If I'm going to be the front woman of a rock band, I've got to let myself feel everything -- and be brave enough to show it.
Good songs and good lyrics aren't written by unfeeling people. Rather, they're made by people who feel things most acutely, no matter how small the emotion may be.
They give each emotion dignity by acknowledgment of its existence and the allocation of space for it to unfurl. This is risky behavior for the fragile of heart. I realize now that my experiences of past emotions are precisely what make my heart robust and ready to love.
In this rock band vocation, I must be willing to feel and show all emotions (whether joy, grief, or even normalcy) to the greatest, most tangible degree. My emotions have to be so much on display that even YOU can feel them.
I've also been asking God to please bless my voice. I've prayed for this by asking to speak more Truth. It is interesting how--only a few weeks after I started lectoring at Mass (a calling which I felt since age 14 but actively ignored because I thought I was much too young)--He blessed me with yet another opportunity to use my voice: being in a band. It is as if these two opportunities were paired together for me for some reason. How I wonder what my life might have been like if I had responded to Him sooner!
My voice does so much now. As a teacher, I speak all day about math (a truth); as a lector, I proclaim the Word (the Truth); and now, as the singer of A Mirror Darkly, I am to called to sing the truth with love, affection, and praise.
With this quantity of vocal output, there is no way I can risk uttering falsehoods. My range is widening from students to a congregation, and--maybe one day--to a concert. The volume on my little life is cranking higher, and I had better make sure this voice proclaims the Truth--in all of its glory--since people seem to be listening.
