Weekly Voice Insights #72 – An Intention, Lived and Practiced
A year after naming the intention
Last year’s New Year post focused on intention and breath. I wrote about watching Maria Callas prepare for the Habanera and paying attention to what she did before a single sound came out—how deliberately she arrived in the moment, and how much was already decided before the voice was ever heard (Weekly Voice Insight #20 – Breathing with Intention). The preparation, the breath, and the clarity behind the sound were doing real work.
Those observations never depended on singing a famous aria. The same elements are available in any situation where the voice carries weight—teaching, leading, responding, or choosing how to enter a conversation.
This year feels different. It’s good to be able to say that I stayed with that intention across the year.
For me, that intention took the form of the Epictetus reflection journal. Not as a loose idea, but as a commitment to build something carefully and see it through. Staying with it asked for steadiness and attention to how small decisions accumulate over time.
The work began with curating fifty-two quotes. Epictetus offers no shortage of strong material, but not every passage works for weekly reflection. Some quotes overlapped too much. Others were compelling but didn’t invite daily use. Choosing one quote per week meant setting many good ones aside and trusting the structure that emerged.
From the beginning, it mattered to me that the reader could see the source material clearly. I wanted these quotes presented as close to their original form as possible, not adapted to fit a modern lens. Even on their own, they carry weight. I return to them often, sometimes realizing only afterward how directly a line applies to something I’m dealing with that day.
That’s also why each entry includes a Greek glossary. This wasn’t about being academic. It was about showing what words Epictetus actually used and how much meaning lives inside them. Translation choices influence understanding, and I wanted that depth to be visible on the page.
Each quote then opens into an ancient insight, placing the passage back into its Stoic context. That section helps clarify what the text is addressing without turning it into instruction.
The Voice in Practice section is where the material moves through my own lens. This is where intention, breath, tone, and connection show up as things you can notice and work with in real time. These are observable behaviors and vocal choices, not abstractions.
The reflection prompts are there to make the work individual. They invite the reader to notice how these ideas show up in their own experience, however they use their voice. Singing and performing are part of that world, but so are teaching, leadership, interviews, and everyday conversations. The journal was always meant to speak to general voice use, not a single discipline.
While finishing the blog and working through the journal formatting, I was also preparing Germont for La Traviata. I was thinking about what a father says to a son, and what he says to the woman his son loves. I was thinking about restraint, care, and responsibility, and how those qualities sound when the voice matters. That work lives in the same place as the journal—the preparation before speech, the choice behind the sound, the attention brought to what follows.
Seeing all fifty-two entries laid out in a finished format changed my relationship to the work. It was no longer something I was still adjusting internally or holding open for improvement. It existed as a whole, with its own shape and limits.
Staying with this process all year, without deadlines or external pressure, became the practice itself. The work asked for judgment about when enough was enough and attention to when further revision no longer served clarity. Finishing meant recognizing that the journal had reached a point where it could stand and be used, even as future refinements remain possible.
As the year closes, it feels worth naming the follow-through itself. Something lived across time. An intention kept in view, returned to repeatedly, and brought into form through steady use.
Related Post:
Weekly Voice Insight #20 – Breathing with Intention
https://dyavwithelias.blogspot.com/2025/01/weekly-insight-20-breathing-with.html?m=1
Further Resource:
Who was Maria Callas, and what made her one of the world’s greatest opera voices –https://www.classicfm.com/artists/maria-callas/voice-family-life-death-operatic-soprano/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
Elias Mokole | Keynote Speaker, BA & Beyond 2025 Voice, Breath, and Clarity | Developing Your Authentic Voice Newsletter
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