The voice is one of the instruments, the main one for many of us, that people have to communicate. All of us who dedicate ourselves in one way or another to public speaking because that is our job or daily work, as in my case, must dedicate some time to the care of our vocal cords and each of the muscles involved in the production of the voice, specifically our articulating muscles of vowels and consonants that are located in the oral cavity (the mouth).
The voice is our main instrument of communication. Source: @emimoron.
For me, my voice is not only an instrument of communication, but also my source of income, since I am a language and literature teacher, a commercial speaker, I give talks and workshops, and I am an event presenter. There are days when all the work comes together and I have to be speaking from very early in the morning until very late at night, that is why voice care is so important if I want to continue my work for many years to come. Here I am going to give you some recommendations that have served me over time and that have really made my voice stay nice, fresh, and healthy even on the days of greatest effort.
For many of us the voice is also our working tool. Source: @emimoron.
One of the first recommendations is the good management of breathing, take air properly so that my lungs have enough oxygen for both our survival and for the production of the voice, is of utmost importance, hence before starting to speak we must take a few minutes to perform deep breathing exercises, that is achieved by taking a good amount of air through the nose and making this descends to reach our lungs, I do ten deep breaths that also serve to relax, before starting to work with my voice then my breaths are diaphragmatic to project the voice. Let us never forget that before starting to speak we should not be fatigued, there are people who climb stairs or arrive running somewhere and immediately begin to speak, this is a serious mistake because we are forcing our organism to work without a sufficient amount of oxygen to do it, hence the fatigue in the voice.
Another important point is NOT to overexpose the voice, that is, if we have to speak in an auditorium where the conditions do not lend themselves to it, ie it is a very large or open space and there is no microphone, please do not do it, you can project your voice but by striving to make it reach the last person with more force without such important support as the microphone you expose yourself to irreversible damage to your vocal cords. Likewise, exposing yourself to very cold temperatures without proper protection, if you are going to be outdoors and the weather is cold remember to wear a scarf or a turtleneck sweater to protect your vocal cords. In this order of ideas, for all those who live in warm areas is not to allow the air conditioner or fan to hit us directly in the face, this causes dryness in our vocal cords and even in the nasal cavity which brings with it the dryness in our vocal cords and overexertion with which we end up tired to speak and almost voiceless.
It is not advisable to overexpose our voice to make ourselves heard. Source: pixabay.com.
It is necessary that every day when we wake up, just as we stretch our muscles before we start moving, we stretch our organs of articulation such as the mouth, the tongue, and our cheeks; with small and easy exercises before starting to speak; you can open and close your mouth slowly, move the lower jaw from one side to another slowly, raise the back of the tongue to touch the hard palate, take out and put in and put in the tongue all these exercises 10 times, then say with exaggerated movements of our mouth and cheeks the vowels. Then after our oral hygiene, and before we start speaking we should drink either a glass of water at room temperature, a cup of tea, or warm water to lubricate our vocal cords. I have a mixture of honey and grated ginger at home and before going out to work on my voice I take a teaspoonful to lubricate my vocal cords.
Finally, it is not advisable to be in places where we are exposed to cigarette smoke, or any other type of smoke such as from vehicles, do not consume alcohol in excess, nor abuse the intake of mints or drinks that are irritating to our throat and can cause damage to our vocal cords and, very importantly, drink plenty of water. The quality of our voice will depend a lot on our good eating habits and body health.
Well friends, I hope you find the information useful and remember, "if the eyes are the windows of the soul, the voice is the sounds of the heart". See you next time.!