The Power of Song

How often do you raise your voice in anger? How often do you shout at others in irritation?  I would bet that for most of us, myself included, we exercise our voices more in anger than in the pure joy of singing.

For the past two years I have spent the first weekend in September at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, New York along with 450+ others, singing and chanting for four days, from morning till late in the night.  I cannot begin to describe the pure, unadulterated pleasure this brings me.  How often do any of us give ourselves such a total break from our daily routines and just sing, sing from a space of delight and joy and meditation, from an inner core of beauty that is suddenly open to anyone simply by being in the room and experiencing the simplicity of chanting?

This is not as off the wall as it might sound at first.  All of us have had glimpses of this kind of joy.  Maybe it was in the choirs we were in as children or in church or synagogue, or for me, round a flagpole or campfires in the summer as a teenager.  Singing like this connects us to a heart space that is normally difficult to reach in our busy daily lives.  It's as if by chanting and singing all the usual busy pathways in us are suddenly empty and we can directly connect with ourselves easily , or at least that has been my experience.

I came upon this purely accidentally. I used to enjoy singing as a kid in summer camp where we would sit round a campfire, or sometimes just sit round nothing and someone would bring out a guitar and my friends and I would sing folk songs of the 1960's. Wonderful protest songs by Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs and Pete Seeger and we'd also sing in Yiddish.  It didn't really matter what we sang, just doing it in harmony with others made itspecial.

Many, many years later I went to The Findhorn Foundation in Scotland for a week and the group of residents who were in my weeks' intake had a free evening together. I figured that since I was in Scotland, in the Highlands, home of whisky distilleries, the only sensible thing to do was to buy some malt whisky, find some music and an old piano, get pleasantly tipsy and have a mass sing-a-long.  This was tremendous success and caused some uproar in normally sedate Findhorn, but my memory is of a wonderful, warm evening.

For my birthday last year I had a karaoke party.  Wow, what a surprising success it turned out to be, despite the reluctance of my family to initially embrace this idea.  We sang in English, Italian and German. We sang the Supremes, Frank Sinatra, the Beatles and lots of others.  We sang individually, in pairs, in trios, and as a group, all joining our voices together, not to sound good, but to feel good. And boy, did it feel good to sing with friends.

The music I listen to at home is usual kirtan chanting - the musical repeating of mantras, ancient Hindu, Hebrew, Tibetan and other languages in song.  I find this wonderfully stilling and to the consternation of those around me, I usually join in and sing along.  I love this.  For me it is like finding water in the desert.  When my nerves are frazzled and the day is just too chaotic, just hearing this wonderful music is enough to bring me home to my quiet heart again.

So, this year I am debating NOT going to Omega and passing up my four days of pleasure.  Why?? I'm not really sure. It's primarily a financial decision, though leaving home again for a week or two feels not right. I know I haven't earned enough to justify the expenditure.  Flying to America is expensive and I'm just not sure.  Last year the generosity and kindness of my friends helped me along the way as my birthday gift.

Do I want to go, yes.  Will I go,I don't think so.  Sometimes the daily priorities of life take precedence.  I'll just have to keep singing and I'll find that joy anyway.  It's all inside me in any case. I might just join a choir or keep singing in my car - at least that way I don't have to worry about how I sound, just how I feel.