To be successful, both singers and leaders need to have the kind of centered sense of self that helps them weather challenges. The demands facing a singer, like the demands facing a leader, involve the pressure to succeed in a most public way. Handling such demands requires an inner fortitude that acts as a continuous motivating force to meet and figure out how to surmount potential barriers that frequently arise. In fact, singers often face inordinate challenges just to find opportunities to sing. Without a secure sense of self, a sense of inner congruence, both leaders and singers leave themselves open to failure.
Let me pause here to say that to have inner congruence doesn’t mean you are always confident or that you always succeed. We all face situations that bring up the question: “Can I handle this?” The difference between those with inner congruence and those without manifests itself in how we approach the situation.
If I lack a centered sense of self, I operate from fear and worry, and I let that rule me. If I’m the kind of person who knows and trusts myself, however, I operate from a sense of awareness of purpose and efficacy in meeting challenges that arise. I confront challenges despite the fears I might have.
What contributes to the fostering of inner congruence? How can you develop the kind of “can do” attitude that is based not on arrogance, but on the kind of honest self-assessment that breeds self-knowledge, which in turn fosters a sense of confidence and a willingness to express oneself—a willingness to risk being seen and heard in the world?
For a singer, it starts with the very experience of learning about your voice and how to use it to its fullest advantage. My research respondents spoke of this when asked whether they felt participation in singing had affected their individual sense of self. Their thoughtful answers spoke of learning humility and self-reflection, becoming more self-aware, gaining self-confidence, and feeling a sense of freedom as they found and used their voices. Let me illustrate this with a composite of the experiences of learning and performance my research respondents shared with me.
A student entering the voice studio must be focused, ready to collaborate with her teacher, and open to feedback and new ideas. Moreover, she must tune acutely into her physical and emotional senses, simultaneously examining what’s happening in her body internally and externally. Because her instrument is inside her, everything learned must be achieved through intense focus of thought and physical sensing. Her attention needs to be on anticipating what her body needs to do next to continue developing and producing a healthy, well-placed, free sound.
In a very real sense, learning to sing takes the kind of systems approach Peter Senge, an expert on issues of leadership and personal mastery, describes when he writes: “Systems thinking is a discipline for seeing wholes. It is a framework for seeing interrelationships rather than things, for seeing patterns of change rather than static ‘snapshots.’”
In the process of studying, singers learn to think in just this way; and unlike other musicians, singers cannot see their instrument. They must feel if things are right.
It’s a very intimate thing because, unlike other instruments, it’s your body that’s actually creating the sound. So it’s a lot of looking inward, and understanding yourself and what you can do, and what you can’t do, too. So you get to know your abilities and also your limitations. . . . It’s something that you’re creating and making. It’s part of you. (Sandra)
Employing such focus and attention in their singing lessons, the women in my study became aware of, connected with, and used mind and body to unleash their unique, individual voices. They had to be willing to explore and stretch their knowledge of themselves as they undertook the learning process. Then, adding repertoire, they had to delve into their emotions and thoughts to bring to life the layers of meaning in a piece of music, while still attending to the rigors of vocal technique. In all, the demands of learning to sing required that each woman bring her whole self to the learning process, and that she trust and use her whole self toward the discovery of her voice.
I think the study of singing, the practice of it, requires a level of all of oneself . . . singing brings . . . at moments self-epiphany, moments of self-discovery, and every so often, [you] feel pretty powerful when you actually can tackle something that’s hard, that requires everything that you have physically, if you really want to bring it to that moment or that song. (Marcie)
Vocal pedagogue Clifton Ware refers to the process of learning to sing as “a consummate learning program for helping people realize their full human potential.”
Indeed, singing involves the kind of holistic learning and self-development in which Peter Vaill, an innovator in the field of effective management and leadership, counsels present and future leaders to immerse themselves. It is this type of learning, Vaill says, that promotes the integration of habits such as self-direction, willingness to take risks, and learning as a way of being that leaders of change need to develop. “We are describing learning that resonates in the total person in an integrated flow of mind, body, and spirit, no matter how humble or mundane the activity. It is the essence of learning as a way of being.” It is, too, the essence of congruence.
Such learning extends to the demands of performance as well. In the moment-by-moment existence of your onstage life as a singer, you must open your voice and assume the power and responsibility that comes from letting others hear you reveal your most intimate self. The goal is not just to sing well but to connect with the audience, tell them a story, make meaning of the notes and words, to elicit feelings and opinions from them, and engage their hearts. As musician and experiential educator Moon Joyce writes, singing “provides . . . a tool with which to be heard in a profound and whole way.”
To accomplish this, you must at one and the same time be present in the moment and emotion of the performance, and aware of the myriad technical considerations of singing that allow you to sing your best. Whether you face an audience large or small, the considerations and responsibilities are the same, as is the need for the presence and sense of confidence to sing in public—and unlike an instrumentalist, you stand on stage with nothing between you and the audience, and bare your voice.
It’s so personal. Singing is very different than playing an instrument, because . . . voice is you. (Susan)
This, as they describe it, is what my respondents were called upon to do as they sang in public. This is the challenge they took time and again. As they continued to perform and study, they learned about themselves and about their potential to achieve.
So then, if your voice is this very personal thing and you get used to putting that out on display, you can get a lot more comfortable and confident with yourself and your relationship to the world. (Jane)
Through the trial and error process that eventually leads to accomplishment and a sense of mastery, they became aware of themselves and their voices in new ways, ways that helped foster within them a growing knowledge of and congruence with self that became a situated part of their individual identities.
Beth, a senior researcher and project director at a non-profit, spoke in the following exchange about what it means to her to know her own voice, how that contributes to being a responsive leader, and how participating in singing factors into her sense of her voice and the way she knows herself:
B: [When] I found my voice, I was able to know myself and know my identity. I know who I am and can voice who I am to the world without the need to censor, or adjust, or adapt because of what someone might think of that in response . . . the extent to which you understand and are comfortable with your own voice is what allows you to be a responsive leader/server.
K: So, let me go back to the three things that you said: identity, being known, and communicating. How, if at all, have your experiences singing contributed to that sense of your voice?
B: I am a singer. Music is what carries my life.
Donna characterized it well when drawing a parallel between singing and leadership, and what she feels is necessary for success in both:
I think, ultimately, what it comes down to, for both things, is being comfortable in yourself.
Her words sum up the core of congruence.
The final article of this series will discuss how the three themes—commitment, connection, and congruence—work in dialectic relationship with one another to transform your understanding of yourself and your capabilities. You already have a preview from the past three articles. Till then, think about how your singing experiences as a whole may have helped you develop a sense of “Yes, I can” that enables you to take on risks and challenges in other areas of your life.
