As you think, so shall you be...

As you think, so shall you be..

I’ll relate this to singing I promise… And I’ll even make an singing exercise out of it! If you haven’t guessed by now, my teaching methods can be, well…. “outside the box.” For me, anything is fair game when it comes to learning and growing.

I’m teaching a few groups of young students at a summer camp for the next few weeks and what hit me as I was teaching was how many negative things some of them have to say.. about singing.. about what they can and can’t do.. about life in general… some of the things they didn’t even have to speak out loud.. I can read it in their body language… a heavy sigh, a roll of the eyes.. looking away … If we start talking to ourselves this way from these very young ages, no wonder we have difficulty getting what we want from life… or what you can do when you sing… Teach yourself to speak positively and give our youth the same gift.

The anchor to every action is a thought…. If you want to anchor yourself to negative thoughts… I can’t hit those notes… I’m not that kind of a singer… teachers will take all my feeling away and make me sound like everybody else, so why study.. or this crowd is dead tonight, this is gonna be a rough one.… I’m not making near enough money to be here… or … this travel schedule is terrible… why am I here… I don’t need this… or I wish they’d quit telling me what to do…any of these negative things sound familiar… you will get pulled down and caught in vicious cycle of bad things happening to you…

If you keep focusing on what you don’t want… guess what you’ll get more of it, all the negative stuff will keep showing up … What you focus on you enlarge… As you think, so shall you be… You wanna miss that high note… Worry about it as it’s coming up and 9 times out of 10… you’ll miss it… Fear is a strong emotion… so when you attach fear to a thought … like I don’t think I’ll be able to hit that note… it makes it that much more powerful. And you have done it to yourself…

Here’s a way to help break that cycle and put yourself on the road to achieving all of your dreams!

Here the exercise… First take any negative thought out of your speech…and that includes you private talk to yourself and change it to a positive statement… then write down on note card or recipe card positive thoughts that inspire you… start building a whole deck full of cards… place them where you can see them each morning… mine are in my bathroom… I have a set in my office… and some in my wallet… each morning… read them … out loud… when you see them in the afternoon or evening.. read them….out loud… before you go to bed… read them… out loud…

Out loud for two reasons… one I think it helps you put more passion behind the thought.. so it will help draw it to you faster..

and two, for the singer… I want you to also notice all the consonants… notice how forward they are on your mouth, teeth, or face… if you can learn to keep the voice in the very forward placement all of the time.. you won't believe how easy singing gets... Let’s look at the one that’s in front of me right now, it says:

“Keep fresh goals in front of you”

The K and the ee force the sound forward in the mouth, the f should be made by letting the air pass over the lips, very forward.. the sh, of fresh is also forward, the g and the o in goals are or should be toward the front of the mouth, the n in the word in is forward on the teeth, another forward f and another n in the word front…. of, most people pronounce this word like ov with the v sound forward on the lips and the y in you should also pull the sound forward..

If you are supported correctly and use the consonants, like my teacher used to say, “let your consonant be your guide!” You’ll be amazed how much projection you will have and how easy singing will feel…

Remember, whatever passion or emotion you put behind a thought… that’s the future you’re building. Make sure it’s really what you want!