May ALL Voices Be Free to Sing and Express

*** Because Shamanic Journeying may not be familiar to all who read this, I will explain more about my experience with it in my next blog or you can read more about it on Jeannette McCullough's website (see below).

***In previous blogs I have posted some of my drawings of my Alien Friends. This drawing is one of my very special Shaman Friends. I'll introduce you to more of my Shaman Friends in my next blog.

A Remarkable Vocal Healing

Last night, Thurs. Oct. 28, I attended our monthly Shamanic Journey Group led by Jeannette McCullough (http://www.shamansong.ca/). My journey experiences were a continuation of the work I had started on Sun. Oct. 24 at the "About Face" workshop. (See previous blog). It seems as though that 8 year old child in me still needed to be healed and listened to. I decided to allow the 8 year girl that I was to be in charge of my journey last night.

Just before we entered into the journey I asked for a healing for that 8 year old part of myself. I asked for healing of the trauma that had shut down her voice and I requested direct healing of her voice.

As the drumming started, signalling the beginning of the journey, I saw my 8 year old self climbing to the top of her very favorite tree. It was a huge gorgeous willow tree that I used to climb as a child. From the top of the tree, my Hawk friend picked me up and, with me on her back, she flew me to the edge of Earth's atmosphere. From there, my Purple Dragon Friend picked me up and flew me to my beloved Space Station where I go most of the time when I take these Shamanic journeys. Transporting me to this Space Station requires real teamwork!! However I can also just close my eyes in meditation and be there. Or I sometimes do travel there in my nighttime dreams. But the journey with Hawk and Dragon is half the fun of going there too. I love to fly on the backs of these powerful allies of mine.

When I reached the Space Station, I was greeted by my Beloved Guide, Sweet Wisdom (my drawing of her appears in a few of my past blogs.As she took me inside, I was surprised to see both of my parents there, along with my grade 3 music teacher. There was also a grand piano and my current vocal teacher, along with his voice teacher, were also there. I started doing my vocal exercises with my current teacher and as I did that, I felt the support of my  parents and my grade 3 teacher in a really nice way, but somehow it just didn't feel like enough.

   Then Sweet Wisdom made a cushy little bed for me right on the piano bench. As I lay down on it, (remember I'm only 8 years old in this journey, so I fit quite nicely on that bench) my parents and grade 3 teacher started grooving to the drumbeat and dancing around me. Then my Dad (who had always been a very quiet man in real life-- the youngest of 13 children and son of a pretty dominant mother, so he likely had no voice in his growing up years) started making some beautiful low, growly, guttural sounds with his voice. As he began to explore these sounds, I saw his face light up. He really started to come alive and enjoy himself.

My mother also began to make a variety of sounds with her voice. (In "real" life my mother never sang. In fact she often said to me, "You're just like me. You can't hold a tune." My mother was orphaned at 11 years old and had no say, no voice, in her upbringing.) Then she just stopped at the foot of my bench and began to sing, full out, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". Her whole face and body came alive as she did that. She was totally transformed into a beautiful, confident, vibrant woman in that moment.

To see both of my parents looking happy and joyful and to hear the beauty of those voices really did something to my heart and soul. In listening to them I felt my own voice finding its freedom. I didn't have to do a thing or make a sound. All I had to do, and all I wanted to do, was listen to the voices of my parents as they sang and sounded. For the first time ever, I was truly hearing the sounds of my parents voices. And I was being filled with the joy and the fun and the happiness that was pouring out of both of them.

What I really came to understand in that moment was that my parents and my teacher didn't deliberately set out to shut down my voice. They weren't against me expressing myself, even if that is what it felt like to me at that time. But in "real life" they had no voice. They weren't allowed to express. So how could they give me what they didn't have? Simple. They couldn't. None of us can give what we don't have.

Allowing them to find their voices and express themselves so fully (as they did in my Shamanic journey) allows my voice to be free.

I really believe that in healing and freeing ourselves, as we can do in these kinds of journeys, we also heal and free those who came before us. Perhaps by healing ourselves, we can actually influence past generations. If our parents had no voice or means of expression, it is probably because their parents were cut off from expression and so on .. back through generations. I believe that we can be influential in healing those in spirit (as my parents, grandparents etc. are). 

Last night felt like a huge vocal healing not only for me, but also for my parents and I did feel that healing energy travelling back through many previous generations.

I am very grateful to this group and to all groups like this that allow people to explore their inner worlds in a way that is safe, comfortable, supportive and accepting.

Thank you Jeannette, for offering this to us and thank you to all who are openly and courageously embarking on this journey of healing and conscious awareness.

May we all be free to express the beauty and love that is in our Hearts.

Barbara

Let ALL the Children Sing!!!

Greetings,

   This past Sun. Oct. 24, I attended an absolutely wonderful and inspiring workshop "About Face". It was a day of exploring (through creative writing, sharing stories, mask making etc.) the "face" that we show to the world and the "deeper face" that we may show only to ourselves. The facilitators were two very creative women: writer Teri Degler (http://www.teridegler.com/) and visual artist Shelley Yampolsky.

   This is one of Teri's books "The Divine Feminine Fire"

   In one of the writing exercises, a very important story emerged for me and I did share it with the group. Although it was my own personal story, many of the other people did identify, in their own way, with it. And I think there is  a larger message in this story. So I'm calling it

                                    Let ALL The Children Sing!   

In the workshop, Teri guided us into a visualization where we were instructed to remember a time and experience in our younger lives that forever changed us in some way.

Immediately I was back in Grade 3 with Mrs. Self (yes that really was her name!). She was our music teacher. As I remember her from a child's perspective, she was quite tall, grey hair, somewhat of an imposing and intimidating figure to a little child. I still remember her white dress with black flower designs on it. She came into the classroom this one particular day and one by one, she made each child stand up and sing Do Rey Me.....I remember being terrified as my turn came closer. I had not even been allowed to speak up at home, never mind sing!! Vocal expression just wasn't part of my growing up experience. And any minute now, this teacher was going to make me stand up and humiliate myself by trying to sing, when I couldn't.

When my turn came, I stood up and, scared as I was, I tried my best.

It wasn't good enough.

All the children who could sing the scale well were allowed to go with Mrs. Self and sing in the school choir. The few of us who could not sing had to sit back down at our desks in total humiliation. Those of us who were left behind were given some math assignments to do while the other kids got to go to the auditorium and sing. Eventually they (the singers) were given the opportunity to perform in the school concert, watched by their proud parents. The rest of us were simply left out to suffer the pain our voices being silenced: the pain of "knowing" that the sound of our voices was unaccepatable.

At that moment, I became "The Child Forever Silenced"!!

Until..........Many years later -- actually at age 58 -- I could no longer stand to have my voice trapped so deeply inside of me. Although I had been facilitating  workshops and giving the occasional lecture, just the idea of standing up in front of people and allowing my voice to be heard had been difficult and traumatic. And I never attempted to sing, unless I was certain that I was alone and no one would hear me.

Finally, a series of events pushed me to find a vocal coach/singing teacher. Just about a year and a half ago, I started searching for a technique and a teacher that could help me. Man was I lucky!!! I found an excellent technique called Speech Level Singing (which you may have read about in my previous blogs) and I found a highly qualified teacher (Brandon Brophy, 3rd Voice Studio) of this technique here in Toronto.

About a month or so into my lessons with Brandon, he had me make some "bratty" "nasty" sounds, some of which were done with sticking my tongue out. These were done to help me connect with, and develop my Chest Voice. Prior to this work, my voice had been weak and disconnected so in my vocal practice I have focused a lot on developing a strong connection with my chest voice and getting really rooted in the depths of my voice. Those "nasty" sounds helped me to do that. And...they also had an added benefit! One day, during my lesson with Brandon, I was making "Na Na" sounds, as bratty as I could manage. With some of the bratty sounds I even got to stick my tongue out. As I was doing all that, Mrs. Self appeared right in front of me! The image of her felt and looked so real that I almost felt as though I could reach out and touch her. Imagine my satisfaction at being able to stick out my tongue and say "Na Na Na" to her in my brattiest voice!! In that beautiful "Na Na" scale that I was practicing, I could feel the child in me coming forward and saying to her "You will never silence me again. I'm letting this voice be heard and I don't care if you don't like it." It was a beautiful cathartic moment.

This whole idea of not allowing children to sing is nasty and cruel. I hope and pray that this is not happening at schools any longer.

I am very grateful to have found a voice teacher who, from the very beginning (when I really didn't have any singing voice, to speak of!) taught me with such enthusiasm, as though he never doubted for a minute that I could learn to sing. And now it is starting to be so much fun to let my voice out and to allow it to make all of these wonderful sounds, and yes -- I am even beginning to sing -- a little bit!!

And one day, I will get to perform in that Concert.

                                         *********************************

Thank you Teri and Shelley for an incredible workshop and for allowing me to share my stories (with  my strong, connected voice!)

Thank you Brandon for being such a skilled and patient vocal coach and for helping me feel safe and comfortable in letting my voice be heard!

Thank you to the therapist who has been so willing to listen so patiently and attentively to many, many of my stories over the past three years. Thank you for introducing me to the joy of making music and sound and thank you very much for helping me to find the courage to look for a vocal coach.

Thanks especially to that 8 year old, grade three student that I was (and still am somewhere deep inside!). Thank you for waiting so patiently all these years to finally be able to free your voice and tell your story.

    
I'll be back soon. "About Face" has stirred up a few stories that I want to share!

May we all sing our own special songs in our own special way.

Barbara

A Message from My Artwork!

I was going to title this "A Message from My Alien Friends" but I know that some people get a little nervous at the idea of "Aliens Among Us". However I highly recommend the book of the same title. I believe that there are Beings among us from many other dimensions and I totally believe that they are here to love, help and support us. Ruth Montgomery, the author of "Aliens Among Us" came to that same conclusion a long time ago.



On Sat. Oct. 2, I was at a gathering of very open minded people -- Spirituality in Health Care Network. http://www.spiritualityinhealthcare.net/ I had a chance to chat with a few people who were interested in my Artwork (which has started appearing in my last 2 or 3 previous blogs and the images you see here are also mine). I was talking about the fact a number of the images that are coming through in my Artwork seem to me to be "Alien Friends" or friends from another dimension. Many of these same Beings have also appeared in my night time dreams and journeys and some of them are the central characters in a story that I have been writing (or perhaps it is more accurate to say this story is being written through me!) for the past two and a half years. Whenever I attend our monthly Shamanic Journeying group, my journeys always take me to the Space Station where I meet with my Alien Friends.


At this gathering on Oct. 2, one woman asked me the question, "What is their (the Aliens) message to us?" Because I have had innumerable in depth conversations with these Beings and every conversation is loaded with insight and inspiration, I was hard pressed to think of one message that I could impart from them. Plus up until now, my connection with them has been largely personal. But now I do feel like I am being asked to start bringing their wisdom and insight into this reality.


When this same woman then asked, "Have they come to warn us?" I immediately and emphatically said "NO! They have come here only to love and support us. They have come to nurture and inspire us. They are Beings of pure unconditional love and compassion. That is what they are offering us."


Once I got home, I reflected again on her question and my emphatic "NO!" to her suggestion that they might be coming to warn us. I looked around at the images of these Beings (many of which are hanging on my walls) through new eyes. What I saw and felt was Pure Unconditional Love and Support. And great inspiration. They have not come with any complex message and, despite my many hours of dialoguing with each one of them, they have not come to pass on more words and definitely not more dire warnings. Few of us (seekers) need more of that anymore. But I don't know anyone who doesn't need to be loved and cared about on the very deepest levels. And that's what they bring to us.


I have already introduced you to Sweet Wisdom in past blogs, but I feel compelled to bring her love and wisdom and great inspiration in once again to share with the World.


I know there are many of us who have made great heroic efforts to stay on a Spiritual Path, to be the best possible Human Beings we can be, to serve the greater good of all......... And I believe we should be commended for all of our efforts and every one of us should really appreciate ourselves for all of the good we have brought to this Earth (I suspect you wouldn't even be drawn to these kinds of blogs if you were not a spiritual seeker or healer of some kind). Yet our world is still full of conflict. And, if each of us were to be really honest, I suspect that many of us, no matter how dedicated we are to our Spiritual Path or practice, still at times, experience our own inner conflict and "so called" negative emotions. And I also suspect that repeated warnings, being hard on ourselves, feeling guilty or inadequate, being judged or judging ourselves are not going to help our situation or the Greater World situation. So ...no....my Alien Friends do none of that. And they actually have nothing to tell us. Their only desire is to love and support us.


And perhaps, once we accept this love and support into the very depths of our cells, into the depths of our heart and Soul, into the very depths of our Being, then we will be able to love unconditionally. It is through unconditional love that Peace will reign on this Earth.

Few (if any) of us, were raised in an atmosphere of pure unconditional love and acceptance. Just as it can be challenging for us to love and accept without judgement, it was probably even harder for our parents to do that. So we enter into adulthood with that child part of ourselves still crying out for love and compassion and acceptance. And yet that love is there, all around us, if we can only open the door to allow it in. If my Alien Friends can help offer that love, then I happily share that energy with all of you. If my experience with my Alien Friends inspires you to connect more deeply with your own source of unconditional love, be it Angels, God, Buddha, Jesus, Nature or other "Friends" that are just waiting for you to let them in, then that would be wonderful.


However we experience or access that unconditional love, let's just all find a way to allow it to sink into the deepest recesses of our body, Soul and psyche. Let's imagine the Infant that we were being filled and surrounded with unconditional love and compassion. Let's offer that same love and compassion to the Child that we were, and to the Teen-age part of ourselves, and the Young Adult that we were, up until this present day moment. Let's offer absolute unconditional love and compassion to the person that we are right now in this very moment. And let's even offer that love to the person that we will be in ten years, twenty years....... We have the power to actually pave the road to our future with unconditional love and compassion. Imagine walking down that road.


I'm imagining now, a planet where everyone is radiating unconditional love and compassion. I know planets like that exist. That is the atmosphere that surrounds the planet that my Alien Friends come from. Imagine our Earth being one of those planets.


Until we meet again -- Love Yourselves, Love the Earth and all of her Beings.




Barbara