Slay Your Own Dragons

I love fairy tales. I love feeling like a princess.  I love the idea of danger or a battle.  I love seeing people overcoming obstacles and learning to believe in themselves.

One of my favorite scenes in any Disney movie is when Prince Phillip takes on Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty.  She grows larger than life, thorns and brambles grow all around, Prince Phillip only has his shield and sword to take her on.  It looks impossible.  If he gravitated towards the "flight" response in the Fight or Flight reflex, he would have taken off and hid.  Instead he faced her straight on and even though victory seemed impossible, he won.

It would be nice to have someone slay our dragons for us while we sleep but sometimes, no one can fight our battle for us. Sometimes, we have to slay our own dragons.

Usually these dragons are in our own head.  Past experiences that left us feeling self-doubt, things someone said that we have chosen to believe, regret for things we've done or opportunities we didn't take.  No one can go into our heads and fight these thoughts for us.  They try by telling us words that should be helpful, but until we change our own thinking, we can't believe the good things other people have to say.

I posted before about auditioning for musicals.  It's been such a stretching experience.  I said I rather have a Brazilian wax or stand naked in front of a crowd than sing in front of one.  Here’s where my fear came from:

When I was in high school, I was known as a dancer.  I had never had lessons but took to it naturally (all those hours of imitating the latest episode of Fame in my garage paid off I guess.)  But what I've always loved to do was sing.  No one in my family ever said I was good at it, but I did get encouragement from a few people who heard me sing during auditions at school.

My last year of high school, I decided to audition for a talent show with a couple of other girls but instead of dancing as I had in the past, I would be singing.  I got an, "Oh you've GOT to be kidding!" from someone very close to me.  That hurt. A lot.

I moved forward with the auditions anyway with the other girls. One was the daughter of a voice teacher and one was a student of the voice teacher.  I had never had a lesson in my life.  They decided I should sing the Alto part (I had always been a 2nd Soprano) and that the Alto was the harmony, not the melody. It was a disaster!!!!  I could not hear the notes in my own head to be able to sing them alone while the other two were singing the melody. 

A couple of days before the show, another friend pulled me aside and told me that the girls had decided to get someone else to sing my part and that they just wanted me to lip-synch. Wow, I must really stink at this. It scarred me for life.

I'm not a good singer.

I don't have a good voice.

Welcome to my dragon.

But something deep down inside of me knew this wasn't right.

I remember going into my bathroom and looking into the mirror above the sink and vowing, "Some day I'm going to take voice lessons. Some day I'm going to prove these people wrong!"

There have been a couple of times I've felt comfortable enough to sing in front of  others if the situation was safe enough, like with my sorority sisters, and I was encouraged by them. But then there were other times I tried and things did not go well.  I went to audition for a show in college and could not for the life of me start at the right time or on the right note.  I got the, "That's OK, thanks" from the director and did not even make the ensemble cast.

This year, I started voice lessons.  I auditioned for a couple of shows.  Got called back for a second audition for the first time ever. Then, got a solo part.  You’d think that once you have a part, you’d feel more confident but I didn’t.  My voice teacher and I worked every week getting the song down.  The notes got changed and words got rearranged  even as late as the day after opening so I could have easily freaked out, but I worked through it.

People were sweet and encouraging the whole time, but it’s funny because deep down, I knew when they were just trying to be nice verses telling the truth.  I admire truth above niceness any day.  So when I finally got my best theater friend to give me feedback, I was relieved to hear, "You have come so far. You've got the beginning of that song down. But I'm not going to lie and say you don't need to keep working on the rest of it." Thank you!!

By the time my parents came to see the show on the second night, I was feeling confident enough to know that I wasn’t going to blow it.  That I could get through the song without my voice cracking.  After the song was done and I went back stage, I not only knew I got through it, I knew I had done really well.  Hugs and high-fives were given back stage and it felt very good.

Each performance got better and better.  It was funny to see the people who had given me praise early on change what they said to me.  “Wow!! You did great last week but what a big difference between then and now!”  Because I knew those words to be true, I could let them sink in.

I slayed my own dragon last week.  One that had lived in me for twenty-five years.  I sought the help and got the tools needed to do it well.  Most of all, I dug deep and listened to my own voice that knew I could do it. I was scared, but I faced it.

What dragons do you still have living in you?  What tools do you need to overcome them?  Even just posting your thoughts in the comments below can empower you to start your journey. Let’s fight together.