Five Minute Friday / Voice

It's Friday and I'm linking up with Five Minute Friday for a little bit of writing practice.

GO.
As dusk draws in and the last week of the school term draws to a close, I take a deep breath and breathe out slowly as my thoughts circulate at a far greater speed than my exhaling breath, and I think of finding your voice. For me, finding my voice this week has come in a diversity of ways from the whispered morning prayers, the first words that leave my mouth as I usher in a new day, and bring it all before God, bringing a quiet stillness to my heart and mind before the flurry of three year olds that I greet everyday. My thoughts circulate around to the quietest of children in my class, who only find their loudest voices when all is silent, and something within them rises up and out roars a sound like one I have never heard them utter before.

I hear my voice daily - as we all do - but it is only in the reflective process of watching footage of myself teaching that I really hear myself. I hear my voice through different ears because my eyes are tuned in too - watching the quirks, the gestures, the unashamedness of my dancing with the children that become the participatory audience in this acting role of teaching that I put on every day. Hearing so much of my voice makes me crave just a little bit more quiet than I have been allowing, for those moments for the inner voice of the Holy Spirit to refine those rough edges that I hear in my voice - for out of the overflow of my heart does my mouth speak (as the Bible says in Matthew 12).
STOP.