[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Find Your Voice Rock Your Confidence podcast. I'm Sloane, your host, an expert voice and confidence coach in all things voice. This podcast is dedicated to teaching you how to find your authentic voice, grow your confidence. And unlock your potential, creating life-changing results.

[00:00:22] I share weekly tips, tricks, guest interviews, and over two decades of helping people just like you learn how to express themselves from a holistic and empowered space. Now, let's get into the episode.

[00:00:40] Sloane: hello. Welcome back if you are. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening. Goodnight. When and where you are watching this. I am Sloan Reality Vocal Coaching by Sloan. And this is my weekly Wednesday Wisdom, all things voice. A couple of little changes. If you're, if you're new, it's all new so it's not gonna matter.

[00:01:05] But I am gonna shorten these down. I was trying to keep them under 30 minutes. I'm gonna go even shorter cuz folks. You are all busy people. The majority of the views seem to be coming in on the replay and I am gonna be looking at, you know, potential better times if there are be, is a better time, maybe later, I don't know.

[00:01:25] I'm gonna be doing some market research and sending out some questionnaires to y'all who are watching, but either way. I am attempting to shorten this down. Hello. Whoever is out there watching right now, I see your, I see some eyeballs. If you can put in the chat who's joining me would be great. Your name and where you're from where you're watching from.

[00:01:44] So my apologies. Last week I posted on. The health benefits of singing and its positive effects on mental health and wellness there turns out to be, I'm not sure what happened. There is a, a horrible audio issue with that content, so I am going to be reposting that again at a later date, probably sometime in, in a few weeks.

[00:02:09] I've, I've got a list of things already on the schedule, so the next thing to come up on the schedule, I'm gonna go back and repost that because the content was outside. Standing, definitely very useful and helpful, especially during a time of year that can be so stressful. In fact, the statistic just heard on our local health and wellness report during the holidays, the stress that the holidays can potentially bring 19%.

[00:02:37] Of the population. I think that's us. According to a specific study, I will, I will go get that info, but suffer from some sort of anxiety disorder of some sort. And according to I prescribe, it's an online, online medication website for meds, 35%. Of the people who have taken that survey actually take anti-anxiety medication if not during the holidays at at, on a regular basis.

[00:03:05] So my whole point with the health and wellness report I'm going to be reposting is that singing, breathing, all of these things are. Ways to incorporate that calm, that sense of peace, that grounding, and you don't need a prescription for it. So there is that. Today's topic, today's subject we are on. Oh, the number one mistake most people make when using their voice.

[00:03:37] And what I couldn't fit into the title is and how to fix it. So, I wanna see who's in the chat here, if you know what is the number one, oh, where did y'all go? Okay, well if you're watching this on the replay, I am curious, put it in the the chat notes. What do you think is the number one issue around using one's voice, whether singing, speaking, teaching, leading teams, doing a presentation, put it in the chat.

[00:04:10] Number one, what do you think is the number one problem? There are other issues, but there is definitely one that stems that I've spoke about that I continue to share information about because it's, it's 100% fixable.

[00:04:28] Going back to my full screen.

[00:04:34] All righty. If you put, I'm pulling these up. If you put not breathing correctly, As the number one mistake when using your voice. You get the prize today. Yep. You get the coffee card or the sip of champagne. Ding, ding. I'm ringing the bell breathing, not breathing correctly, breathing incorrectly, not using the breath so that the we are.

[00:05:03] A wind as a human being, you are a wind instrument. You need air to move through the vocal chords to make them vibrate, to create what we call sound, singing, speaking this, this sound that is leaving this part of my body is driven by air. It is driven by breath. Breath that not comes. It doesn't just come from your lungs in this area of your body, but comes from down in that solar plexus.

[00:05:32] I, I liken it to an accordion. If you're familiar with that old accordion. It's a keyboard on one side, it's buttons on the other, and it's a bellows. You need to take the air into that. Instrument. And then it's the contraction, the squeezing of that contraction as a human being. That contraction of your solar plexus muscle that moves that air up through your body, up through the lungs, your vocal cords, and then creates this sound at the exit area.

[00:05:58] So I want to share other things and I, I found around, I was doing a little more research. There are a couple of other sites here, one. So it's all breath is the number one, but other things that can occur mistakes that actually could be career liabilities, especially for women. And then that's another report I'm gonna share in a minute.

[00:06:22] The top six complaints about women's voice. So if you are a woman watching this, especially a professional woman, standby, consisting a couple of minutes. I'm gonna aim, I'm gonna head over there and share some more info with you. So the number one, they're the top three here. Couching statements as questions.

[00:06:41] Mistake number one, according to let me share this resource with you. This is according to Cigna and Oscar. I'm sorry, Carolyn McMullen, Portillo Biz Women Reporter is the woman who wrote this article and her research comes from, oh, where did it go? I had it standing right here. So, this woman interviewed a career coach, Lois Frankel.

[00:07:06] She is the author of Nice Girls, don't Get The Corner, office 101 Unconscious Mistakes Women Make That Sabotage. Their careers. So the first one, and this is not just women, but I, I work with a lot of women. It's the asking or or posing a statement as a question. It's the uptalk, for example. It let's see.

[00:07:32] It can indicate that we're either not sure of ourselves, we're not confident, or we're of what we're saying, or that we feel inferior. So an example, let's see what an, what is an example of this would be I don't have a good example of it here, but it is anything, anything where your voice ends up in a question like, Are we going?

[00:07:58] Let's see. I'm trying to think of a statement, not a question. I went to across the street at the coffee shop for lunch tonight. I plant I, you can tell I'm, you can tell I'm hungry tonight. I think I'm going to stick with my soup and salad. It's, it's posing it. It sounds like a question, but it's not a question.

[00:08:20] So the remedy for this is we've talked a little bit about elements in the past. I've done whole segments on the elements that that uptick. A way to reverse that to ground, that would be to add more earth, more of a grounding, instead of ending the statement up here, ending the statement either neutral or neutral.

[00:08:43] Right, you can hear the different tonal quality of my voice as I'm using it. Number two. Where did we go? Number two here. Speaking at a higher than natural pitch, this one is very common. Why is it that women can be speaking with another woman in a natural pitch, but when a man comes into that room, she suddenly has a falsetto?

[00:09:05] Right. So this is another, and this is a very unconscious thing that I've seen with clients that I've worked with. They're not even aware that this is happening either until we've come into a session to work together or heard their voice on a recording device, recording devices, video videos of yourself doing your work or using your voice.

[00:09:25] Super, super helpful. This is where we catch things like that, that we could have been doing for so long, we're not even aware of it. So a what this woman suggests that you can recommend making a sound when you first wake up. That is your natural unrestrict unrestricted pitch. Try to maintain throughout the workday.

[00:09:46] She uses a silly example, but I guess effective la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la.

[00:09:57] Bonus points for whoever can tell me. But the title of that song is, anyway, the point is, upon waking up in the morning, just moving energy with your voice to, to attain and get to that neutral level, grounded place. And so much of this is awareness, just being aware of how you're using your voice. Last one is speaking to softly, and I hear this a lot.

[00:10:21] I've had many clients, many. Maybe hundreds come through for the very purpose of they had been, they've been told a good part of their life or growing up to repeat themselves or to speak up or been told. I can't hear you when you talk. And that is, is literally just a matter of speaking, not loud enough or not moving enough air and energy or.

[00:10:47] Again, coming back to the psychology, the mindset, what's going on in our head when we're speaking too softly or too low, right? Obviously that has got to change when you come into a room of people, if you are needing to make a prete, a presentation or. Give some instruction. I work with a lot of teachers.

[00:11:08] You know, you've got a classroom of, of, of kids, you know, college. Otherwise you have to use your voice absolutely in a very different way. And it comes again, all back to that breath originating from the solar plexus combined with what's going on here? What is the shape you need to create here to release that sound?

[00:11:28] Backed with a little extra energy or athleticism to move that sound out of your body. And what tends to happen, people that struggle with this, it's, it's all kinds of things that have been implanted from early on in childhood. I, I've shared before, you know, I was told growing up, you know, I'm too much.

[00:11:49] You're too loud, Sloan. Be quiet. Tone it down. Which is, Interesting that I've become a vocal coach, a voice and confidence coach as, as my profession. But many people, you know, the lack of confidence comes from being told by well-meaning or not. You know, a, you know, a parent, a sibling, a teacher, a coach somewhere along the line, somebody who, who inadvertently didn't realize the power of their words.

[00:12:18] And in that moment, in that instant, You're making a decision that I'm, I'm never going to share my thoughts again. I don't feel part of, I don't feel validated. So these are all things that can affect how we are using our voice later in life. Now, for you ladies in the house, real quick, I wanna show one other report here.

[00:12:39] You men too. You men might actually know a woman who struggles with some of this stuff. So the last report here.

[00:12:51] As a female, specifically in the professional workplace. And here are some things. This is the top. Now again, this report is from the ch This is an NPR report, the Chaining Lives of Women. There's actually a video on this talking while female Salina Simmons Duffin is the author of this report or this article.

[00:13:12] And here are the top six. Of course there's an ad. Your voice is, your voice is too high. Women's voices tend to be higher than men's, at least, partly because our vocal chords are thinner, and that's also related to hormones. Research suggests that lower voices are perceived as more confident. So an example would be if you are someone who speaks way up here, it doesn't show that you're super confident of what you're doing.

[00:13:40] A simple. Fix for that would literally just be to lower your tone, get out of your head, get out of this throat space, take a breath and relax into more earth, more confident, more authority. Having faith and belief in yourself in what you're teaching or presenting or sharing, right? That's the remedy.

[00:14:04] You sound like a child. I've heard this a lot. People have listened to their voice on a recording or a message machine, and, and, and by the way, it's not uncommon to hear your voice. And not care for the tonal quality. That is very normal. It's very natural. And that's where we really start to get into that element play.

[00:14:23] And I actually had a client yesterday, we were working on some holiday songs and this was her Concern is Right, I my voice, voice, I don't feel like my voice sounds. It's pretty enough. I want my voice to sound more, more pretty, more more of what it's not. And so what we literally did is sang, this was for, this was singing client.

[00:14:44] We sang the first verse of this holiday song five different times using. Earth, air, fire, water, and metal. And first of all, what a blast it was doing that activity it is so revealing. It really gives you the opportunity to experiment and experience your voice in five literally different ways of using it.

[00:15:08] So in this case, if someone speaking too high or sounding like a child or being mistaken for a child on the phone, oh my goodness the remedy again. Is to start with that breath, lower down into that body, add more earth, add more weight, more authority to your voice, which literally can transform your voice even in a, in a phone call over the phone.

[00:15:33] Number three, you don't sound authoritative. There is our Lower voices are associated with being more powerful and authoritative. She talks about an NPR first woman anchor, national Nightly News. And back then, you know, historically women weren't taken seriously in the media. And as reporters, you know, we there, you know, thank thank goodness to all those women who paved the way in professions that have been primarily male dominated.

[00:16:02] We still have some work to do and some of these other industries, but we've come a long way. So, The remedy if you speak too high or if you're mistaken for, for being a small child or a, a teenager and you're a 40 year old woman. The way to add more authority is to add more weight, more ground, the power of the pause.

[00:16:24] I've spoke about that in the past. And then number four, vocal fraud.

[00:16:41] What energy sitting on the vocal chords, and again, the way we move that out is that breath combined with what we're doing up here and moving that sound, moving that that air through the vocal chords to create what we hear out here. So fry, there's absolutely no reason fry used. Over a long period of time can actually damage your vocal cords.

[00:17:05] It, it's, it really is what it is. And if you are someone who uses Fry, I have a client right now uses Fry in his speaking voice. Became aware of it. We eliminated it in his singing voice, but still as an auto or a default, when speaking goes back to this fry and what it is, people, it's being lazy. It's using your voice in a way that is, is lazy.

[00:17:30] Now, there could be physical things going on. It could be that maybe you're. You could be tired, you could be run down, you could be dehydrated. So all of these things can also contribute to fry. But when, if you have this thing, I'm really exaggerating this right now, but if this is happening in your voice, You wanna clear that up and get rid of that?

[00:17:51] Here I use an, an example with some young adults that are entering the job market now, right? They're, they're getting into their professional careers. Let's say you've got two people completely qualified in every possible way. That come in for the final of all the final interviews, and it's down to you and one other person, and if you have that fry in your voice, that tired, weak, lazy, it's being lazy, and the other candidate for the position does not, who do you think is gonna get the job?

[00:18:24] They're not gonna be hiring the person with the fry. So if you struggle with that that's something to think about. Call me. I can help you with that. And, and then coming back to the uptalk always being it, it's uptalk is a really old vocal affection. This author says it dates back to the 19th century, actually, here's some history.

[00:18:42] Some people believe in Britain so much for a new fad. There's some evidence that women who find themselves in a socially dominant position will use uptalk in order to soften that dominance. So, That said, I say, oh, there's one more. Number six, your voice is too low. If women's voices aren't too high, they're sometimes perceived as too low.

[00:19:06] We don't want a high squeaky voice, but we also don't want a really low booming voice on a woman. And then there's more studies that go into that. So, you know, it all comes back to, first of all, the number one remedy for any vocal issue. The number one thing. Is how are you breathing? Are you breathing short, shallow breaths, trying to deliver, trying to deliver sound from up here, or worse case in your throat?

[00:19:34] Or are you fully connected and grounded, centered from your solar plexus muscle? That is where you wanna be speaking from. That is where you wanna be breathing from, is in that solar plexus. For more information you know where to find me. Vocal coaching by Sloan. There's a ton of videos the YouTube channel.

[00:19:51] Sloan Reality Vocal Coaching by Sloan. Tons of little videos like this. Two and three minute, please tune in next week. I'm going to have a very special guest next week. I've got Annette Bond. She's a professional stylist. We're going into the holidays. She's gonna be sharing for you ladies, I guess guys too.

[00:20:08] But she's, she works with ladies. Ladies. Tune in for the latest. On how to she's gonna be going over three different styles, three different ways to dress for the holidays coming up. So thank you so much for tuning in, please again if you're looking for specific topics, I've got topics for days, weekly, Wednesdays with Sloan on voice.

[00:20:29] But I am open to suggestions. If there's a specific area you want me to cover, please reach out, put that in the shell notes. Reach out to me personally. If you have questions about vocal coaching, cf, vocal coaching is right for you, and of course always a great experience if you're looking for experiences consumables to give as gifts.

[00:20:48] Vocal coaching is a really, Fun way. You can, we can handle it all online. No lines, no weight. Super fun and a great thing to check out going into the new year. So thank you so much for tuning in. Until next time.

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