How a Stuttering Priest Inspired Me to Use My Voice

I'm not sure why I chose this photo though.

Father John used to come to say mass once a month at our church.

I was always glad to see him. He was a Franciscan oblate, meaning he was hipper than the ancient dinosaurs living in our rectory. Father had a strawberry-gray beard and wore long brown robes under his vestments.

His sermons were down-to-earth and pragmatic. As much as I enjoyed his good-natured presence at our church, I would at the same time get a knot in my stomach when I found out he'd be the celebrant of our mass.

You see, Father John was a stutterer. He'd get stuck on words, especially during his sermon. I found it excruciating to listen to him.

Besides stuttering, he spoke S-L-O-W-L-Y. The slow pace gave me a lot of time to anticipate his next stutter.

I'd pray, "Dear God, please help him to get the next word out."

I don't know why I was so nervous for him. It's not like I was the one up at the podium in front of a few hundred people.

There was one saving grace, though--Father would sing the Eucharistic Prayer. That prayer was the pinnacle of the service and consisted of a few pages of scripture text. He sang all the words of that prayer and kept singing until the mass concluded.

When he sang, he did not stutter.

I thought this life hack was amazing and clever. I wondered why he did not sing all the time. His life could be one big musical, and he would never trip on his words again.

I mean, why not?

I admire him for choosing and sticking with his vocation despite his disorder. Imagine having such an immense love of God that he was willing to publicly endure humiliation.

Whenever I want to wimp out from speaking my truth, I think of Father John. If he can do it, I don’t have any excuse.

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Father John is not alone in using singing as a technique to avoid stuttering. Carly Simon, B.B. King, Bill Withers, Nancy Wilson, and Mel Tillis are famous examples of singers who stutter. Marilyn Monroe and Ed Sheeran also suffered from stuttering as kids.

You may not think you need singing to help you with your speech, but that doesn't mean you don't need singing. We all need singing.

Singing is healing.

Singing is prayer.

Singing is a powerful way to alter your nervous system, releasing a trifecta of feel-good hormones: dopamine, oxytocin, and endorphins.

Singing with others spins sound into gold.

Beautiful Chorus is a group of artists whose music I incorporate into my class playlists. Listen.

Can you see why I love them so much? True gold.

When we sing, we breathe differently. We exhale out the melody. Long exhales make your body relax.

The yoga sages have given us beautiful chants and mantras to sing. They may not have understood the science behind singing 5,000 years ago, but they knew it worked.

Through singing, you clear the mind and discover clarity through the use of breath and sacred sound.

Here is a song by another favorite artist, Silvia Nakkach, who has helped me use my voice to bring peace and calm to my mind.

Try an experiment this week of singing or humming along to these tunes or one of your own. It is important to practice using your voice, no matter what it sounds like. Your Higher Self will thank you!

Maybe you could use your voice to leave me a comment. I’d love to hear what you have to say.