Yeah, there you go. Isn't that interesting? It's like it wakes up the, I think it wakes up the imagination. Yeah. Um and I think I was out walking in the rain, um, walking up from downtown where I got my hair cut, and a doe and two fawns came running out. I live on a pretty busy street out here, came running out of the woods, and I made this sound. I swear to you, I went, oh, wow. Here. The sound of wonder and surprise, right?

SPEAKER_01 59:25

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 59:26

And even in the most serious business place, you can say, I have an idea. Which is very different than I have an idea. Mm-hmm. I have an idea. What? You know, I have a sequence kind of like oh my gosh. It's it's seductive, but in a good way. I mean, it can also be seductive in the seductive way if that's what you're intending to do, but it's also it's inviting, it's digging, it's uh magical, it's dreamy.

SPEAKER_02 59:56

So it can bring you in unless you're in ya. It can bring you in.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:01

It can unless you're in ya in your case, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:04

In my case, yes.

Gender Rules That Shrink Our Sound

SPEAKER_02 1:00:06

Um the other part of that, which you're kind of referring to in a way, is the how women are treated.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:16

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:17

And men are treated. And women are often taught, you know, be nice, be sweet, and men are don't cry, don't don't be soft, don't be vulnerable. And, you know, these very much, you know, become who we are, whether we're that person or not. That's just how we're trained, I guess you could say.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:44

So if you could talk about that, yeah, I think I mean, I I have to say I'm kind of celebrating that gender is getting a little mushed up, you know, the binary, this, you know, this is male and this is female. You know, it's like, whoa. I I appreciate it because for in my own vocal growth and growth as a person, I feel more like I'm everything. You know, I've been able to express masculine, feminine, magic, all of the business in there. And culturally, uh, women are kind of herded into the water and air voice. We're here for everyone. And my friend Sally had a great way of kind of countering all that by saying, I do not have a breast for you. Which I just as like, yeah, no, I'm not here to make your sandwiches and make you feel like stroke your ego. No. Yeah. Yeah. But women are herded into that in how we how we talk, how we sing, how we move in the world, all of that. And men are often taught how to be hard, and you could just have to like be solid all the time and and forceful whether you feel like it or not. And I do feel like that is so limiting, so limiting for all of us. And these qualities that are awakened in the five elements, they're just human. It's just human to be grounded and passionate and caring and insightful and dreamy. It's not gendered. And so I also think, you know, it's to break out of the gender norm is really often frightening because a lot of what herds us into those norms is violence, shame, ostra being ostracized or fear of it. And so uh I worked with a couple of men this week who are going to be taking my training. And um, for both of them, the air was the least expressed. And it just was like they were interested in it, but it was like that was never part of how I even operated. It there was one man who who is a f had his children were older, but they were very young at one point, and that's he said they I think that was when I was really using that voice was with the little when they were little.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:17

Okay, that's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:19

Not much sense. Yeah, most of us use that air voice when we're talking to pets and babies.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:24

Right. Yeah. Yes, that's true.

Singing As The Bridge To Speech

SPEAKER_02 1:03:28

Uh you also you talk about singing and the bridge it is between sound and speech. Why is singing so important?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:38

Oh my gosh. I just but part of it is it's like how our ancestors got through things so we could be here. You know, they transmitted all of the information they needed from generation to generation through the oral tradition. And a lot of the like creation stories, like big Icelandic sagas that take days to recite, a lot of it was done through singing because it's easier to remember things when you sing them.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:03

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:04

Right? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:08

Yeah, school house rock.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:10

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:11

You know, conjunction, junction, what's your function?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:14

I mean exactly. Those go in so deep. And so that is our birthright. That is our ancestral story.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:22

And the book, the writing, that is just barely, yeah, just a tiny slice of human history. The rest of it all was transmitted like from like this is this now, it's time for us to move for nomads. I live in a valley where there's lots of maple trees. And so the uh native tribe, the Ojibwe people, who lived northeast of where I live now, would make, you know, camp, pack up everything and come down and do camp for tapping the trees and boiling the sap. And so like the time that it was right to do that was passed from generation to generation through speaking or and so to me it feels like intrinsically human um and can express things that words just can't. That's why it's so powerful and also so scary. Because it's it's uh you're open from the inside. It's vulnerable, right? Super vulnerable, yeah.

Poetry Pace And Accurate Silence

SPEAKER_02 1:05:27

And poetry is too. And you do talk about poetry and how that slows us down. Why why does that matter?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:36

Well, the slowing down, I think, is helpful. And I love eloquent speech. So you read that Shakespearean quote. Yes. Beautiful, I must say. And there's a quality of speech that I think has been lost through functionality, speed, um, even just all these um. artificial uh Siri generated Alexa, you know, all these like machine voices.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:07

There's something very ancient and amazing to hear beautiful speech, beautifully spoken. And so I encourage people to use poetry as a way to bring some of what they've been learning about the elements through the sound and the singing into their everyday lives. And that usually involves, you know, you can have a process in the book about how you can use a poem to sort of expand your eloquence in how you speak. So that when you're being well when you're when people are hearing you, they're actually taking pleasure in it. So it's not just perfunctory, you know, here I'm just talking to you now, here I am. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. Which is a lot how we operate.

unknown 1:06:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:59

The quote that really stayed with me is may my silences become more accurate.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:07

Theodore Retke.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:10

That I sat in that. Because I think, you know, we all need to be more mindful of that, I think. And we we have to be on all the time. We just have to be. And I love that my silence can have meaning.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:31

Yes. Yes. I actually um I had one of those experiences of just having a blurt come out of my face that was just like, oh God, you know, just why did I say that? And I remembered that acronym acronym wait why am I talking? And so I made a little a little four part song of it just a community song where there's one group that sings this part and that part and and it's and it goes it rifts on why am I talking? Why am I talking? Wait. Why am I talking? Wait. Shh and anyway, and there's a couple other parts and then the last part is blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah you know so I've oh my gosh experience of and and it's so fun to teach it because people just break into giggles because I think most of us have had that experience of going like oh my gosh you know may my silences become more accurate.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:34

I think I might teach my youngers that why are you talking you need to stop yeah yes be very intentional in your silence um one the last part five practices for life I wanted to walk through these if we could um five practices of life and you even have songs that go along with them if people have Kindle like I read this on Kindle but you also have access to them on your website and what is your website?

Brain Rats Purpose Kindness Letting Go

SPEAKER_02 1:09:10

Barbramacee.com okay they can access it there but you talk about tame your brain rats oh yeah why what are brain rats and why do we need to tame them?

SPEAKER_00 1:09:28

Well I wrote that's based on a song I wrote a long time ago it's very silly about brain rats and it's just the junk in our heads and I used to think mine was so special you know whatever my negative self-talk was somehow like uniquely terrible. And it's like the more I started listening to other people it was like no they basically it's all the same stuff. And so I made a silly song about it just about like if people really knew me they wouldn't like me. I'm gonna die you know eating cat food under a bridge whatever those things are. And I poked fun at them and um yeah and so that's what brain rats are. It's just that you know you stink la la you're a fake bad radio station. And the taming I think a lot of us think we're gonna eradicate them. I think they're just gonna be there forever. But they just I think we just have a different relationship with them. It's like taking them to obedience school and one of the disempowering things we can do to them is is first of all tell someone that a trusted person. And I've actually had whole teams in organizations take on the language of brain rats or in couples to say oh honey I'm having some brain rats about something. So it's like useful language but telling someone kind of takes the power away and laughing at them. So that's how you tame them.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:52

Yes I have brain rats and they sometimes we just have to figure out a way for other voices to speak louder than them those than those brain rats. And that's what you know my when with my kids being neurodivergent and having lots of things going on in the world I want to be louder than the rest.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:15

That's true.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:15

You know I want their self-positive talks about themselves you know to be louder than the bullies. Yeah and and that's kind of what it is that you're doing in that is that it's kind of silencing those I mean you know taking them to training you know dog training school or however yes I mean yeah I mean that's that's a great way of looking at it because we are trying to um silence them a little bit and uh make the other voices louder which I really like. And you talk about remember why how do we reconnect with purpose?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:54

Well by nature humans are forgetful. That's why there are all these rituals in every culture. I kind of remember where I was when that really struck me. It was like one of those whoa I guess I'm again I'm not unique in being forgetful because otherwise human beings wouldn't have built all these rhythms and rituals for remembering. Right. And so I like to suggest that people and a lot of people do this already they have a meditation or prayer practice or they have a yogic practice or tai qigong or tai chi or I my personal one is going for walks in the woods in the morning and then jumping in the river unless it's frozen. You know whatever these uh poetry can be a practice these symbols you know you I noticed your beautiful tattoos sometimes it's tattoos or jewelries jewelry helps you reconnect to the larger story because the weeds can get very dense and it's like okay now why am I doing all this? What's the what's the larger story here? So that whole uh aspect of that part of the book is around what are your touchstones that will you know click it back in.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:09

It's like oh right oh right that's that's my why which is partly connected to our lineage and how do we honor the people who shaped us well I think telling their stories is just so wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:26

When I do this I do this as a keynote this last part of the book and I often have people pair up or trio up and talk about a teacher or mentor. What did they what's the message you gave them and or they gave you and how do you want to live it out in your own life and people just cry their faces off so often just so and then there's that's just talking about one. And even those of us who've had a pretty rough ride are still here because of I don't know people who saw us called our gifts uh loved us so um and so I think telling the story is a really great way to honor that lineage and then consciously take it forward like kind of what I'm doing with Alfred Wolfson even though I've never met the man that I continue to speak his name, tell his story and hopefully honor what he went through in what I'm teaching. So I think that's a really great way to honor lineage and I honor my blood lineage as well. I love talking about my grandmother who was the governor secretary.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:41

Yeah I yeah and I loved how you did have people like you wrote in your book how you know to write down your family blood and chosen you know and the people that have really made a difference in your life. So it's just interesting in your book how you take people through all of these steps but you bring us all along with you and it's very interactive where we really stop and think yeah the fourth step be kind. Yes I and I loved the Fred Rogers story.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:15

I mean on the pool at the pool?

SPEAKER_02 1:15:17

Yes I mean I love him but you know if you could tell that story and why kindness is so transformative.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:26

Actually I have a friend who became good friends with Fred Rogers and um at a very dark moment in his life and he was a journalist also and interviewed Fred and they of course got in it went past the interview and Fred went very much into connecting with him as a as a person and became a friend and mentor to him and would write they wrote letters remember those back and forth and Fred would this is not the story in the book I'm just doing this is a preamble to the story in the book. Every time he would write to my friend Tim he would say I'm proud of you or I T O Y I'm proud of you. And it was so important to him and he ended up writing a book called I'm proud of you I believe about his friendship with Fred. And so I kind of know firsthand that that that was the real guy. That's how he rolled all the time. And so story I tell in the book is that he he was a swimmer as I'm a long distance swimmer a pool lap swimmer andor river swimmer but he would go to the pool every day and swim a slow mile and every day he would uh talk to the young man who was handing him his towel and just like really interact with him as a person and uh day in day out um and reaffirm his humanity too and yeah so bless Fred Rogers. He got a lot of grief for being a he's a water voice man and he got a lot of teasing right for being so soft.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:08

There's many different versions of all of us but I think that you know he would be somebody that I would want to sit across from me too yeah he taught everybody about kindness didn't he did and he was an amazing songwriter too he wrote so much music for that show.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:26

Your last part of that was compost the meaningless what are we holding on to that no longer serves us I keep hearing people talk about their plates my plate's really full I'm adding to my plate plate plate plate so okay uh I think a lot of times I just had coffee with a dear friend yesterday who's like always adding things and you know she's in her 70s you know technically retired but she's writing grants and she's on this board and she's doing this and the other thing. And there was one other thing she was thinking about adding to her plate and I just said no don't do it. You know it's like you don't have to and it and I already know enough of what other things she's doing. And so uh in this part of the book I'm inviting people to kind of take a serious look at what are you doing that maybe you don't have to do anymore. Yes, pay your taxes yes pick your children up from school but there are other things um when I've done this live I like do a little revival and have people shout out things they're ready to give up and one of the first times I did this was in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and this woman raises her hand and she says ironing bed sheets we all just went whoa and then other things show up like you know rehearsing things that have already happened you know where he's like well what I should have said was or regret or having a perfect I don't know family car body career house I don't know all that whatever that is so it's just kind of instead of adding it's like what could you um I use the quote I believe by um Pablo Casals give up doing things that have no meaning for life and so I just think it's helpful to look at if I stop doing stuff that doesn't mean thing much to me then I'll have more space for the things that do or for that silence and space and nothing. Rest.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:39

You know throughout this entire book one thing that kept coming back to me that so many of us have spent our lives trying to become acceptable versions of ourselves. You know we're smaller, quieter, less emotional, less passionate, less ourselves and what you've really done is given people permission to come home to themselves and you remind us that our voice isn't just something that we use it's who we are.

Play Sing Listen Then Speak

SPEAKER_02 1:20:10

So my final question is if every person listening walked away wanting their voice to represent who they are, what would you tell them?

SPEAKER_00 1:20:22

I'll play just play. Just start with playing you know voice your yawn when appropriate of course you know and uh sing along to I I mean I love to invite people to make up a playlist of a variety of songs that they absolutely love to sing. Okay. No Enya for you though. But you know have some Leonard Cohen and some Dolly Parton and some Willie Nelson and some Tony Bennett and some Sabrina Carpenter and some Billie Eilish and you know for El Williams you know just a whole real really diverse sounds and and songs you love and then have you know sing it in your car when you're cleaning your kitchen or because that singing is like a bigger it's a bigger space for your voice to inhabit. And then while you're doing that just notice it's like oh this is you know you could do it unconsciously but if you notice all these different places you might be able to find your way back to them later. Um so I think play and sing and read children's books uh whether you have any kids or not and uh listen more closely to the voices around you as well hearing under the words.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:49

I I connect with so much of that and you know one of the things that helped really did help find my voice was reading children's books. So I find that really interesting that you said that. And I still today when I go into a bookstore find myself in the children's book section to just sit down and read you know it they really do help us connect to who we are even as adults.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:17

And they're full of archetypes.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:21

The troll under the bridge you know they're they're they are they're these iconic archetypal characters of the fairy and the witch and the giant and the hero and the the healer the the sirens I mean all of the there's so much in these books that are full of these archetypal uh characters that help us open up these parts of our humanity that's why they're so uh delicious these books yeah yeah Barbara I absolutely love this book because it isn't really a book about speaking it's about becoming and perhaps that's what our voice has always been not simply words but the sound of ourselves coming alive Barbara I I I thank you so much for being on the show you have given us so much to think about and Barbara's book is Vocal Intelligence Leading with Vitality Presence and Impact and you can reach her on her website which is BarbramakAfee.com so Barbara thank you so much for being here today I really appreciated this it was my great joy thank you very much and remember to all of our listeners there is always purpose in the pain and hope in the journey and as usual we will see you next time