Tanya Shaffer

View Original

The Song You Came to Sing

Let no one keep you from your journey.

-Mark Nepo


There was a sign on the wall at the Lawrence School of Ballet, in Lawrence, Kansas, where I grew up, that read, Make sure the song you came to sing does not remain unsung. Throughout junior high and high school, coming and going from dance class, I saw that sign almost daily.


That sign frightened me—What if I don’t find my song?—but it also filled me with determination. I would find my song. Nothing and no one would keep me from it. I would find it, and I would sing.
 
So here I am, forty years later: still searching, still singing. I’ve come to realize that finding one’s song is not finite—find song, sing song, done. The journey is ongoing. The search is in the singing, and the singing leads to more searching. The process is infinite, but oh, how glorious it is. At fifty-six, I'm singing some of the most powerful songs of my life and finding more joy in it than ever.

How about you? Are you in search of your song?


This is what Off-Leash Writing Workshops are about: blowing past all forces, internal or external, that stand in the way of you finding your voice and using it. Every week in our circles, we find our voices, and we sing. Join us.