vocal health, vocal beauty

My day job is a singing teacher. I've been teaching for about ten years now and have done so through university, through illness and through confusion about what I wanted to do when I grew up. Now I know that who I am is far more important, more defining and more relevant to my life and my health than anything that I do. But through all the ups and downs I've learnt how to be a good singing teacher in the process. And along the way, I've learnt a thing or two about vocal health. So, whether you are a singer or just like to talk (a lot!) read on for some tips and tricks about how to look after one of your most precious gifts - your voice.

Your voice is a part of your body. Our voices are a reflection of what is happening with our bodies. The voice is an unique instrument in this way and you can't trade it in for a new one. Knowing how to look after your voice, whether you use it for singing or speaking, is imperative if you want longevity in whatever career path you have chosen. No one wants to be a one-hit wonder because their voice didn't hold up. Too often I've seen vocal abuse and damage, and many times at the hands of singing teachers! The road to recovery and retraining the singer or speaker is long and difficult, so I suggest learning how to practice healthy singing and speaking habits early on. 

You are what you eat. And the vocal timbre of your voice is affected by what you eat. Basically, if you eat rubbish, you'll sound rubbish! All dairy products are mucus forming, which can interfere with the production of the vocal tone. For a more beautiful sound, avoid dairy. Caffeine is dehydrating, so avoid caffeine that your body and your voice may be hydrated. As always, drink loads of water! And if you have a sore throat, drink a ginger tea or juice with lemon and raw honey. Drink fresh pineapple or grapefruit juice to help reduce vocal cord inflammation as these foods contain bromelain, an anti-inflammatory enzyme. Many foods in their raw, unprocessed state will also help to heal the voice and enhance vocal beauty, such as mint, eucalyptus honey, red clover buds, blackberries and radishes. 

More tips for vocal health and beauty:

• Engage your whole body in the process of singing or speaking and physically warm up with a short walk or stretching. Include stretches for your face, jaw, tongue, mouth and soft palate. Do them in the mirror and have a good belly laugh at yourself!
• Before you use your voice focus on your breathing and learn how to breathe in and out in a way that supports and sustains voice production. 
• Always do a vocal warm-up before you sing, for practice or performance, and before a speaking engagement. A singing teacher or speech therapist can teach you specific exercises you can use to warm-up your voice correctly.
• Try to avoid coughing and clearing your throat to shift mucus on your vocal cords. Instead, try to "sing it off" or use swallowing to shift it. Make sure that your speaking voice is not too croaky or breathy, and speak or sing within a comfortable range and volume for your voice. 
• Do not sing if you are sick; the best thing you can do for your voice and for your body is to rest. Be quiet as much as you can and seek out natural remedies to aid your recovery as all synthetic medications will have side effects and some can damage your voice, such as aspirin, which thins the blood and can weaken your vocal membranes. 
• Don't underestimate the value of a good night's sleep for a healthy voice!

May these vocal health tips lead you further down the path to vocal beauty. May you find your voice... and sing!

For more information on the art of singing and vocal health I highly recommend The Handbook for Working Singers by Roma Waterman.

the rhythm of self-care

To hear from the words of the song The Rhythm of Life from the musical Sweet Charity, "the rhythm of life is a powerful beat". If you've been reading my blog over the last month or so you'll have picked up on a word I keep using over and over again, and that word is self-care. Ok, so that's two words,.. turned into one word!

The practice of self-care creates a rhythm in my life. And boy, does it have a powerful beat! The World Health Organisation defines self-care in health as:

... the activities individuals, families and communities undertake with the intention of enhancing health, preventing disease, limiting illness, and restoring health. These activities are derived from knowledge and skills from the pool of both professional and lay experience. They are undertaken by lay people on their own behalf, either separately or in participative collaboration with professionals.

Basically, we are responsible for our own self-care. It's only been in the last few years since I've been recovering from a chronic illness that I've truly come to understand what it means to care for myself. And to not feel guilty about making this a priority. It's not about being selfish, it's about stewarding my body, my health, and my life, so that I have more to give, not less.

You see, we're like ducks. Our lives look calm and perfect on the surface but underneath the water there is chaos as we try to keep ourselves afloat by working our little legs as hard as we can to keep doing what we know to be life. But there is something the duck knows, an ancient wisdom lost; it knows when to rest on water and it knows when to fly. Too often we try to fly without the resources we need that come from being fuelled by rest, and by rest, I mean self-care.

Self-care looks different for everyone. It needs to serve you, your life and your family or community. It can be as simple as choosing the salad over the fries. It can be as delightful as having a date night with your significant other without the kids. It can feed your body, your soul and your spirit. But self-care will always move you towards enhanced health and a better quality of life. 

Learning how to care for myself is a lesson I keep on learning. At the start, I had professionals who helped me to find ways to practice self-care, such as how to manage my sleep and exercise. Now, I listen to the needs of my body and take action with steps of self-care, some which may seem to be quite extreme! My morning routine for example can be quite lengthy but it prepares me well for the day ahead. And if I need to, I also give myself permission to slow down. I understand now that practicing self-care not only realigns my health but it creates a rhythm that reverberates not only through my life, but into the lives of others too.

To learn more about practicing self-care here is a list of 100 extreme self-care ideas, here is a self-care planner by Kris Carr, or I highly recommend the book The Art of Extreme Self-Care by Cheryl Richardson.

sleep sweet sleep

Oh, how I love my sleep! I was pretty much born sleeping. I forced my twin sister to be born first even though I was the bigger baby and was supposed to greet the world before her. But I decided to sleep in a little longer, much to the pain of my mother, who endured both the natural delivery of my twin sister and a caesarian section for me. Oops! But in my defence, it was warm and cosy in there, and a lot more spacious without my wombmate!

Sleep is one of the elements for the sustaining of our lives as there are many restorative processes that take place when we are sleeping. Ideally, we should be aiming for around eight hours of shut eye every night. And the truth is that people who sleep for less than six hours a night have a shorter life span than those who sleep for seven to eight hours. So, even though you may be cutting back on sleep to keep up with the daily demands of your life or you may simply believe you will get more out of life this way, you are actually losing time at the other end. And most likely, the time you do have will be severely imposed upon by various health concerns induced by an unhealthy lifestyle. 

I used to burn the candle at both ends; that is, until my candle burnt out! When my ME/CFS doctor diagnosed me with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome a few years ago he sent me off to see an Exercise Physiologist who worked with me for nearly a year, helping me to make lifestyle changes, which included managing my sleep hygiene. My sleeping patterns have probably been one of the lifestyle changes that I've struggled with the most as I love to sleep, but often had trouble getting to sleep, and at the time of my diagnosis, I was highly stressed and doing shift work. I've found though, that as my life is more in balance, the ease and quality of my sleep has improved. Now, I regularly sleep for seven to nine hours every night, my body is healing, and I no longer count down the hours until I can go back to bed!

Here are some sleep hygiene tips from me that you may like to try to work towards a sweeter sleep:

• Keep your bedtime and wake-up times regular to set your body clock (sleeping between the hours of 10:00pm to 7:00am is best).
• Exercise during the day to improve your sleep but don't exercise two hours prior to bedtime or you may find yourself wide awake.
• Don't nap during the day! Napping can make it harder to get to sleep at night and decreases the quality of your sleep by interfering with your natural body rhythm (circadian rhythm), which in turn makes sleep less refreshing.
• Don't consume alcohol or any stimulants, like caffeine, up to two hours before heading off to bed.
• Create a bedtime routine and wind down with activities such as a warm bath or shower, a cup of tea, reading a book, relaxation exercises, and generally, keep the lights and the sound level low.
• Try not to worry or dwell on problems in bed. Instead, write them down before you get into bed and focus on your breathing to help you to fall asleep.
• Make your room an oasis. Remove the gadgets, control the temperature (not too hot or cold), use aromatherapy oils, be generous with blankets and cushions, and be comfortable!
• Avoid late night snacking as your body will be digesting when you should be sleeping. Try not to eat at least two to three hours before bedtime.
• Get out in the sunshine every day to help set your body clock and wake up with the sunlight streaming into your bedroom in the morning.
• No clock watching!

Like any new skill, improving your sleeping patterns will take time to learn, but your reward will not only be better quality sleep, but a better quality life. If you have any sleep hygiene tips please share them with us in the comments section below. But for now, may your sleep be sweet as you lay your head down to rest. Sweet dreams, my friends.

raw vegan desserts: chocolate chia pudding

Hello friends! As I write this I am drinking a refreshing green juice and thinking about my adventures this year as the countdown is on until I'm in foggy Londontown with my beloved sister and brother-in-law. For now though, I'm all about getting my health in order so that I am in a good place to travel. In my last blog post I wrote about my travels to Shark Bay and the things I did to travel well. One of those things was to take a packed lunch with me on my flight to Perth. Did you know you can take your own food on an airplane?! Most people don't!

In my lunch bag of goodies I packed some celery and cucumber sticks, a couple of kiwi fruits, a quinoa salad and a chocolate chia pudding. In my suitcase I also took some dry organic food supplies with me, like quinoa, kale chips, peppermint tea, raw chocolate and a Loving Earth Luvju! Soooo yummy!

My quinoa salad was a throw-everything-in-my-fridge-together type salad. For a quinoa salad with an abundance of greens see my recipe here but for a more spontaneous quinoa salad add chopped greens, non-sweet fruits like capsicum, cucumber and tomato, spring onion, celery, nuts/seeds and dried fruit in with your cooked or sprouted quinoa, and mix together with some cold-pressed olive oil, lemon juice or apple cider vinegar, sea salt and cayenne pepper. This is my fallback salad plan, and it hits the easy, delicious and nutritious spot, every time!

Now,.. here is my chocolate chia pudding for you all! You can read up about chia seeds here and here; chia seeds are not only a complete source of protein but also an excellent source of dietary fibre, omega 3 fatty acids as well as vitamins and minerals such as calcium, manganese and phosphorus. You can eat chia puddings for breakfast or as a dessert or afternoon snack - pretty much for any meal of the day or whenever you need to satisfy a craving for something sweet.

chocolate chia pudding

1 cup almond milk

1 frozen banana, peeled

1 Tbs raw cacao powder (caffeine-free: raw carob powder)

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp natural sweetener (coconut nectar, pure maple syrup, yacon syrup) or 1 medjool date - optional

1/4 cup chia seeds

Handful of berries (dried, fresh, frozen)

Handful of dried shredded coconut

Blend the almond milk with the banana, cacao/carob, cinnamon and the natural sweetener (this is an optional ingredient as the banana adds sweetness). Mix together well with the chia seeds, berries and coconut, and let the pudding set in the fridge for 30 minutes to 3 hours before eating. Garnish as you desire. Enjoy!

brooke's travels to shark bay

Melbourne has welcomed me home with it's symphony of seasons after my travels to the beautiful Shark Bay in Western Australia to visit my beautiful cousin. I've not been on an airplane for nearly two years, so this time I was very aware of my need to travel as well as I could (airplanes and airports expose us to radiation) without worrying about being free of my normal self-care routine. I'm pleased to say that my body has handled the travel better than ever before despite long hours on the road, eating more conventional than organic produce, and a routine that did not include my normal self-care practices. Hooray!

Denham, Shark Bay, Western Australia

Getting my earthing on!

I had such a great time with my cousin it's hard to know where to start! My travels to Shark Bay saw me facing many of my fears, like holding a thorny devil and riding a camel, as well as going on a scenic flight in a small plane! Shark Bay is located at the most western point of Australia and is a place almost untouched by humans. I stayed with my cousin and her awesome trivia-loving, karaoke-singing flatmate in Denham, which is a coastal town down the highway from Monkey Mia. The air smelled of the ocean and the locals walked around barefoot, never bothering to lock their cars or their homes. It's a beautiful place with beautiful people. 

My gorgeous cousin Skye and I...

...in her beloved van, The Skoobe Van

Some of the many highlights from my travels were seeing my first shooting star at the hot tub fed by a natural spring in the middle of the desert, hanging out with my cousin and her friends at Monkey Mia, flying over Shark Bay, seeing dugongs and dolphins on a wildlife cruise, hugging a camel after riding a camel, road tripping to Perth with my cousin after my bus was cancelled and sleeping in her van at a 24 hour servo! And then giggling hysterically as we quoted Austin Powers "this is me in a nutshell" as we tried to go to sleep, her in the back, me in the front, rugged up, with a pile of stuff between us that any hoarder would be proud of!

The plane and pilot...

... and me ready to fly

The jetty to the boat at Monkey Mia

Do you think sitting on a net above the water is like walking on water?!

During my travels, I made sure I maintained a baseline of self-care every day. I drank up to 3 litres of water a day, I took chlorella tablets to help my body detoxify as well as daily probiotics and digestive enzymes, I did dry skin brushing before my showers, I went walking, I ate a vegan diet, and I spent quality time with my cousin. Thanks to my cousin's stash of dry organic food I was able to mix in some high-quality food with conventional produce and still ate more than 50% raw food, including fruit bowls for breakfast and fresh salads during the day. Eating out was a bit trickier as the vegan food available was slightly outside my day-to-day diet, but the good thing is I didn't suffer any digestive troubles! In fact, my body was efficiently getting rid of waste, which tells me my body is healing well and can cope with the stresses of travelling without negatively impacting on my health and my long-term recovery from ME/CFS.

Hello, there's a thorny devil on the road!

What a dopey little guy...

...but awake enough to wave at us!

Now that I am home, I am cleansing my body through juice fasting, coffee enemas, oil pulling, chlorella tablets and lots of sleep! I've come down with a cold and cough, but to me, this is a sign that my body is trying to get rid of the nasty bugs. With this self-care routine, my body only took a day to get over the travel fatigue! I feel so satisfied with my travels to the other side of Australia. Even though I've needed to be diligent about how I've travelled and made some compromises along the way with my diet, the memories shared with my cousin make it all worth it! My love tank is full and this keeps me healthy just as much as my plant-based diet and self-care practices!

Camel ride along the beach at Monkey Mia

Please be my friend!

Hugging the soft and gentle Ally

Skye giving Ally a big kiss!

Kat, Tinka, Skye and me

For more tips and tricks about how to travel well read this blog post by The Wellness Warrior.