Be a Powerful Voice!

I believe that anything is possible, that anything you set your heart and mind to achieve, you can. And I believe that we are all born with infinite wisdom.
If we don’t get too distracted, if we don’t forget what we know and intuitively feel to be true, we will instinctively understand what to do with our lives, which way to go, and how to fulfill our dreams. Our heart will tell us.

The above is taken from “Little Voice”, a story that I wrote last year as part of the Bestselling inspirational book, Living in Clarity.

I grew up with my Danish grandma. She was a jazz singer, an actress, and a children’s book writer. She was also an extraordinary, vivacious lady.
As a young child I promised my grandma that I would always listen to my heart and follow my dreams for only this, she said, would truly fulfill me and make me the best that I could be. “Follow your heart, Love, and you can do anything you want to do in this world”.

And so I did what grandma told me because, to me, she was the wisest and most amazing person that I knew.
This took me to many remarkable places and led to an unusual order of events that doesn’t read like your average biography. From worldwide recording artist to Bestselling Author, speaker, teacher and coach - I have has come a long way from the tiny town in the tiny country where I grew up.
It has indeed been an inspiring journey, and although I was guided onto my particular path very early on, I feel like I’m just getting started! There are still lots of books to write and plenty of songs to sing.

When I think about my childhood and early youth, it is very clear to me why I chose the path that I did - or rather why it chose me. I had a very free upbringing. My family was very artistic and whereas in our home it was considered a virtue to express yourself and be creative in any way your heart desired, I did notice that for most of my friends, it was not quite the same. Needles to say, our house became the favorite hang-out for the entire county!

It frustrated me to hear some of my friends relaying arguments that they’d had with their parents about what they wanted to do with their lives and why. I guess that my being allowed total freedom to make my own choices made it even harder for me to understand why on earth these parents would want anything else for their kids than for them to fulfill their dreams and be happy.
To me, happy meant being free to be you.

So I became a strong advocate for personal freedom – the freedom to live, be and do what’s right for you, and the freedom to express yourself and believe that you have something worth while to share with the world.

I find it fascinating how we are often able to pinpoint certain themes or defining moments in life and absolutely know that these were the lights that lit up our path. We also tend to recognize the people who carried those lights.
I still remember the day, thirty-five years ago, when my second-grade music teacher came knocking on my grandma’s door. She wanted grandma to know that I had a special gift that she felt needed nurturing—my voice. Since then the voice has been a main focus in my life.

Now, when I talk about “voice”, this, to me, really has come to mean two things. There is your physical voice that is operated by your body and is clearly audible to everyone – and then there is your voice, as in who you are, what you stand for, and what your life purpose is.
The “second” voice or Little Voice as I prefer to call it, sometimes gets disorientated and then it starts sending out mixed messages. This is when we go off track. We get confused – and the people around us get confused too because whatever this voice is thinking, it will immediately transmit energetically.

What kind of energy is behind your words? Do you get in your own way? Do you speak with a balanced, clear and strong energy - or do you sometimes communicate mixed messages when you speak? Is the message behind the message telling a different story than the one you are attempting to communicate? Basically, how do you show up? This will determine if people “get you”, and if your message gets through to them – or not.
You are always thinking something – so you’re always transmitting something. This means that you are always communicating, even when you don’t mean to, and even when you are not aware of it. Is not just important what you say – it is also how you say it but even more importantly who is saying it. What is the energy is behind the words?

We all want people to realize how wonderful and amazing we are and how valuable our service is. Whether consciously or sub-consciously, we all want to be seen – and heard. We all have a need for recognition, we all want to be loved and appreciated for who we are. And rightfully so!
That’s why I’m passionate about helping people to be free and to find and nurture their own unique voice, showing them how to unravel its full potential and use it to be creative and express themselves. For I believe that only those who honor their purpose truly live fully.

Most people have a message, something that they feel passionate about that they would like to share. But many are afraid - they don’t have the confidence to speak their heart and mind. They freeze up at the thought of speaking to a crowd or even to a small group of people. Perhaps they don’t trust themselves and their message to be “important” enough.
As a result they never get the chance to truly shine and share their gifts and inspiration with the world.
This is a great shame. It is important to make those people aware that they too have a true, unique and powerful voice - a voice that speaks from the deepest core of their being and enables them to offer true value and contribution – if they let it.

If you are one of those people, please know that your voice is a gift – all you need to do is unwrap it. Share you wisdom, knowledge and inspiration with the people that are waiting for your words. By doing so you are offering a great and valuable service and you are contributing to the lives of others, inspiring them to do the same.

There, I’ve said my piece and it felt GREAT! Now it’s your turn.
Use YOUR voice to make a difference in the world. It’s easier than you think and it will make you feel wonderful knowing that you too can touch people’s hearts, impact their lives and make a profound difference – just by being YOU. What could possibly be more fulfilling than that?
Your voice is your “calling card”; it reflects who you are, what you are, and how you are at any time.
Make your voice your strongest ally. Use it to inspire people, to teach, to motivate or compel them into action. Speak from your heart to the hearts of others.

Be a Powerful Voice.
I will be listening.

PS. My new book Your Voice is Your Calling Card; How to Power-Charge Your Voice, Boost Your Confidence and Speak with Joy, Ease and Conviction will be available from June 1, 2009. Special launch on Amazon.com JUNE 9 includes over 40 free bonus gifts from leading experts in speaking, communication, spirituality, self growth/development and success principles available with every purchase!
Go see www.yourvoiceisyourcallingcard.com (Link accessible from June 1)

Today is the launch of Wayne Dyers new book!
Amazing, of course :)

Plus loads of fantastic bonuses! Don't miss it.

Go see: http://promos.hayhouse.com/dyer/052609email/

Attention Bold Women!

Hi Guys - Good Sunday to you!

My friend Aprille has set up an amazing web event that you MUST join, especially if you are a BOLD woman or if you aspire to be one ;)

The event called In Praise of Bolder Women! It runs in May 2009, in fact it has already started but there is still LOADS to come, so don’t miss out, it really is quite exciting AND it’s absolutely FREE!
Wee heeeh!!

Aprille asks: Isn't it time you brought your dream to life?

What we as women do, how we feel, what we talk about and give our attention to permeates and shifts the energy around us. As Bolder Women (45+) we have the energy, the resources, the wisdom and the moxie to shift the world around us for the better.

Our generation is not like our mothers' generation. We are in the prime of our lives and possess the power to take action on what's important to us on a deeply personal level.

Why do I believe it's so important for women to take action on their dreams?
Because we are influencers. There's a reason we all smile at the old saying "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." We recognize the underlying truth of it. We understand the power of influence.

I believe that, if enough women take action on what's important to them on a deeply personal level, we can create our own version of Global Warming - in the very best sense. There is the very real possibility that the underlying paradigm of our culture will shift from competition to cooperation.


Join Aprille and me + a host of other Bold Women in May to explore how to get into action!

Some of the Bold Women that you will meet are: Kathleen Gage, Michele Wright, Kim Fulcher, Heidi Richards, Dotsie Bregel, and Laura Hollick!

Join these Bolder Women as they share their journey and wisdom with you.
Find inspiration for your own dreams on these free webcasts.

Find it here: http://www.aprillejanes.com/bolderwomen.htm

To Your Bold Joy and Success!

Love,
Suzann.

PS I will be there too. Join me on May 26, where I will be sharing some of my story with you.

Hi guys,
Happy Saturday to you all!

On Thursday I had myself a real scare – I was booted off Facebook for about 24 hours!

At first, I totally panicked. With little more than one month to go before my book launch and much of my networking and communicating with people from around the globe depending on Facebook, this was a disaster!
Loosing all of my Facebook “pages” including my speaker group, my book Page, my Networked Blog and not least my personal profile, was a HUGE blow. The thought of hundreds of hours spent in vain “meeting” people and building an online platform made me squirm in my seat. Arrrrrrgh!!!!

But then I made a smart move. OK, it’s hard to tell if this is what did it for the Facebook Police but I suspect that at least it played a part.

I calmed myself down and instead of complaining about what had happened and playing the victim, I wrote a VERY nice, understanding and polite mail to the powers that be.
In that mail I proclaimed my innocence, of course, in the nicest possible way. I also deeply apologized for any perceived wrongdoing on my part, and promised that I would promptly inform myself better about their rules and user guidelines and conduct myself more appropriately in the future.

Did I mean every word that I wrote? Well…probably not. I was kinda miffed, to be honest, especially because I was not quite sure what it was that I was supposed to have done wrong. But I was well aware that an “attack” at this point was not a good tactic. After all, I had to think about my objective which was clearly to be allowed back on Facebook, to be reinstated, every page intact!

I knew that many had found themselves in similar situations, and that this would indicate that perhaps the Facebook people were somewhat ambiguous about communicating their rules to people before it was actually too late - but this fact I chose to keep to myself at this point.


Why am I telling you this?

My point is that although my heart was pounding double time and I was in fact quite upset at first, I made a conscious effort to “meet” with these people on their turf. I made a point out of telling them how much I appreciated Facebook, how important it was to me to have this wonderful, organic way of connecting with friends and family and people I work with all over the world. I thanked them for making me aware of their guidelines instead of freaking out that they simply shut me down!

The whole thing made me think of how we as speakers, or let me simply say communicators, deal with difficult situations or indeed difficult people when we work. You know what I mean, those endlessly disruptive “I know better” types, commonly referred to as “hecklers”.

When dealing with a heckler, the last thing you wanna do is get upset and try to defend yourself.
If you do, you’re playing right into the heckler’s hands.

Best thing to do is simply to ignore them, or quickly put them straight once and for all (in the nicest possible way of course) so that they look silly, not you. You could also invite them to state their case after you’re done stating yours. I’ve done this often and mostly it turned out that this was really not what the heckler wanted. They wanted attention and they wanted to feel great and powerful – and so they believed that the best way to achieve this was to steal the attention and make me feel small and insecure… I’m sure that mostly they were not aware of this - but that didn’t make it any less tedious.

I’m sure you recognize this scenario?

Never allow “psychic vampires” to drain your precious energy. Save your energy for the people who want and appreciate what you’re offering and who will put it to good use.

Did I feel “small” for buttering up to the Facebook Police? Not at all. I was focused on my objective:
To deliver a message in a language that I knew they would respond to and get my desired result – and I did.

So actually I felt pretty darn good about myself on Thursday morning when I found myself BACK on the Book baby yeah!!

Hey Facebook Police, who’s your momma now?!

You all have a GREAT weekend – I know I will!

To your speaking Joy and Success!
Love,
Suzann.

PS Fore more on this topic (hecklers): Your Voice Is Your Calling Card, Chapter 13, Who’s Afraid of The Big Bad Wolf.
If you’re interested, I have set up a Page on Pagebook for the book where you can track it’s progress. There’s also an event set up for the launch on June 9. Page on Facebook is: YourVoiceIsYourCallingCard.com