Be Heard! Developing Your Alpha Voice

As some of you can see I've changed the site to a blog format. It's much easier to work with and looks cleaner.

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Alright, let's get on to the meat-and-potatoes. There are a few key fundamentals that I think everyone should work on when it comes to improving yourself to make yourself more attractive. Things like body language, eye contact, fashion, vocal quality, this is stuff that can really improve your game. Hell, the typical douchebag (or AFC as known in the "community") can do nothing more then work on these basic qualities and make dramatic improvements.

Running rampant online are articles that tell you how to move, how to walk, how to dress, etc. However, one thing I've noticed a shortage of is a resource to help you develop a strong, loud, resonant voice. Well look no farther.

Developing an all-around good voice isn't really hard, it's simply a matter of learning how to speak the right way and practicing it until it happens naturally.

School is in session.

The best place to begin is with your breathing, and getting it down is your first step.

Stand up with your arms down at your sides. Slowly inhale, paying attention to your shoulders as you do. Did they move? Most likely they did. When you're using your chest and shoulders this is called accessory breathing, and it's a habit you need to break. The natural way that people are intended to breathe is called diaphragmatic breathing. Unless you hit your head a lot when you were a kid you've probably figured out that this type of breathing uses your diaphragm to draw air into your lungs.

So let's try another exercise.

Diaphragmatic Breathing

The easiest way to do this is to lie on your back, so get your ass on the floor. Great. Now put one hand on your stomach in the area of your belly button, and the other hand on your chest. Your focus here is to inhale slowly through your nose (I'll explain why later) for approx. 6-8 seconds, making the hand on your stomach rise but making sure that your hand on your chest is motionless - remember, you don't want to use your chest to breathe. Hold this breath for a few seconds, then relax your diaphragm as you slowly exhale, again for 6-8 seconds. The breath out doesn't really have to be forced, as the diaphragm will naturally push air out as it returns to it's relaxed state.

Not only do you want to repeat this several times, but you should also practice breathing like this throughout the day. Just by focusing on what muscles you are using to breathe you can "retrain" your body to naturally use those muscles. The best part is you can really do this anywhere - in the car, in class, at work...you get the point.

The purpose of breathing through your nose is that your nose filters the air and keeps it moist, where breathing through your mouth can typically dry out your throat.

At the risk of complicating things, I'm going to go ahead and throw in a little information for you future American Idol contestants. If you're a singer you want to breathe just as I've described above, but you're going to take it one step farther: when you inhale you are not only going to expand your stomach/diaphragm but also your sides and lower back. The easiest way to do this is to image that there is a balloon in your stomach that you are inflating with each inhalation. For more on this I really recommend seeking professional lessons or buying some singing instructionals online.

Larynx Exercises

Great, you're working on your breathing. Next we're going to do a few exercises that will teach your larynx to go into the proper position while you speak.

These may seem odd, but then again so does memorizing scripts and games to try to get pussy, isn't it? These exercises work, practice them daily or better yet several times throughout the day.

Think about how Yogi Bear or Rocky Balboa talk. You're going to emulate their speaking style saying the word "mum". When you do this your voice should not only be deep but should also kinda make that sound like when you have a cold and your nose is stuffed. Try this a few times and you'll get it.

Now, in your deep "Yogi Bear with a cold" voice you're going to sing the song "Happy Birthday", but replace all the words with "mum". As you do this remember to take in a breath through your nose using your diaphragmatic breathing, and make sure that your diaphragm is moving IN as you say each "mum", so that you are exhaling - too often people hold their breath when they talk. Big mistake.

The second larynx exercise is similar to the first, except this time you're going to replace the word "mum" with the word "no". Also you can change the song if you want, but don't pick anything too fast or crazy. You may be an old-school Metallica fan, but save this shit for when you're working out. Children's songs work good for these larynx exercises. I suppose that if Metallica happens to redo children's songs then this would be a loophole.

Practice these three exercises as much as you can throughout the day, and before long your breathing will naturally become diaphragmatic and your larynx will develop the "memory" to stay in the proper position when you speak.

On Saturday I'll post part 2, which will cover one of the most debated pieces of vocal mastery - voice resonance, as well as pacing and vocal tonality. The section on resonance alone will be worth the read.

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-Dane