1. Space Suits and Sunburns: on finding your voice

This episode shares stories of being silenced—moments that teach us to hide, to shrink, to protect ourselves by closing off our voice. These experiences, both big and small, don't just live in our memories. They live in our bodies, literally shaping how we sound by affecting our breath, our throat, our entire vocal mechanism. We explore what happens when we separate from our sound and lose awareness of a tangible part of ourselves.

Through the metaphor of taking off a space suit in the cosmos, we're invited to explore what becomes possible when we stop filtering ourselves for the sake of belonging. Sound makes such a powerful starting point because it doesn't let us hide. And beneath those layers of protection, there's so much waiting to be discovered.

✨ Key Takeaways

• Small moments of being silenced stay with us and literally shape how we sound
• The body, voice, and emotions are inseparable—they function as one unified system
• Sound doesn't allow you to hide, which makes it a powerful place to begin discovering what's already there

✍️ Journal On This

• What does "finding your voice" mean to you?
• Have you experienced moments when your voice felt diminished or silenced? How did those moments shape how you use your voice today?

Connect

Reach out here with your voice story or thoughts about this episode.

Transcript

Welcome, Intentions, And Warnings

Chelsea 0:03

Welcome to the Wisdom of the Voice. I'm Chelsea Edwardson, and I'm so glad to have you here with me. Before I start, just letting you know for any little ears around that I do swear in this episode, in case you want to put earbuds in.

What “Voice” Really Means

Chelsea 0:21

If you haven't listened to the trailer yet, I encourage you to do so. But quickly: this is about voice. The one that makes sound and the one that quietly exists in spirit. It's about bridging worlds and how mastering our physical voice is a beautiful vehicle for addressing trauma and stuck emotion in the body.

Outsider On The Inside

Chelsea 0:44

The wisdom of the voice is about a deeper knowing. It's about getting something out and sharing more of who you are with the world. It's a journey that we'll take together. So buckle up, let's take a deep breath and jump right in.

Chelsea 1:03

I was always the weirdo. I'd say strange things, and some people got me, and some people really didn't. I could usually find my way into social circles. I was feisty and pretty enough to get in. Yet I existed in this strange space of being an outsider on the inside. I was included, but I didn't belong. Present, but unseen. So inevitably, unable to keep up with the performance, I'd usually end up saying something that would get met with judgment or even hostility. Either I was too bossy, too stupid, too deep, or too much in general.

Small Hurts That Reshape Sound

Chelsea 1:47

I remember my 14-year-old neurodivergent masked self in a low rider full of guys, which included my cool boyfriend at the time. Full disclosure, in an attempt to fit in, I ate some mushrooms and was feeling a little extra weird. So I made the suggestion that we could go into the mall and pretend that we were watching a bunch of busy bees. Okay, super weird, but here I was thinking I was safe to be myself in the glory of strange. And in the vulnerability of it all, this boyfriend turned his head and sneered at me in the back and said, Why don't you shut the fuck up? You're so fucking stupid. I shrunk in my seat.

Chelsea 2:33

When I was in my mid-twenties, I ended up playing in this band. I was so grateful, so excited, and so eager, and I was constantly thinking about how we could develop our songs, creative production, etc. I was sharing these ideas enthusiastically and freely, naively thinking I was this awesome contributing bandmate, until one day, one of the guys got really annoyed with me and aggressively accused me of being bossy and telling them all what to do. He was actually really angry with me, and I was not prepared for it. It was all I could do to get into the bathroom so that I could cry into bunched up towels and make an exit strategy that didn't let anyone see my face or engage with me in any shape or form. Tears would have flown out with wailing cries if any sound had caught my voice.

Chelsea 3:25

Countless other encounters like this became voices in my system. Who are you to be wise? Why do you have to be so ambitious? What makes you think you have the right to? These might sound pretty tame in the context of the rest of the world right now, and while they are in some ways small fleeting moments, they were also big and they stuck, because the voice is tender and fragile, and it stings when it is silenced. These were moments where I'd taken the shell off, and in all the tenderness of my skin, I was vulnerable and open and thought I was safe.

Separation Of Body And Voice

Chelsea 4:04

We often dismiss these moments because they don't compare to the bigger tragedies in life. So we put ourselves down, we force ourselves to brush it off, and we tell ourselves to get over it. After all, this is to be human. This is just part of it. Life is harsh. And yet, these small moments stay with us, hiding in our psyche often for the rest of our lives.

Chelsea 4:30

I know I'm not alone in this. We've all had these moments, ones that have taught us to shrink, to silence ourselves, to hide. And they don't just live in our minds, they live in our bodies. They affect how we sound, how we engage with the world, and how we identify, shaping our sense of belonging with others.

Chelsea 4:52

They also shape the constriction in our pharynx, the position of our larynx, and how breath connects to and moves sound out of our body. These experiences literally shape our voice.

Chelsea 5:06

Why don't you shut the fuck up turns into us shutting the fuck down. And when we shut down, our voice follows suit. It learns patterns of constriction and tension. It learns that being powerful is unsafe. It learns that making sound can ostracize us and other us into oblivion.

Chelsea 5:27

So we stop sharing and start hiding. We stop feeling and start guarding. We shrink in our seat. Our diaphragm tightens, our throat closes, and we close off our soul. We put a wall up, we deny access. We block the ability to be witnessed. We prevent our soul from reflecting itself through sound. And when we do that, we cut ourselves off from a profound wisdom that is innate and natural. The wisdom of the voice.

Chelsea 6:27

These events, big or small, psychological or physical, are what I call separations of the body and voice, where we suffer a disconnection between who we are and how we sound. When we separate from our sound, we lose awareness of a tangible part of ourselves, and it can result in this sense of losing our voice. But the body, voice, and emotions are symbiotic and inseparable. They live and breathe as one unified system. We can't actually lose our voice.

Chelsea 7:03

To be clear, when I'm talking about voice, what I'm really talking about is the wholeness between who you are and how you express yourself, how you connect with others, the frequency that you emit across every domain of human expression. Whether you're speaking, singing, writing, leading, or shaping literal clay on the wheel, the process of reconnecting with or finding your voice starts with reconnecting with your truth.

Taking Off The Spacesuit

Chelsea 7:31

Or, put another way, your voice is more than sound. It's your authentic expression of that truth in everything you do.

Chelsea 7:41

Sound, however, is where we start. In fact, it's where everything starts. Vibration holds wisdom and creative potential, and it doesn't allow you to hide. That's why there's so much to discover through connecting with your voice in both sound and spirit. And that's exactly what we'll be doing together in this podcast.

Chelsea 8:11

Let yourself out of those cages that you travel in. And if the sun burns you on your skin, at least you have died with freedom within.

Chelsea 8:28

I keep returning to these lyrics because the process of sharing this much realness feels like taking off a spacesuit in the cosmos. Terrifying, vulnerable, and like I might not survive it. Well, let's be honest, I wouldn't, but you get my point. And yet I know deep down that taking off the spacesuit is my only option. It's my declaration of return.

Chelsea 8:57

I spent years thinking I was too bossy because that one bandmate couldn't handle my ideas. I made myself smaller, quieter, less. And because that boyfriend didn't have my depth of imagination, I became ashamed of my weirdness. I swallowed back my genius. I stopped contributing ideas and thoughts when they may have been exactly what was needed.

Chelsea 9:22

I stopped my own evolution.

Chelsea 9:26

I believed that my greatest strengths were my weaknesses.

Chelsea 9:32

Thankfully, I found voice. And in the process, I found my voice. That process brought me healing that I didn't know I was signing up for. It has been my path back home.

Chelsea 9:46

You see, studying voice holds this inherent gift. You have to face the body to face the sound. Because to technically move and transform the instrument, you have to deal with the blocks that are there. That lump in the throat, the way you hold your breath, those butterflies in your stomach, the tears and the anger you're holding underneath.

Chelsea 10:10

Again, sound doesn't allow you to hide. In fact, your voice is the greatest window to your fragility. And the real magic happens when you let people see all the way in. When you share the parts of yourself that feel juvenile, trite, or embarrassing, the awkward and weird, the parts that feel broken and undeserving.

The Courage To Share And Listen

Chelsea 10:34

Sharing your voice is an act of bravery. It's a declaration of worthiness and belonging. And it's a reclamation of being witnessed, of being felt, seen, and heard. Because that's the point. That's the point of connection. And while it's ultimately what we crave, it terrifies us because it is a risk. No outcome is guaranteed. And it feels as if our belonging is at stake. But when we take off our spacesuit and let the sun burn our skin, we choose to belong to it all. Out of isolation, to the edges, the margins, the whole beautiful expanse.

Chelsea 11:18

That belonging changes not only how we are heard, but how we listen. We start listening for truth. Truth that we might not even want to hear. Truth that might leave us on the sidelines, rejected or alone. It takes just as much, if not more, courage, to listen.

Chelsea 11:39

But when we stop filtering who we are for the sake of being liked, when we stop changing our voice to fit in, when we stop ignoring our truth, aka when we take our spacesuit off, we start to get a sense of something greater than us. A sense that we naturally belong, just as we are. And when we honor that, the truth stops feeling so scary. It stops threatening our belonging, and we stop pushing it away.

Chelsea 12:08

Your voice belongs. Period. And your job is to get out of its way. That's where the real listening and connection happens.

Chelsea 12:19

So as we come to the end of this first exploration, I want to leave you with an invitation to consider: Loosen the zipper on your spacesuit. Start asking more questions. Start becoming more curious about what you hear and feel. What is your voice telling you? What truths want to be heard? Tiny acts of courage. One notch at a time.

Belonging Without The Filter

Chelsea 12:45

You'll be surprised at what reveals itself. Your body is talking to your spirit, and your spirit is shaping your sound. The wisdom of the voice lives within that exchange.

Chelsea 12:58

Be brave enough to listen. There are no right answers, only your truth. In that truth lies the beginning of finding your voice. And where you find your voice, you find yourself.

Chelsea 13:15

In our next episode, we'll explore what's at stake when we don't listen, the ripple effects of abandoning our truth. Then, in future episodes, we'll dive deeper into the different aspects of voice, uncovering the connections between emotion and vocal expression, and discovering practical ways to strengthen your relationship with voice in all its dimensions. I can't wait to dive into it with you.

Chelsea 13:43

Oh, and by the way, if you're wanting to reflect on this more deeply, I put a few questions in the show notes for you.

Chelsea 13:51

Do you have a story about your voice or any thoughts about this episode? I'd love to hear from you. Please reach out through my website at chelsea.com. Thanks for tuning in to the wisdom of the voice. Until next time.

Chelsea 14:10

Oh, and one more PS. The lyrics that I shared earlier are from the song that's playing right now. And you can find it on my latest album, The EOS Project Galaxy, on any major streaming platform.