Ep. 12: You never know where your voice will lead you

Do you ever wonder what's the point of working on your voice? Where is it all leading? In this episode we're discussing the concept of following to those little breadcrumbs Hashem leaves in your life to show you where to go.

Helpful Links:

Book a Lesson with me!

Email me - nechamaleahmusic@gmail.com

Join the email club

Transcript

0:18

Hello. And welcome back to the Jewish singer podcast made especially for you, the Jewish female singer. Thank you so much for listening. And if you've been vibing with these episodes, please hit the follow button on Spotify or Apple or wherever you are, subscribe on YouTube and share the podcast with your singer friends, please. Because you know, they want all the singing tips too. So today's episode is really juicy. And personal and I'm super excited to be talking about this topic today with you. I think you're really going to relate. So I was talking with one of my voice students after her lesson the other day, and she was telling me that she's having a really hard time with her voice and feeling like it's not doing what she wants it to do. And that sometimes she wonders why she's trying to sing at all. She's had this dream ever since she was a small girl that she's wanted to sing beautifully. That's just been something that's been a part of her, like this, this deep desire to sing and it's been her lifelong dream and she never really did anything about it until like well into adulthood and she started taking voice lessons with me. And by the way, if she's listening, I've told her this. She knows that she's made amazing progress. But it's, it's still hard for her to feel like, well, I wish I was at a professional level. I wish I was like my friend who I see has this gorgeous voice and she doesn't even really care that she has a gorgeous voice, you know, but it, but she feels like if she had that, it would just be like, you know, all her problems are solved. Not really, but you know what I'm saying? And so she has this really, really deep, deep desire to sing. And, and then she's like, well, it's not working. It's, it's not, it's not coming fast. It's not working. Why am I even doing this? What's the point? Why am I even wasting my time with this? Why am I banging my head against the wall? Why am I whipping a dead horse? As she likes to say, if I'm not going to do anything with this or if I'm not sure that I'm going to get anywhere or get where I want to go. Okay. So I just feel like I have to sigh because it's such, it's such a real feeling and it's such a hard feeling. And I know what it's like for singing not to be easy, not to come easy. And I'm going to get into it in just a, just a minute. But like, I did not start out singing Well, I really didn't and I, so I so relate to, to those who feel like, I'm not amazing yet. And so I just like, don't even know what's the point of keeping working on it. You know, I just, and also there's, there's an underlying question, which is really what I want to talk about today. There's an underlying question of what's this all for? Why do I need to learn to sing if I'm not any good at it? Or why do I need to learn to sing? If I'm not sure I'm going to be a professional singer, or why do I need to learn how to sing if I just am doing it for fun, I'm having a lot of fun. It fills me up, but like. Is that selfish? I should be doing other things with my time and money, right? So this is what I said to my student the other day. I said, look, Hashem gives us a ratzon for something. Hashem gives us really deep desires, and they're not stam, they're not for nothing. They're not, oh that's nice, oh that's cute, side note, when I was in college I once had someone ask me, I think I was in a business setting, ask me, oh so what are you studying in college, oh I'm studying, um. Music. I'm studying to sing. Oh, that's cute. Oh, that must be fun. Yeah, it's fun. Okay, but that's not all it is. Okay. And we're going to get into it. Can you tell this is a loaded topic for me? Um, it's, it's not just like, oh, that's cute. That's fun. Oh, that's not practical. We don't need to do that. I grew up. In a house where music, studying music was not a practical thing to do. And so I get it. I get these, like, what's the point of it? And I want to talk about it, but I want to say first that Hashem, he gives us these deep desires because it's a clue as to what you should be doing. Hashem gives us this really deep ratzon because he's whispering in your ear or yelling. This is where you need to go. This is where you're going to find yourself. This is where you might find your purpose. Or even, even if it's not like you're tafkid, b'gadol, like this is what you need to do with your life and in your business and whatever, like that, maybe there's a part of yourself that needs some healing or growth and, and you're supposed to go there. You might be still asking yourself, how can this be something that's going to propel me forward in life? Spiritually, financially, physically, how is it going to be something that's going to help the world? And we don't know. The truth is that we don't know. You don't know, I don't know, your rabbi probably doesn't even know. We have no idea the things, how things are going to propel us forward into achieving the things that we are meant to do. Or meeting the people in life that we're meant to meet. We don't have a crystal ball and we just have to go after what feels right in the moment, what your gut is telling you, what that deep ratzon is calling you toward. And that's emunah really, is that not just like the epitome of what we learn about having emunah and bitachon. And so you have this desire to do something and be something. So, girl, better do it, Hashem whispered in your ear and you have to listen. So, I want to tell a little story, a little story time about how I got to where I am right now and sort of the dominoes that, fell, to get me to where I am right now to be a voice teacher. And it'll hopefully illustrate for you this idea of like not knowing, we don't know where one thing will take us. So when I was seven years old, I begged my mother, literally just begged her to let me play the violin. And I have no idea why I wanted to play violin or where I'd even heard a violin being played or, I just needed to for some reason. And my mom, like any parent, was skeptical, of a seven year old wanting to play violin. And, or skeptical of the idea, not of me, and was like, no, I don't think so, no. And you know, it was brushed off for a while. And finally, maybe about a year or so, maybe more, of begging, it paid off. And she let me start taking violin lessons. that were offered at my school. That's probably where I heard a violin. They had a program. My, my, uh, elementary school had a very robust music program. Which is really amazing and so after that I eventually started private lessons Maybe the year after that and I loved it. I was not a prodigy by any means and I I didn't have a really great practice ethic but I was good. I took private lessons weekly for years and it really shaped my identity and I even played the role of the Fiddler in Fiddler on the Roof in my middle school's. theater production. I was like a little uh, um, what's it called? Preview not preview. When you like predict, I was not Jewish. I most of you probably know if you've been listening that I I'm a convert and so it's it's funny that I got to play a fiddler on the roof And now here I am a Jewish convert. I always loved that part of the story. So, um, I played all throughout high school I even began college as a music major. My violin teacher really encouraged me to, um, audition for the music program. And I did, and I got a scholarship and I went, I was playing violin. I was in the orchestra. I was doing all the things and yeah, what a nice story, right? Like it led me to, to being a violinist today, not cause I'm not a violinist. I'm not, I'm not a violinist today. And I spent a lot of time, a lot of years playing violin. And so I'll tell you a little bit about that time. So there I was in college, a little, that 19 year old girl banging my head against The wall, not literally, but trying to become a professional violinist. And I was literally hating every moment of practicing. It was out of a self hating nature. I was very critical. I was critical of my playing. I didn't have a great instrument. There was a lot of reasons why I just was not enjoying that experience. And so one day I was, um, I was taking a break from my practice room and I was sitting out in the hallway and the university choir director comes speeding out of the elevator and like passed me or then he kind of like doubles back, hardly, he hardly stops, but he's like, Hey, you want to be in choir? And without missing a beat, I just said, yes. And I have no idea why, but I was like, yeah, yeah, I want to do that. And he's like,"K, come with me." So I stood up, I walked down the hall with him and he proceeded to audition me. And I sang, uh, the star spangled banner, as I recall. And then he, he put me in two of his best choirs. One was a choir outside of school, even, um, it's really, really gorgeous. Oh yeah, I loved being in that ensemble. And, and I was, I was a goner from there. Like I loved singing and I knew that I loved singing from it, from when I was in musicals as a kid, but I didn't know that I was a singer. You know what I mean? Like I needed to sing and this was I wanted to be now. So I started taking private lessons and I just, I had this, this, like what I'm talking about, this deep ratzon this really deep desire to go for it. I wanted to study with what I thought was the best teacher in the music program. And I begged her to take me and I like, please, please. And she, and she finally agreed. and by the way, it was not easy for me. Singing was not easy for me as I, I think I mentioned it already earlier. I had to work through a lot of technical issues. I had a lot of tension, I think, partially from just like the way I, I was with my violin. I tensed a lot around my neck muscles and it was not easy for me. I cried in lessons. It was really like an uphill journey, but I found a A part of me that I didn't know existed. I like came out of the shadows, so to speak. And as a violinist, I could like hide behind my instrument, and as a singer, I am my instrument. So there was no hiding. I had to learn to be vulnerable. That was hugely scary for me and deeply healing. To go through that process of, of learning to be vulnerable and allowing myself to be seen by people. It's an ongoing process, really. And so I thought I wanted to be a professional singer. I wanted to be an actress. That was the plan. After college, I had moved down to LA. I was like going to auditions. I was taking acting classes with a fancy acting coach. Um, I was going to sketch comedy group. Like I was having the best time and that's what I wanted to do. Also, I want to say like in the professional world back then and like the singing world and the performance world, I'll call it, there was a bit of a stigma that you only taught voice lessons to make money between gigs. Teaching was not on my radar. I knew how to teach. I had taught voice lessons. It wasn't my passion. So fast forward years and I've converted to Judaism. I've taken on kol isha laws, I moved to Israel, I got married, and I opened up my teaching business in Jerusalem because, again, my skill set is in singing and uh, I didn't see nobody hiring me to sing. Especially not in frum settings. It doesn't exist like a place where you get hired to sing in a frum musical theater thing, maybe in, in the future. But when I started to teach, I realized quickly that I attracted singers who were doing similar work. That I did when I was in college. And not only did I need to help them with technique, but I was guiding them through this opening up and unveiling of themselves, um, that really, that I feel like very few instruments, affords us, like it's a very unique process that we go through as, as singers, because of what I said, we are our instruments, our instrument is inside of us. And it's very difficult to, uh, separate ourselves from the process. And that can be frustrating and it can also be your best friend. We learn things about ourselves through singing that you might not have cause to. realize in any other setting in your life, or you might not be able to realize it in, in the open way that we do when we're learning to sing. Like for instance, I'll say my, my control issues really show themselves in my singing. And, sometimes it comes across, you know, like, my teacher will say, like, you're still trying to control the sound, and I'll be like, yeah, I'm still trying to, still, still, still got that thing going on, you know, and it's a reminder, of how just, how I am. In life and how I am in the world as well as my singing. And so it can sometimes be like the best gift of therapy or the best, like mirror that you get to look at, but not in a crazy, scary, you need to fix yourself kind of way. It's just Oh, there it is again, you know, coming up in my singing. And I know in the back of my head that like, this is just something in my life that I'm working on. Anyway, that was a bit of a tangent. And I, I absolutely love that aspect of voice lessons. It really, really lights me up. And I also love helping students get better quickly. And I realized quickly after when I started teaching, you know, some years ago that I didn't have the tools that I needed to do that. And I was kind of winging it based on what I had learned in my voice lessons, which also was of a classical nature. And so I got myself enrolled in a voice teacher certification. And since then I've gotten, uh, two different certifications and I'm also right now working on my third. And I can finally say Whoa, this, this is my tafkid or at least part of my tafkid in the world. I love helping other people open themselves, help them make sounds they didn't know they can make so that they can inspire others. Right. I mean, I love singing and I, and I do work on putting my own music out when I can, but I, I realized that I love teaching in a way that I did not ever expect. And this is like, it's such an amazing thing. That's come out of this whole journey. I had no idea that I was going to get to this place. If you had told 17 year old me that I'd be sitting in Israel running an international vocal studio and helping students all over the world with their voice and their relationship to themselves, I'd be like, um, no, sorry. That's like a different timeline. Anybody else watch Umbrella Academy? Nope, just me? Okay, cool. Um, but who knows what would have become of me? if I never learned violin and never went to school for music, or if I never switched my major to voice, or if I never found Judaism and didn't move to Israel, or, you know, each of those decisions at the time felt pretty crazy to me. It was crazy to me to go to college for music. And it wasn't met so nicely with, by some of my family, and it was crazy to me to convert to Judaism. I was like, what am I doing? I was in denial a little bit about it, you know, but there was just deep Ratzon, this deep calling that I could not explain. And why did I move to Israel? People looking at me like I'm crazy. You don't have anything. Where are you going? What are you doing? I don't know. I just have to go. It was crazy, so maybe becoming a singer feels a little crazy to you. Maybe you're a nurse right now and you're like, uh, pretty sure this is more important work, you know, and maybe it is. Maybe it is. Maybe it's not your work. I don't know. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. You won't really know until you follow that nagging feeling. That nagging thing in your gut that says, I really want to do this. And not having a reason why you want to is maybe a clue that it is one of those whispers from above. Sometimes they don't make sense. Another deterrent I sometimes hear people talk about is that your life just isn't like set up for becoming a singer, maybe you do have another job or you have a family to provide for. You have all these reasons stacked against you. Why this, this calling that you have has to go on the back burner. So my advice to you in that instance is to start small. If you know, you want to work on technique, book a voice lesson, see how it goes. You don't have to commit to anything more than that. And if you have a goal for yourself to produce a cover song, awesome. Write out the steps you need to get there, work backwards and say, okay, I need all of these things. Like make a list, get a blank sheet of paper. I'm serious. Go get a blank sheet of paper, write down. K so here's the track before that, I need to make my cover art. Okay. Uh, for that, I need to like sign up for the platform. That's gonna produce my thing before that. I need to record the thing before that I need to, you know, all these steps. And figure out where your stumbling blocks are, you know, don't sell yourself short and be like, that's just crazy. What do I need to do that for? You don't know. I don't know. You don't know, but there's a reason why you want to, so go for it. And by the way, I'm totally happy to help anyone who is lost about how to get a cover song or any song that they're making rolling. You can totally DM me. I'm happy to chat, and I'm hoping to release an episode really soon about how to release a cover song for the least amount of money because I know that's always a big deal for people. So to sum it up, if you're like my student and you feel a little hopeless or you aren't sure what's the point of all of this, remember that your inner knowing is super duper smart. Okay. Your gut is connected to the divine and you don't need a reason to learn a skill and to get more in touch with yourself. Don't be afraid to do the work and cross over the bridge because you're not sure if you're going to like what's on the other side. Okay. You can always cross back over, and you know, they all go to the same place. Really. So if you're worried, oh, I'm going to be wasting my time with something that is not the end goal, you have no idea what you will discover about yourself. In the process of following your, your gut. So, I really highly encourage you, that if you're, you're feeling ready to explore that Ratson that you have. If you think you're ready to try out a voice lesson, please be in touch. You can DM me, I'll link my calendar to book a voice lesson in the show notes if you're interested in booking a session. Or if you just want to chat. You just want to talk about whatever's going on with you, your voice, please be in touch with me. You can DM me. Instagram. I'm at nechamaleahmusic, and I'll also put my email in the show notes. I would really love to talk to you. Thank you so much for listening to this episode. I hope you got something out of it. Don't forget to rate and share the podcast, and I look forward to seeing you next week. Happy singing.