Complicated feelings about singing

[wildeabandon]

Note: Please do not comment on this post with observations about the quality of my singing. However well intentioned, at this stage they would be more likely to do harm than good.

My relationship with singing, particularly singing with and in front of people is complicated. I am both very scared of it and have a deep yearning for it. In the last decade or so I have made considerable progress on improving the health of this relationship, but it seems to have hit a sore spot at the moment.

On an intellectual level, and on every level when it comes to anybody else, I believe that it doesn't matter how good you are, singing can and should be something that you do for yourself, for the sheer joy of it. But also it matters far more than it should to me what other people think of my voice/singing ability/musical ability in general. Which is a problem, because it's not very good. (It has improved, but from a pretty low base, and I have to work a lot harder at it than people with more natural talent than me.) My awareness of my limited ability means that sometimes at least, singing in front of people, or even just thinking about doing so, can range from uncomfortable to outright distressing.

I expect that fixing this is likely to be quite a lengthy and emotionally taxing process, and now is not the time to do it, not least because I think the emotional work will be much easier if I'm regularly singing in a group where I'm not pushing myself outside my comfort zone, and clearly I can't do that at the moment.

So I have to put this work to one side for a while. I would like to do that in a way that a)prevents any toxic ideas about not being good enough to be allowed to sing in front of people from digging in deeper, and b)avoids, or at least minimises, poking at the sore bits. I think that what that means is that I shouldn't try to sing until I'm ready to give this work the focus and attention that it needs. It's possible that I may decide that I need to avoid or limit my exposure to discussions of other people singing, but that doesn't feel necessary at the moment. I'm hoping that playing the piano won't poke the same sore spots, and will be trying to do a bit more of that.

But I need to be very clear with myself that I am choosing to do this as a reflection of my priorities for my finite resources of time and emotional energy. That it is my choice, and that when I choose to start singing again, that will be a thing to celebrate, not a thing for which I need make any apology.

Just to re-iterate, please don't respond to this by commenting on the quality of my singing. Things that would be helpful, either here or as behaviours in the futures are:
- expressions of sympathy/empathy/solidarity
- discussions of similar experiences, whether about singing or other activities
- affirmation that it is okay, and not cowardly, having noticed and acknowledged that these unhealthy patterns are there, to decide not to confront them right now
- not inviting me* to participate in activities which involve singing**

*telling me about such activities and expressing that you would have liked to invite me if I were in a better place is fine, and in fact likely to be positive
**if you are at all inclined to worry about having done so recently and caused this, please don't; whilst it contributed to the process of realising how sore this area is for me at the moment, it didn't cause it, and I'd much rather have noticed and dressed the wound than left it festering unexamined

Comments

[liv]

I feel very much the same. I one hundred percent believe that everybody should be allowed to enjoy singing, but I also personally can't hold a tune and find singing in front of other people extremely emotionally hard. I think it would be overall good for me to work on both my singing technique and my feelings about communal singing. But also communal singing is massively unsafe anyway right now at the present moment, and I have lots of other demands on my time. So I think for now the right answer is to just carry on feeling a conflicted and sad about it. It sounds like the issue is much more intense for you than it is for me but I really recognize what you're writing about here.

[atreic]

Sympathy. Hoping that taking a break from singing helps, and that talking about it helps, and hoping there’ll be good times with good group singing that work well for you in the future

[barakta]

This sounds really hard, especially at the moment where you don't have much choice to engage in likely-helpful group singing activities. I hope you can park this quietly in your brain to pause until you have more time and capacity to explore more usefully.

I don't know if I experience things myself as intensely as you describe, but I feel a little similar about my British Sign Language (BSL) signing skills (try typing singing and signing without getting the wrong one constantly!). Skeleton isn't up to it and recent attempts didn't work. I haven't decided what to do; I may look at private lessons after the pandemic anyway because receptive skills are still very useful. I can't sign well on camera cos skeleton angles, so I thankfully have no choice till after face to face is possible again.

[ewt]

Picking your battles around this is good self-care. I'm so sorry it's hard right now.

I said the other day that struggling with issues around musical performance is something I still encounter even though I'm a professional musician, and that it gets easier with practice. This is true, but it also gets harder sometimes -- and not always from lack of practice, either, sometimes it's just stuff beyond my control that ends up affecting how I feel about performing and makes it harder to engage. Pushing through it is what I have often done, but I know doing that can cause a lot of damage which needs mending later. You are the best person to estimate whether such damage is worthwhile for you, and knowing yourself well enough to make that decision is wisdom, not cowardice.

When you feel you want to pick this back up again, let me know, and I will resume inviting you to participate in singing things if you would find that helpful. (This doesn't have to wait until post-pandemic activity begins, either; I have a few thoughts on things that might be helpful before then, but will keep them to myself unless asked!)

[emperor]

*hug* it is sensible to take a break. I worry about my singing quite a bit at the moment, it all feels quite un-trained right now.

[kotturinn]

(Here via 'Network'). I think your approach is entirely sensible. My 'first instrument' is clarinet and the last few years, for reasons both different from and similar to, yours, I've been increasingly struggling with conflicting feelings. This year I've hardly played at all and the only time I did - trios in a back garden - it was entirely for fun, well within my comfort zone, and did a lot to reassure me that my playing hadn't gone entirely down the tubes for ever and ever. I would never have guessed that I'd stop quite so abruptly, nor for so long! I'm still not doing much playing at home, but am at least doing some again. In order to do so I've been thinking very hard about what I can do and what I want to do, to avoid tying myself in knots again. For me, it's about taking more time to just 'footle around', for example as an adult I discovered that scales and arpeggios can actually be fun so I'm 'playing around' with those (patterns, starting on different notes etc).

Good luck when you do start again. I'm glad that piano doesn't poke the same spots (it tends to with me); recorder is my low stress instrument in that I've never studied it 'seriously' (i.e. to public performance standards) so I've been using that as my go-to instrument this year.

[rmc28]

Lots of sympathy and solidarity. I've had a similar process of "I will deal with this, but Not Yet" around my somewhat dysfunctional relationship with food, and in fact it went through several phases:

• me saying flatly to a counsellor "I don't want to talk about that in these sessions, it's not something I want to dig into right now"
• sometime later, after digging into and making progress on some other issues, doing a little digging, and making enough useful observations to improve matters from "this is a topic I won't touch" to "I can think about it now and again, and when I do, I can identify and make some small changes to everyday life to make things less painful", and build a gently positive feedback loop that way
• finding a way to channel some of the dysfunctional impulses into something genuinely helpful to me as a coping mechanism for pandemic this year

I'm aware that my coping mechanism is probably not healthy in the long-term, and I'm going to need to put some (more) work in to sort my head out to get to a healthier place in the long term, but I'm not doing it right now. And anyone who wants to give me grief about that is welcome to take their "concern" and put it where the sun don't shine, and the same to anyone making you feel bad about your decision re singing.

[kht]

Sympathy! I feel the same about my singing and playing.
It's entirely reasonable and sensible to pause on the singing for now. Just because you can do a thing doesn't mean you have to.

[mtbc]

Definitely fine to push this aside awhile and good that you are thinking about it all so clearly.

I too worry more than I'd like about what others think of me in some situations. I'd love to be able to sing well and it really is all uphill, when I try alone I sometimes amuse myself by making a sound so unintended it's positively surprising.

[the_elyan]

I think at any time, and particularly this time, recognising anything you do not have the capacity to deal with or fix, ring-fencing it, and putting a "to be dealt with when circs permit" sign is extremely wise. The opportunity to deal with it will still be there when you want it.

I very much dislike being publicly bad at things, and therefore tend not to do anything where there is no opportunity to become tolerably proficient in private (eg punting).

Hope the freed up headspace is helpful.

[sfred]

<3 Taking a break sounds sensible. I'm glad you're being kind to yourself.

[ceb]

I sympathise, and it is *absolutely fine* to pick your battles with your own head in the same way you pick your battles with the rest of the world.

I really really miss gigs, for all sorts of reasons, but being able to joyfully sing somewhere where people can't hear you over the music is one of them.