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YOUR
REAL VOICE - the vocal ezine for real people
February
19, 2006
#20
FEATURE EDITORIAL
What Is That News Crawler Behind My
Eyes?
Let's start Goofy Voodoo, Part 2 with a review. Last time in Part
1 I introduced the concept of having unconscious or conscious thoughts,
worries, feelings and sometimes dread that take over the throat and
manifest physically during singing. I also described the
experience of this as a tight, restricted throat, feeling like wearing
a dog collar while singing, and generally having to "work" really hard
to get the song out because of the thinking going on in the mind while
singing. All because thoughts lead to feelings which we
experience physically in our bodies. The more intense the
thought, the more intense the physical experience of it.
I also described the experience as the "news crawler." All
of your thinking, conscious or unconscious, has an effect on the voice,
but we don't always recognize our thoughts while we have them.
For the homework, the challenge was to write down every single thought
you have about singing a particular song and then read the thoughts OUT
LOUD to yourself. Did you do the homework? You will
get MUCH more out of this process if you did the homework. (It's
not too late to do the challenge if you haven't yet.) When you did the
homework, did you start to notice your own news crawler going on while
you were singing? Did it crack you up to actually be present to
your own news crawler while you were thinking and singing
it? That's the funniest part of the whole thing. I
know in voice lessons many times I can almost see the students news
crawler going on behind their eyes while they are totally unaware of
it. They are so stuck in their thoughts and worries about their
voice that they don't even notice what is happening and they can't
monitor their own thinking. The look on their faces gives away
the whole thing every time! I've gotten very good at reading news
crawlers from the other side of the piano over the past few
years!
So, now we pick up where we left off, which is "What do I do with all
these thoughts now that I know they are there?" Good
question! Now that you know the thoughts are there, you can begin
to clear them
out of your head and your throat and your song. The most
effective and fastest way to do this is to begin singing the song, "a
cappella", and STOP the instant you have one of the Goofy Voodoo
thoughts. (A Cappella means no accompaniment and no backing track
or CD to sing to. Just your voice.) Immediately say
the thought out loud, just like you did when you read the list you
made. Once you've said the thought, start singing the song again
right where you left off. (This is why we sing it a cappella; it
requires a LOT of stopping and starting, which is easier to do without
accompaniment or a backing track.) The instant you have another
thought like the ones on the list, stop again and say the
thought. Then start again exactly where you were and continue
that process until you get to the end of the song. Do this
process over as many times as you need in order to eliminate most of
the thinking and distraction going on while you sing the song. Do
you notice that as you work through the song or repeat it a few times
that the amount of thinking and distraction reduces significantly?
You may have to stop during each line if you really have a lot of
thinking going on. Remember, NOTICING the thinking is the goal
here, not worrying about the singing. In fact, this whole process
of dismantling Goofy Voodoo is to get you to stop worrying about the
singing at all. If thoughts lead to feelings which you experience
physically in your body, and you have NO thoughts, then you have no
negative physical experience to constrict the throat! I call this
whole process "Vacuum Out Your Brain" and it has had remarkable results
not just for me, but for all my students that I have put through this
process. I have seen students completely transform their ability
to perform successfully just by using this one technique for a few
weeks. I had two particularly gifted students doing some really
difficult music go from tense, nervous and making lots of mistakes to
being able to perform flawlessly and relaxed in ONE week by doing this
process. When a student faithfully practices the "Vacuum Out Your
Brain" technique with patience and attention, it works every
time.
Patience and attention really are the keys! Don't be in a hurry
to master the song and put pressure on yourself to do it quickly.
The beauty of this technique is that it builds over time to completely
train your level of focus, which HUGELY impacts your performance
ability. The more you are willing to go slowly in the beginning
and focus your mental efforts on noticing your thinking and speaking it
out loud the sooner you will succeed. Have you noticed what
happens when you say the thought out loud?.....
It disappears! That's the beauty of this whole process. The
thoughts really do disappear out of your mind and your body once you
speak them. By speaking them, you allow the thoughts to disappear
because you stop storing them in your body and your brain!
Remember, I said to write them down and say them, not write them down,
memorize them and be prepared to be tested on them! No! Not
at all. The whole point of the process is to get those thoughts
to go away by letting them go. For performers, the best and
fastest way to do this is to acknowledge the thought, speak it and let
it go. Your body will respond by relaxing almost right
away. The more you do this process of clearing by speaking the
thoughts and letting them go, the more you learn to relax your body
instantly, and you get much better at it over time.
Email me at info@sing-in-tune.com if you have any questions about how
to practice the "Vacuum Out Your Brain" process. I can easily
assist you by email.
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Contact Athena by e-mail at info@sing-in-tune.com
or learn how to sing
perfectly in tune at her web site at www.Sing-In-Tune.com
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