The most beautiful sound I’ve ever heard

Dashing this off from my dining table in Ontario, where I’ve touched down for three days before going back out on the road again.

I’ve just come back from Rhinebeck, New York, where I’ve been singing with my elders in the community singing world.

(Before you ask: Yes, that is Janice from Friends. And it’s a story for another day.)

In the last week I’ve learned a dizzying number of Ndebele words, and have woken every morning with gospel songs from Zimbabwe falling out of my mouth like I was born singing them. My heart remembers something when I sing these songs. I feel a peace come over my whole body. I want to start my own choir just so I can hear these songs sung one more time!

Please, take a listen to us singing!

I have also heard – and please believe I am not exaggerating here – the most beautiful voice my ears have ever beheld, and that’s the voice of Bruce Ncube, whose last name is pronounced in a way that sort of sounds like a smooch. Very fitting, if you ask me. That voice is PG-13, folks! Do not make me say any more about that.

I wish there were more than just this brief moment to share what this experience has meant to me. How high my hopes are soaring, how wide open my heart feels, and how big the possibilities I see from this vantage point. It’s exactly the feeling I hope to create at Song & Story in October, but haven’t quite been able to capture in my sales emails.

Someone told me recently, “Just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean you have to keep doing it forever,” which felt like a new layer of permission to shed my title of Email Marketing Expert, and lean more deeply into this calling.

And on that note…

My car is packed for Cleveland, where I’ll be leading my biggest circle to date, at xchange’s annual event, Transformation By Design. I am still waiting for the songs to reveal themselves, but I have quite a robust basket to pull from, given all the singing I’ve done this year.

I hope we get to sing together some day, [first name goes here].

I want to dedicate my life to the work of helping others remember their song — by which I mean remembering a) that singing is for everyone, and b) that every person on earth is gifted with a precious instrument, and it is our job to learn how to wield it, whether it’s for writing an irresistible sales page, speaking up at the dinner table when Uncle Fred says something weird, or marching in the streets with anthems of resistance on your tongue.

If you’re not interested in hearing about it, I won’t be mad if you unsubscribe. After all, many of my subscribers signed up to learn about email marketing and consent-based business strategy.

But my hope is to take as many of you as possible with me on this road, where I have found comfort and joy on a level I did not imagine possible. I feel certain that the greatest work of my life is ahead of me, and I can’t wait to see how it unfolds.

Onward!

Tarzan