A golden voice is a wonderfully attractive asset. With a golden voice, you make people more comfortable with you, gain their trust and become more confident and persuasive. While genetics and body structure does affect the quality of your voice, working on it will help you remove any drawbacks in your voice and put you well on the way to attracting more people and keeping them attracted. I know, because it's worked for me!

Here are three secrets to get you well on your way to attracting people through the warm, rich quality of your golden voice.

Secret # 1: Breathe Correctly

What is voice, after all? It is vocalised air. Breath from the lungs vibrates the vocal chords and creates sound, which is then moulded by the mouth, nose, sinuses, etc. into coherent speech. It stands to reason, therefore, that the better your breathing technique, the more "raw material" your body has to create your voice.

Correct breathing involves dropping your diaphragm - the band of muscle just below your rib cage - to draw air into the deepest part of your lungs. When you breathe IN, your stomach should move OUT and your chest and shoulders should not move at all.

Learning to breathe correctly is the first step in getting your golden voice

Secret # 2: Project, Don't Yell

Most people are quite capable of attaining a low pitch while speaking. However, the problem is that the voice becomes almost inaudible at this pitch because an unsupported, unprojected voice loses volume. In an attempt to raise the volume, the person then raises the pitch, stretching the throat and the vocal chords.

If you learn to project your voice, you give your low-pitched voice the body of support on which it can travel to your listener.

Think of your voice as a bubble, floating on a cushion of air. The stronger the cushion, the further it can carry the bubble. To get this strong cushion, learn to tighten your abdomen when you speak, firming up the outgoing breath so it can support our voice.

Secret # 3: Make a Lifelong Commitment

Working on your voice, while involving physical exercise, is almost totally a mental game. You have to be able to make a lifelong commitment to yourself to work on your voice EVERY DAY for the REST OF YOUR LIFE. Do you stop watering a garden once the seedlings sprout? Do you stop trimming the hedge once the plants have grown?

I developed my own techniques to work on my voice when I was 18. Today, 22 years on, I still do the exercises every day and will continue to do so until the last breath leaves my body.

The good news is, once you make the commitment and your mind accepts that this is now your new lifestyle, the exercises become part and parcel of you and you don't have to set time aside to do them.

Making that lifelong commitment is the most important secret to getting your golden voice.

Copyright (c) Deepak Morris, 2005

The author runs a unique course on voice development. Check his blog for more tips: http://thegoldenvoice.blogspot.com