The Voice as Healing Tool: From Pain to Transformative Expression

Bea Palya, singer, songwriter, and vocal artist, joins Abdullah Boulad on Living a Life in Balance for a heartfelt conversation about healing, creativity, and the power of the human voice.
 
Speaking with honesty and clarity, Bea reflects on the profound shifts that followed her divorce and the pain that took her to a very low point. She shares how music became the light she held onto, and how writing songs and using her voice helped her move through grief, rebuild her inner world, and reconnect with herself. Her story is a reminder that the darkest moments can become the ground where something new and meaningful begins to grow.
 
🔗 Tune in for a gentle and deeply authentic exploration of the voice as a healing tool, the resilience that emerges in difficult times, and the unexpected ways creativity can guide us back to balance.
 
About Bea:
Bea Palya is a Hungarian singer and vocal artist known for her emotionally rich sound and her ability to weave personal storytelling with profound musical expression. Through decades of performance, teaching, and artistic exploration, she has developed a unique approach to voice work that blends music, embodiment, and emotional honesty. Her work continues to inspire people to use their own voice as a pathway to healing, freedom, and inner connection.
 
00:00:00 – Welcome and Introduction to Bea Palya
00:01:46 – Musical Childhood and Folk Rituals
00:02:30 – First Breakup and Therapeutic Singing
00:05:11 – Songwriting and Emotional Expression
00:06:22 – Creating the “Sing Yourself to Freedom” Method
00:07:34 – From Performer to Teacher
00:08:43 – Singing in Community and Connection
00:09:17 – Emotional Resonance of Folk Songs
00:10:53 – Music’s Physical Impact
00:11:51 – Divorce, Rebirth, and Writing Anthems
00:15:24 – Covid, Growth, and Online Teaching
00:17:34 – Fear of Success and Expanding Reach
00:19:38 – Roots, Loneliness, and Ambition
00:23:50 – The 4 Pillars of Her Voice Method
00:29:55 – Breaking Perfectionism Through Singing
00:36:21 – Voice, Sexuality, and Energy Work
00:55:56 – Using Voice in Trauma Recovery
01:27:47 – Live Song Performance and Final Reflection
 
For further mental health information and support, visit The Balance RehabClinic website: https://balancerehabclinic.com/ 
 
Follow Abdullah Boulad:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/abdullahboulad/
https://www.instagram.com/abdullahboulad/
 
Follow Bea Palya:
https://www.instagram.com/palyabea/%E2%80%8B
 
You can order Abdullah’s book, ‘Living A Life In Balance’, here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/...
 
Follow The Balance RehabClinic:
https://www.linkedin.com/company/thebalancerehabclinic/
 
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Transcript

Bea Palya 00:00:00  One of the biggest life transformations of my life was my divorce. I didn't know that at that time. What I was doing is actually healing myself with the song. But then I realized it's not just for me. I can teach to others as well.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:13  Can you tell me more about your method?

Bea Palya 00:00:15  So the method is called Sing Yourself to Freedom. And in my world, singing is for everyone.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:20  How have you met government?

Bea Palya 00:00:22  I would say it's a long term friendship.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:26  You're a singer?

Bea Palya 00:00:27  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:27  Can we hear something?

Bea Palya 00:00:28  Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. With pleasure.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:35  What meaning has it to you?

Bea Palya 00:00:37  I feel that we touched so many deep layers of me. Many times when you are in the darkest place of your life. That's where you create gold.

Abdullah Boulad 00:00:49  Welcome to the Living a Life and Balance podcast. My name is Abdullah Boulard. I'm the founder and CEO of the Balance Rehab Clinic. My guest today is Beate Paglia. Celebrated Hungarian folk singer, somatic voice therapist and creator of over 25 albums and 600 songs.

Abdullah Boulad 00:01:08  In this episode, Baer shares how she rebuilt her life through music after divorce, using voice as a tool for healing, expression and reclaiming sexuality, and what it means to parent a child through adolescence with trust and release that speaks about her 15 year friendship with Doctor Gabor Mate, how she navigates life as a celebrity and performs her favorite song for us. I hope you all enjoy there. What motivated you to do what you do today?

Bea Palya 00:01:46  So at the age of six, I got to the folk group of my village who kept the tradition alive. So it was singing and dancing all day long. And so for me, it was natural to be together with people, touching each other's bodies and moving together rhythmically and singing together. So the reason I emphasize this ritual part is because I think it's deeply shaped my way of thinking and and also my method. So I really think that those rituals and this togetherness, this natural connectedness, is part of what I do today. But then so I got a member of the queendom of the folk songs.

Bea Palya 00:02:30  So if I may say that. So this was just, you know, invited me and got me in and I became, you know, someone who spent hours and hours to learn folk songs and, and and the, the gesture of folk dance by the age of, I don't know, 20, I got like, maybe more, more hundreds if not thousands of folk songs in me. And so I knew that in one of my first life transitions, which is my first break up at the 20 at the age of 71. Wow. I remember sitting at a wall of a castle. I just gave a concert as a singer, but then I was so heartbroken that I felt I needed to do something. So what I did, and the rain started to fall. And the raindrops and my tears became worn on my face. And so you know what I did? I took a paper and I started to write all these beautiful Hungarian folk songs, very beautifully wording about the the who is heartbroken. What does she feel? So as I was writing first, just writing, and then I started to sing those.

Multiple Speakers 00:03:48  You as she could You see this? Oh, you're gonna do this.

Bea Palya 00:04:03  So as I was singing more and more, what I realized is that my attention has shifted to the next line. What's the next line? How is the next musical gesture? What's the next ornament? So what? What I did, without really knowing it, is that I created a healthy distance between my broken heart and of what I did. And so with time, because I spent like an hour doing that rain. It was a very beautiful movie image. I realized that something has lighter in my chest. My breath is deeper again. I'm. I was so much into the song again, so I didn't know that that time back. But now I know that what was what I was doing is actually healing myself with the song. Because of course, everybody wants in in or more times was heartbroken in her life. So I thought, it's just me. But then there was this song, so it led me towards something more important, which is the song itself.

Bea Palya 00:05:11  And this tested wisdom in this folk song that went through so many souls. So it's I just, I just say this story because it was a very important, stone in my in my, in my journey to know the healing power of song. I stayed in this folk milieu for, for another decade. But I started to sing other cultures music like Bulgarian Gypsy. I'm partly Gypsy also. So Hungarian, Bulgarian, Jewish, Yiddish and Sephardic songs. A little bit of Arabic songs too. French chanson. So many, many kind of songs and cultures. And then I realized when I came back that Hungarian folk songs are beautiful and it's, it's it has a little wisdom. But then I wanted to put my life into it. I wanted to talk about, well, my boyfriend didn't go to to the Army, but I live in a long distance relationship. Guess what? It's the same thing he's for. So I have to do something. So I started to write things like my actual modern life.

Bea Palya 00:06:22  So I put the lyrics first just to not to an old melody. But with the years, I also started to create the melodies. But this is the part of the songwriting. But but what happened is that more and more I wrote about my own transformation in the songs. More and more I got the feedback from my people. I hate listening to your songs. Give Gave me like five years of therapy, or I have severe panic attacks and depression, and the only way I could I could go through is through your albums, listening them in loop. So I said, maybe I do something more than just singing well and writing good songs. There's a healing potential in it. So after a decade forward, I created a method which was sing Yourself to Freedom because coming back to your original question, what was the motivation? I healed myself with the songs and the power of songwriting, but then I realized it's not just for me. If I can write down what I do, then I can teach to others as well.

Bea Palya 00:07:34  So that's how I do what I do today. I cut my singing career and sing it path, but I became a teacher and the The founder of the singer says method singers have to freedom method. And I'm so happy because I see people really getting the deep transformation that they have as an aspiration.

Abdullah Boulad 00:07:58  Beautiful. Thank you for sharing that.

Bea Palya 00:07:59  Yeah. Thank you.

Abdullah Boulad 00:08:01  It's I mean, many growing up little children would admire becoming a singer a dancer. You made it.

Bea Palya 00:08:10  Yes. Also that part. Thank you so much. And I did made it and I you know, I have a one, one sentence, my origin story in one sense, that half gypsy from a tiny Hungarian village, I sung myself into Carnegie Hall. So now you see the journey. Which is true, but this is just one part of what I do. I think the healing and the transformation for people is just as important as the being on stage thing, because somehow I got back to my original state of this commonality.

Bea Palya 00:08:43  Like what I said. Like moving together the rhythm or just touching each other. So natural in a dance or singing together. So what I do today is basically that, like, I make people sing, I make people discover their own voice and their own voice, not just in a metaphorical, but a physical in a physical sense, too. So then we become. We become closer as humans.

Abdullah Boulad 00:09:09  Do you do you think something is special about folkloric music and what's the power in it?

Bea Palya 00:09:17  I love this question. You know why? Because I believe. And I only believe in tested wisdom. And folk songs are like being true of many thousands and hundreds, thousands of souls. Many people sang them. And so it became sharpened, heightened somehow. So Also melodically, but also really quiet. And so it was very interesting when I made my program together that it has four pillars, I can tell you that more later, but like I felt like for each theory part, there is like, I don't know, hundreds of songs I can put.

Bea Palya 00:10:00  So actually I did not handle it, but at least I don't know some. Which is kind of like give another perspective or give a confirmation of the message what what I, what I teach in the theory. So and also there is the part that it has lightness because once you do this, do the singing, it moves another part of your brain and the other parts in your body. So it not just your prefrontal cortex that works, but also become the whole body is involved and all the gods are moving. So a lot of emotion comes in a minute. I just ask you about the songs. And then we were talking about one of your singer that probably you've been listening to as a child, and you've got emotion that I could feel on your face like, oh, you know, it's it's a beautiful thing.

Abdullah Boulad 00:10:53  Yeah, I think music, music is something emotional. It can give a lot of power to someone. certainly to me. To me as well. When I, when I do sports, for example, this morning I went to the gym and I was for a run.

Abdullah Boulad 00:11:07  I like to listen to music. It gives me directly energy, without maybe knowing what, what exactly happens in my body. But if I listen to something I like, it gives me energy.

Bea Palya 00:11:21  This reminds me of my own definition of song, which is song has a life changing potential because the lyrics goes to the mind, but the physical resonance, the, part or the rhythm boom, boom goes into the guts so it makes the body move, makes the soul awake, and then. Hey. Yeah, go and grow and open yourself so it can change lives. Yes, it literally changed mine and my students and my people.

Abdullah Boulad 00:11:51  If we go back to what you mentioned you had at the age of 21, very early, a divorce.

Bea Palya 00:11:59  Oh, no, no, it was a separation.

Abdullah Boulad 00:12:01  Separation.

Bea Palya 00:12:02  Okay. Separation from my boyfriend?

Abdullah Boulad 00:12:04  Yeah, from from your partner. And, how did music help you through? Through, let's say, all the all the emotional feelings that life has brought to you.

Bea Palya 00:12:18  Yeah, but I don't know intuitively. Or you knew about me, but I was divorced later, so it's it's, And the reason I bring it up, because it's it can be also a taboo topic, and also because you're asking how music helped me to heal and one of the biggest life transformations of my life was my divorce, and that's where I really felt that music and songwriting itself is the key to here. So what happens is that, I really went to the bottom like pain, pain, pain. And my children were relatively young. But what I did is I felt is the only light in this dark place was writing and singing about it somehow. And the more I did again, my broken heart left behind a little bit because I started to develop some of the songs for that album, which is called Homecoming in Hungarian, which became masterpieces. And many times when you are in the darkest place of your life, that's where you create gold. So, it's 11 songs if it's about my divorce and a lot of aspects like how to talk to the children, how to be grateful for my partner, and many, many other aspects.

Bea Palya 00:13:50  But what was more interesting that these songs became anthems for any kind of rebirth for my community, and that's the main thing. So first, I was already knowing somehow that what I do is not just about me, but then the end in this life transformation of my life, I really could feel that what I create as a medicine for my own healing is not just for me, it's for my people. And since ever I know you know, my divorce is behind my you know, I have other challenges now, but the songs are still there. So whoever wants to have some some help in a difficult situation. She can listen to the song and she can go back to this deep somehow. Well, Leonard Cohen said that if a song has a spiritual center, then the song will be very good. And so I think this song has a very, have a very good spiritual center or meaning meaningful, you know, motivation to be born. So people feel that people are beautiful human being of feeling hard with feeling hearts and, you know, open God.

Bea Palya 00:15:10  So they feel that.

Abdullah Boulad 00:15:12  All the all about the energy and emotion you have put into it. yeah. And that's, that's what people feel most likely. How has your work been since then? What have you been doing?

Bea Palya 00:15:24  This was already my I don't know how many albums altogether. I have, 25. 600 songs. Wow. So since. Well, another transformation, which was very interesting. Covid went from one day to another. I lost the job I had as a singer. I had already an online course about creativity, but again, I went to the bottom. Not in this sense, like in my divorce, but Covid somehow pushed me to really give my other wisdom to the world, which is sing yourself to freedom. So actually, Covid was the year when I when I started to develop the deeply the curriculum of the Singer Self to Freedom program. And well, it was challenging because first I needed to figure out how to teach voice work through the online world, what to do, what works, what doesn't work.

Bea Palya 00:16:26  So it was a classical Recall testing. Iterating. Asking for feedback. Testing again. So it was a challenging some years, but then for now, what I have is I have a method and I have this program and I have teachers that I trained, and the transformation is way beyond in their lives. What I could imagine before, way beyond of that, I needed to imagine the unimagined and unimaginable going to the non Hungarian world and and bringing my wisdom in English to people, to people from other cultures. So I needed to work with other songs or like imagine myself really being the singer and being the teacher and the mother at the same time. So it was also partly, I don't know, imagination opening of my internal world to a bigger man. So it was quite a big dose of internal work as well. But I'm proud of myself that I did. Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 00:17:34  This is this is a mindset. I feel it's it's it's a mindset we can include every in every day's life. by, by accepting that something has changed for in the first place.

Abdullah Boulad 00:17:50  And and then ask, ask oneself okay, what are my options? Option one. Option two, option three I like to work with the three options and then okay, what's my best option? Is my best option possible okay I go for it. Not okay I take the second one. And and this brings brings someone much quicker forward by accepting and then check what are the options.

Bea Palya 00:18:20  Interesting because. Very true. And what came up is that. Yeah. But then I see my best options. Like, for instance, having the program in English singers up to freedom, which I have partly. But then you know what comes in. What? Because you are asking about emotions, I'm sure. Fear. And it's not the fear of not being successful, it's the other way around. Fearful of being too successful. And this goes back to the very first question you ask about my background and motivation. And yes, I come from four and as a half deep singer I was very marginalised. So all I knew is hard work and then of course dance and singing in the group.

Bea Palya 00:19:10  But then it was a relatively narrow world. And so when I, when you showed the three options, when I what's the best for me, I know it's best for me, but what if I get it? This is actually more gives me more fear than the option of not getting it, or the the chance of not getting it. It's so interesting because somebody is connected to the permission of growing bigger.

Abdullah Boulad 00:19:38  Okay. Why is that so? What are you afraid about? When. When you become too successful?

Bea Palya 00:19:46  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 00:19:47  Is there something like too successful also?

Bea Palya 00:19:50  I love the both sides of your question. Probably is the already. I'm pretty far from where I came from and I'm sure it's true for you. And then the questions that come up, what happens with my mom in my with my, my, I don't know, with my dad. it's not just that simple. Taking care of my parents, but also mentally. And I don't know, emotionally. Can I be that far from my roots? How do I integrate them? Or will I be judged by my previous community? If I fly there? So change.

Bea Palya 00:20:37  You cannot grow if you're full of, you know, every tree. At least in Hungary, they fall, you know, the leaves falling down and then it's empty for a while. And then next spring, the it starts to bring, leaves again. So for a while, you need to empty yourself. And this is also fearful sometimes because it means that you have to leave some people if they have to. You have to move to other places. You have to, I don't know. Friendship, partnership. It can change. So. And for a while it's loneliness. So I have a lot of experience with growth. I am, I. I think of myself as an expert in transformation, in Finnish cycle transformation, like someone who really made the work, really went through the fear to the liminality, through the chaos. If you remember, of the framework of Arnold von Gainax about the rights of passages. I'm someone who really went through these, but there maybe we are at the gateway of another one, and you are asking about that.

Bea Palya 00:21:45  And I feel in my body that is. Oof! Oof! It's it gives me a lot of intense physical sensations because probably I'm growing again. And, I'm just great for you. You asking about it? You are asking about this question.

Abdullah Boulad 00:22:06  So it's not just about fear. What is awaiting you in the future, but also about your past, obviously, and how you may be judged or losing your roots in one way.

Bea Palya 00:22:19  And how do I integrate everything? You know what I have so far? And some of them. You know, you just have to leave behind. Because then it's too full.

Abdullah Boulad 00:22:31  On if you want. There are always you, you have the boundary power in your hand.

Bea Palya 00:22:40  It's also true. But I find myself. You know one thing. So many things at a time. Like because I love I'm curious and I'm, I'm almost 50 and I'm still very curious of the world. I'm actually, I'm more curious of the world now and, and and landscapes and, and special nature and, and and traveling and music.

Bea Palya 00:23:03  But I also feel that sometimes my baggage is too full. So you're right, I can set pretty much good boundaries now. But it's just, you know, it's, it's a dialogue between me and myself. Like how curious I am. You know.

Abdullah Boulad 00:23:18  It is a dance.

Bea Palya 00:23:19  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 00:23:20  To say it in a creative way.

Bea Palya 00:23:22  Yeah. And also, it's like a rope dancer or like juggling with, you know, different options and life territories.

Abdullah Boulad 00:23:30  Every step we do brings new challenges.

Bea Palya 00:23:33  And it's never ending. You know.

Abdullah Boulad 00:23:36  Yes. Yeah. Can you. Can you tell me more about your method? You mentioned your method. You do you teach? You train. What does it entail? What are the pillars? You you you touched on a bit.

Bea Palya 00:23:50  Yeah. So the method is called sing Yourself to Freedom. And already these words to find out. What is it at the core of what I do? It was a year, year long thinking process because I could name it sing more freely or something like that.

Bea Palya 00:24:09  But it actually it's not about the singing. It's kind of, you know, a side effect that we sing better, but it's not at the core of the mission. The mission is to experience, on a physical level, this freedom. When you say, So this when you're joined and I feel in the room that also the people behind the camera just, you know, maybe taking a different, a different breath or, you know, you're smiling, your eyes is changing your shoulders and maybe more loose. So its music does that. Sounding out does that. If you imagine hugging someone just like that or like. You know it's much more joy with the, with the, with sounding out. So in the core of my method is how to free yourself in a physical and emotional level. With the help of your own sound. And I find just the conversations I had in the last two days, I find that we are still somehow blind walking about that like either we just think of the voice as a tool to convey message from head to head.

Bea Palya 00:25:30  When we talk, either we think of singing as a performing art, which is which is just a hidden, secretive castle of the talented ones. And in my world, singing is for everyone. Everyone can sing unless they don't have an organ, you know? Yes.

Abdullah Boulad 00:25:51  biologically.

Bea Palya 00:25:52  Biologically, something is, is, you know, doesn't make this possible. And second, we have one voice. It means that either we use it for singing. Either we use it for speaking, but it has the same route. Of course, it's a little different. But now, am I singing or speaking? Do you? Do you notice the difference? What a what the heck am I doing? I am in between somehow. You see. So by the way, this is one core exercise in my method. I bring my clients very often to this sweet spot in between singing and and speaking. But so we have one voice and so we can play many things. Also when speaking many, many things we can do, I got that, I got there later.

Bea Palya 00:26:46  And also singing is for everyone. It's not just about technique and talent. Yes, the the pitch you you gave about your own voice before we started to talk. It's very. You're so much not alone. Oh, if I sing. What was it? What you said. If I sing, I'm gonna scare people away. That's what you said.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:07  Oh, no, I, I meant it's a bit different. I usually sing to, to make my children a little bit uncomfortable.

Bea Palya 00:27:17  Yeah. Uncomfortable. Yeah. Yeah, I see.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:20  I do it just, in an environment because sometimes I feel. Oh, they they feel like. Okay, are people judging us in a certain situation? And then I try to make them even more uncomfortable.

Bea Palya 00:27:33  So you double down on this exchange.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:36  And I use my voice.

Bea Palya 00:27:37  Yeah. Oh, cool. I pictured this, that movie in my mind, and it's very funny, actually. Not for them maybe, but but maybe.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:45  But they are used that by now.

Bea Palya 00:27:47  Yeah. But I think it's also changing something in them. So it's, it's.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:51  It's you know why I do it. It's to show them, look, there is nothing to be afraid of.

Bea Palya 00:27:57  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 00:27:57  You know, again, I, I mentioned when I, when I, when I talked about this, in Lebanon, getting together, dancing and children. You know you are. You know what happens there is you are not judged. Yeah, you are not judged. You learn from small on little on that you. You can be who you are. You don't have to fear how people think about you or about you and, and but my children are now in the Western world between Switzerland and Spain. They live in Spain right now in Majorca. And and still even even though culturally it's a bit more open, still there is limitation. And oh, what would they think about us? what? we have to be here now, a little bit more quiet. so I just to express even more if I see them getting down this rabbit hole.

Bea Palya 00:28:54  I love that. So that's basically what I meant when I said something is changing in them, too, because it's so beautiful somehow, in a reverse way. But you give them permission because probably they will remember. That is a little crazy one who's singing here. But but he's just doing it, you know. And then he can do it. I can do it. So it's a great thing. So, coming back to the pillars of the method. No, no, but it's great because I'm great. Yeah. Because I connected the same dots you did, so it's so good. So in the first part, it has four parts. It's like four, cause in one it's a year long program. And so in the first part is just we are emphasizing the joy and the, the physical pleasure of giving the sound and singing and singing itself, because I think we distance it so far with like I asked often, what is the word that comes come up when I say singing? What is for you? Singing? But probably you are different.

Bea Palya 00:29:55  I don't know what what? Okay, I say singing. What comes up to you? Joy. Joy? Yeah. What else?

Abdullah Boulad 00:30:02  Freedom.

Bea Palya 00:30:03  Freedom.

Abdullah Boulad 00:30:04  Together.

Bea Palya 00:30:05  Together? Yeah. We are pretty much in the same, you know, same bubble. But when I ask, for example, teenagers, they say microphone stage performance, X factor. Da da da. You know, all around perfectionism, high notes. See all these, performance, celebrity money business. how many, you know, followers. so it's it's it has this, this, context of being perfect, having good skill, which is, which is very true, which I'm not denying because I'm in it. But in the first, six weeks of my course, we, we make another foundation is which is you can you you the way you just describe this scene with your son, with your children, you are allowed to use your voice when you feel it. And of course, you are attuned to your people around you, but you can sing if you want.

Bea Palya 00:31:09  Or you can suit yourself with your own voice. You can sing a sad song. You can. So you can use it for your own joy just without being perfect. Because there's no such thing as perfect. Exactly. I know you are, isn't it? That's what you you you did. So in the first part, we we do have a lot of core exercises there, but it's its title. It's the joy of singing and speaking. Just like I'm daring opening my mouth, you know, bigger than ever. And I say to my boss that I want to double my salary. And then when I say the number, I really say it. And my boss just sees the number and listen. But, you know, sometimes it's just start by opening those two, which are the lips. So I do it finally here in the conference. You know, I make people imagine an apple and then put this apple to the mouth, and then they open the mouth and the sound is very different.

Bea Palya 00:32:11  Also, their speaking voice is very different after those, images. And so in the first part, one of the core exercises, which I like to tell a little bit about, is the additive soul hunting process, which is going back to my contemporary shamanistic studies and experiences in the shamanistic world. Soul hunting is basically what we do in the psychotherapy in the Western world. So the shaman says, you can go to the woods and hunt back your lost pieces, so you become integrated again and whole. And so I realized that We can do that with the voice. So in that particular exercise, I of course, there's a long preparation for that. But we become ancient people, like cave people who.

Multiple Speakers 00:33:12  Are.

Bea Palya 00:33:13  Sometimes really get in touch with this raw self in the voice. Sometimes we use movement. Then we become babies who are crying for milk. And you haven't seen a baby crying with open lips. So if they are baby cries for milk because she is hungry. Yeah he does that. Everything is open with time.

Bea Palya 00:33:40  Does this you know we do this but we, we go back to this baby. Then we go back to a person who is sexually liberated. And then the fourth character in this exercise is the wolf. And the reason is because there is a book that really shaped my mind is, it's Clarissa Pinkel is the woman who ran with the wolf. It's a beautiful, beautiful, book about the ancient power of storytelling. And so in this particular exercise, what the testimonials are is that one of my psychotherapist clients said my main transformation in my life when it happened through psychedelics and with that exercise, because doing all these voices of the wolf and the baby and the cavemen really switched off my prefrontal cortex. Yes. And let me just be from this reptilian brain. And your shout or roar or hum or, you know, scream or. And so she she said, it gave me so much perspective in my world, what I can do with my voice. So this is actually the first part. And then the second pillar is is more about the embodied voice.

Bea Palya 00:35:00  So what is what does it mean that the voice lives in the body? What the heck does it mean? So I come with poetry and then in the end of that part, my students are writing, prayer for their own body, which is a deep, deep one. It's also a long process, but it's a prayer for the own body to really, you know, like see the beauty of each part of it. It's more like it's somewhere between the hymnal, the hymn, and and and prayer. But we do a lot of breathing, breathing and a lot of, vocal technique in that part. The third part is voice and sexuality, which is a very awaited part in the program because here we work with a with very subtile energies and one of the main shift in my students life and feedback is the way they see sexuality at all, that it can be something between them and themselves. Yeah, so it doesn't require a partner. It's like energy. You are. We are born from a sexual act and we can die as a sexual being.

Bea Palya 00:36:21  And so they they start to see that that oh, if I don't have any sex in my marriage, it's not a, it's not because I'm, I'm, I don't have sex in my body. Of course I have this current and and so with with voice we can very easily awaken those energies within the body. So I work with specific songs for the womb or the breast or the heart or So it's, it's a it's a very powerful part of the program. And also, yeah, also we bring in that the harvesting the energy. So it's actually you can create the heightened energy like it's like more shining like in the Greek. I think it was in Homer that he wrote that before Odyssey's got back to, to Penelope, there was Aphrodite coming and made him bigger, somehow put oil on his shoulder and somehow made him somewhat taller, so that after 20 years, having had enough. Yeah. Not seeing the wife that he could be. So that's what I mean. Heightened energy is after sex.

Bea Palya 00:37:33  You're glowing. You are. Somehow the world is a nicer place, right? So this energy we can harvest and so we can do the same thing with singing after we just we were singing together with many of the colleagues here. And after the glowing faces. I mean, this was I call, you know, harvesting. So this part is about a lot of sexual and and vocal energy together. So I connect them on purpose together. And in the fourth part, that's where the real, I mean, real stuff, the whole thing. But in the fourth part, we students are writing their own song. And when they do that, of course they don't believe me in the beginning because they say, I'm not a songwriter. I know, but you know, if you look at children, they are just improvising songs all the time. So I have a protest process that I offer to them and I just give them buckets. So fill it up, fill it up, fill it up. And in the end you got a song.

Bea Palya 00:38:40  So they we use the framework of, of the rise of passages which I tell you, which I told you before, like are not 1 in 3 parts frame. And they get there, they write their own song, and they change something in their life, which is towards their aspiration. One of them told me that her her theme was meeting others expectations, you know, and being always the good girl. So she wrote a beautiful song about circles and circles and. And then she told me I wrote this song. I stayed up late night like 3:00. And then I slept like a newborn baby. So she started a new cycle in her life when it's not others expectation, it's just her own. This kind of thing is things happening, like, I don't know, a hundred times in a year in my program.

Abdullah Boulad 00:39:45  Yeah.

Bea Palya 00:39:46  Pretty much yeah. And of course, there is the community. So it's a very strong. Community too, because we spend one year together and it's it's very we hold the space for it.

Bea Palya 00:39:59  I mean, I hold and we hold space for each other, for each other's transformation.

Abdullah Boulad 00:40:04  And how many people do you work with? every year now, every year it's like 50.

Bea Palya 00:40:10  But I hold, workshops on a regular basis. And I do have a program in English, which is not the length of the Hungarian one, but it's the same title, seeing yourself through freedom. And the core elements are there, like the oddity of soul hunting or the, the prayer for the body, or working with the belief system about my own voice. What is that? They told me that I have a bad voice, that I can sing and tone deaf, etc. so we work with that. And in this program, what I find really interesting that, I needed to have another set of songs, with which I can work. So I went back to Appalachian folksong, or depending on the culture of the people who comes to the container, I always invite them to go from the from class one to go back to their own songs.

Bea Palya 00:41:08  For instance, we have always lullabies in the end of each class of mine, finishing with a lullaby period. So when we do that, I invite them from the first class to write their own lyrics on on the on the melodies, or find a lullaby that they maybe know or they heard as a child, or maybe their mother sang to her. So we work with lullabies and and songs from the culture they are coming from. But also I as I work with the Jewish songs, this is also a big part of the program because then I have three languages, at least Yiddish, Hungarian and English, and many times I also translate Hungarian folk songs to English. Then I got beautiful kind of Irish Irish songs. It is very funny. It sounds like Irish songs because of the pentatonic world and everything, but but the same essential thing is in there. It's a smaller container, usually 10 to 15 people. But then I teach in all over the world like I teach with corporates, also like big companies, organizations.

Bea Palya 00:42:22  Yeah, organizations. And I, I'm also teaching the core exercise this to two leaders because I find that this authentic. Finding my authentic voice as a leader is a big topic, and I find that many of the leaders are, you know, becoming hard and and not so connected when they speak, and then they think that the voice needs to spread power, then they do that. And actually it's not real power. It's then it's draining the energy. So I yeah, I put some path there too.

Abdullah Boulad 00:43:03  What type of issues would they come to do your training.

Bea Palya 00:43:08  So many times it's the the thing is that they are saying I lost myself somewhere. It's not, you know, many times after a life transition like, I don't know, becoming a mother or the other way around, the teenager child is out of the house. so they, they feel like they lost something. And so also with more situationally. They say that many times I cannot say what I say. I have the words inside, but I cannot say them.

Bea Palya 00:43:42  Or I lose my voice with a specific person or a specific type of person. Like I start to cough and being harsh voice when I speak to my male boss or I cannot say what I think to my, I don't know, to my mom. So it's, it's a lot of some of them are like, typically physical voice related. Yes. Like I have I, I, I have vocal cord problems or I'm not a phony either, but but I work with, with, some professionals to, to get some help when there is the case. but many times they can verbalize something physical, something in a physical voice that they don't have, or they feel like they speak like a mouse, although they are like a leader and you know they don't have the power. Or the other way around. They are female leaders and they always sound like a man, you know? And empathy, the part of empathy is missing. So sometimes is that the the physical was. But what's the underlying issues? It's many times the emotional disconnection of the self.

Bea Palya 00:44:56  So many times they are just completely disconnected from their bodies and they are not there. So after all, what I do and what my work voice method does, it's the art of presence how to be in the here and now. So also they are saying many times these are like big like life transformations. They are giving birth or they are divorcing or they are leaving the company. They are the founder of so many, many times it's like. The big changes. And so what? What this finding back. Finding the authentic voice back thus to them is to express from moment to moment what is their inner truth through the physical voice. So the inner voice and the outer voice is deeply intertwined. So we cannot speak about finding my voice if I don't actually speak with my physical voice. So, so many times this, sleeping numb body parts awakened. Many times it goes to the sexual sexuality part. Like many times people find back their sexual aliveness.

Abdullah Boulad 00:46:13  I'm interested in the voice and sexuality part.

Bea Palya 00:46:17  Yeah, many, many people are very.

Abdullah Boulad 00:46:20  So can can the voice can singing a song we can up my sexuality or How? How? How does it happen?

Bea Palya 00:46:31  We have to broaden sexuality first. It's like I'm just coming from Easter pearls. You know, Esther Perry's lecture and she's. She talks about that as eroticism. It's way larger than just intercourse or, you know, narrowing the sexual imagination to that. So also in my world, it's a large world of opening to sensations, to, to the five senses or being open to the other person for deeper attunement or, you know, feeling my own body. So I, I know this curiosity awakened in many, many people I talk with. So there is a video. Maybe this is the favorite of my of my students. It's called ten plus one exercise for connecting voice and sexuality. And so many times it's just, like, we are creating an internal channel in our mind's eye. It's called the stovepipe, which is basically you connect the chakras if you know the chakras or if you are familiar with the Tao, is the microcosmic orbit.

Bea Palya 00:47:42  So either way, you can. Or if you are, you know, here and you are a psychic in psychotherapy, then it's the vagus nerve. So you breathe through that, and then you give a sun by imagining that you have this. You have this open channel in your body in the middle of the your body like an, you know, like, an open stovepipe for free flow of energy, sound, fire, light, whatever you want. So just this little exercise, like, imagine that from the perineum to the top of my head, there is a channel which is open and of course now you connect all these main energy centers and you sound this through a pandemic.

Multiple Speakers 00:48:35  You are.

Bea Palya 00:48:42  Already this exercise gives so much permission and joy to the students to like, open to themselves. And the sexual organs are connected to the heart and to the throat in this exercise. So let's not forget that all these are like one part of one system. And many times when talking about voice and sexuality, they either we are cut from here, down there, or many times I hear what I hear.

Bea Palya 00:49:11  I'm, I'm, I have not in my throat or I have a steel plate in mine. Interesting image, imagery and verb verb. You know words. So this exercise does that. It gives you permission to to connect those parts with the voice. So this is just one layer of it. And then we go further. You can do the flute of bones when you imagine your bones or like flutes and you start to blow in. By leaving a little hole. Actually you can try because it's easy. Like you imagine this is a little flute, and then just you glue in and you try to pass the resonance from this point to here. Can you feel the resonance here?

Abdullah Boulad 00:50:07  Yes.

Bea Palya 00:50:07  And then you can go here and you try to feel the resonance here. Leave a little hole. Whoo!

Multiple Speakers 00:50:20  Ooh!

Bea Palya 00:50:22  Oh, it's so good. I have to cling here. Do you? So with the. With the little. Yeah, yeah. With a little imagination and and work. You you can create new, new neural pathways.

Bea Palya 00:50:33  One more. And if our listeners are open to that try to experiment with that. You blew in. This is one part of the flute. And you try to feel the resonance here on the other side. And then you go next step. You can do that with a partner. If the partner is, you know, consent then you can do this with your lips. It's like the resonance test with a kiss. And then you can do it with other body parts also, not just the bony parts, but the soft part, the sexual organs. So this is a very, very subtile Subtitle work, but sex is nothing. But I would not say work, but like being present in your body and being open to sensations and like. My my five year old Lily was like one time back in time asking mommy, tell me about sex. What's that? What's that thing? She was five and I said, Remembered the film of Nemo did the fish. And when the turtles went to Australia and there were a river within the ocean, you remember? So sexuality is like that.

Bea Palya 00:51:52  Imagine that. Your body from the inside is like an ocean. But there are rivers, currents that they want to go to another ocean's currents and they want to meet. It goes, it flows somewhere. And she was like with her big eyes. And so this is the same thing. You are awakening these, these internal currents and rivers in your ocean so you can feel more, you become more sensitive to to your own touch and maybe to another person's touch, which is like the art of sexual timing. Staying present in your body and paying attention to another body and soul at the same time.

Abdullah Boulad 00:52:34  So it's the the mindful. Be becoming more mindful in what we do. Because when when you are in an interaction, then if the mind is too active, you are not present you it's not the same effect.

Bea Palya 00:52:50  And when you sing and when you give a sound, you are more likely not that heavy had it. It's it's already something physical is connected.

Abdullah Boulad 00:53:02  Yeah. It's probably when we use our breath and and and the voice.

Abdullah Boulad 00:53:08  Yeah. We cannot. It's difficult to use both at the same time. The brain and and.

Bea Palya 00:53:14  It what happens is that we switch on and off. So yeah, I, I have an exercise about fear because it says there are scientific evidence is that you cannot really deeply fear the fear in your body if you if you give a sound. What's happening is that you switch on and off even though you give a sign. And when you breathe in, you think of the future. What if the bear is coming and bite me? So then you go back to fear again. Then you do. so the ways voice is very good for soothing. It's because it takes away the fear part. And if you happen to sing to babies, it's so beautiful because they are like so open that they are changing with the face and everything else receiving. Very much like the resonance. You. You are almost like becoming too careful because you see how much You're affecting this little soul and body with just with resonance.

Bea Palya 00:54:17  So just to give an idea, because you were asking about that part. And of course, it's a very, very, very interesting and important part of my program and my method to awaken sexual, sexual energy with voice, also with songs. So I have typical songs, folk songs or songs I wrote for the womb. So many of the women I work with, they can reconnect to their own organs. Yes. Which are many times kind of feel like cut from the whole body. So it's again, very a beautiful exercise because this song, this particular song is full of, of, of flowers names. And when you imagine a womb it's like lilies and roses and everything. And so I can feel them that they are working with their imagination and also with the touch and then the sound, and they go back to. So, I mean, I can see that from moment to moment there are more, you know, more light in the eyes, more, more loosening in the joints, more connectedness between those energy parts in the body.

Bea Palya 00:55:33  So it's very beautiful to witness.

Abdullah Boulad 00:55:35  Also very nice.

Bea Palya 00:55:37  Yeah. You know, to work with sexuality, we don't have to have sex. So it's not about, you know, it's not a sex cause. But I do find that lips that the voice work is very similar to sexuality, or it can be applied in a very similar way.

Abdullah Boulad 00:55:56  What if someone is traumatized, sexually traumatized, or else? And the connection to the voice. How how is this connected?

Bea Palya 00:56:06  yeah. Many times it's Silencing so many times. They literally cannot say words, certain words, or cannot talk in the presence of certain people. And also many times they are saying that that before they give a sound, they start to verbalize it. I cannot do that. Or I, I'm stuck. And what I do, my job is to first they know that they are the leader of the process. So if at any point it's too much, they they can stop. Yes. However, of course I'm already with them half a year or eight months to the point when we we work with this so we know them.

Bea Palya 00:56:58  They trust me. And so however I mean she she might say stop or but I do feel that if I lead this person very elegantly and very lovingly through this difficult part, she can open up certain things. I'm not saying that it's healing the whole trauma and everything, but many times there appears first, even before they give a sound.

Abdullah Boulad 00:57:34  Yes.

Bea Palya 00:57:34  And when tears appear, I breathe with them. I stay with them. And it's a very big part of my work is just be with them as.

Abdullah Boulad 00:57:44  You see space.

Bea Palya 00:57:45  Give space witnessing. Be with them all the space. And then I invite them, even though they have tears and they might cry. I softly asked them to open the lips and just give a sigh first without sun. And the next one or the next one are a little bit of sound with this open lips. I think the moment the lips can open, it's it's she's winning. Because then there's some things opening also in other body parts. And so because it's connected. So I lead them very, very softly, sometimes through tears, sometimes through shaking still to the landscape of sound.

Bea Palya 00:58:35  So sometimes I have to, sometimes I take, metaphorically speaking, I take a whole lot of your hand and I say, come a little bit further and give, give a sound, keep, keep sounding out. Yeah. And then they have an experience that is safe. If I open myself, no one hurts me so. But of course we before we work a lot with the container. This is number Zero. You know, but in the moment, those those people can open the lips and give a sound. Many times the healing starts to happen because of this channel, which we practice on a regular basis. I just shown you this stovepipe exercise so they know that my sexual organs are, my gosh, my heart, my throat is connected. So in the moment I open something here, I can open up something there. So it's a very, very subtile work. But but I so I saw the transformation. The people without you know, I mean they are doing it and many times it's online.

Bea Palya 00:59:49  So it's, it's but the holding is very strong from the other members of the community as well.

Abdullah Boulad 00:59:57  So they start re relearn expression And and trust. And safe to feel safe.

Bea Palya 01:00:04  Yes. And many times for working with sexuality. We are not even in the we are not in vaginas and we are not in penises. It's not about many times sexualities is is not what happened in your sexual organs or in your you know, it's the whole body. And I find voice is a very gentle yet very efficient tool to open up, you know, numb or hurting places by a traumatic experience. And we know that the trauma is not really what happened to you, but it's the experience in your body when you were left alone with this event and there was not an empathetic with empathic, a witness with empathy. That's what Peter Levine says. So I think it's a very important part of my work to to take off the shame, you know? You know, it's eight months and then in September we are together and it's just happening also.

Bea Palya 01:01:07  You know, the space holding of each other. It's just it's just happening naturally through the songs and through the exercises. Because it's also it's this opening and stovepipe exercise. It's almost, a visual and, muscle memory of my students because we do it every week. Yes. At least once or more. Yeah. So they know that. So there's a set of exercise. Okay. Stovepipe again. Go back to the stovepipe and then she knows what the soap pipe is. And then she breathes again. And then she gives a sound. And then we go to the horse honey apple another sequence of exercise. And then so it's so good that also I like to teach very I improvise a lot and creative. I use my creative power, but there is structure.

Abdullah Boulad 01:01:58  Yes.

Bea Palya 01:01:59  So there is a structure, a set of exercises and some core elements that they know. And we practice it and it becomes a habit a repetition. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. Also in the body. Yes. So yeah.

Bea Palya 01:02:14  Thank you so much for asking these questions because, you never really explained that.

Abdullah Boulad 01:02:18  Of course. yeah, it's, it's very interesting to know it's, also important part of your work. You do.

Bea Palya 01:02:24  And I feel you are very open to that. So it's, Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 01:02:29  You. I mean, talking about trauma. You, How how have you met, government.

Bea Palya 01:02:35  Oh. Is. I would say it's a long term friendship or what we consider long term. It's, almost 15 years. He's Hungarian, I'm Hungarian, and when his first book was translated to Hungarian or it was not. Wasn't the first book, but the first to translate to be translated in Hungarian. I just wrote my first book and we happened to be at the same publisher, and then we met. And Gabor Matei back then wasn't that big. So it was a rainy afternoon. I was very pregnant. And so she was, he was he gave a lecture. He gave a lecture for 40 people, not more than 40, like 40, because no one knew who government is.

Bea Palya 01:03:17  Oh, my. It's it's old times. And then I went there, and I, I knew about, his love of music for music. He's a music collector. And I also knew about his Jewish roots. And I have Jewish, so I made, I just freshly made an album of Sephardic songs. So I gave it to to him. And then he immediately wrote me, where are you and what's this music? I love it so much, and it seems like I was late with the answer. And since ever since the little teasing, you didn't write me back. But then we became friends because we he started to come more to Hungary with his wife and and so we became like friends and also we we we during Covid we pretty much talk online quite a lot. He was writing his book, which is the book which is already published, The Myth of Normal.

Abdullah Boulad 01:04:16  Yes.

Bea Palya 01:04:17  And I was developing my method. And so I was very afraid. Even now I'm, perfecting English. You hear that? But I own my own perfectionism.

Bea Palya 01:04:27  And I'm perfect English. And also, I'm owning my own perfectionism because I'm a someone who came from the world of perfectionism. I have to be perfect and good, and I only say things if I know the whole sentence and it's not true anymore. Partly because he was pushing me push, pretty much pushing me to do what I do. And one time at a zoom he said, stop worrying about your English. Just do what you do. Yeah. Because I think he felt the the potential. He saw me singing many times. One time I, I, I sang a song for a group of people. He was there and then I went somewhere else. When I, you know, when I sing, I mean another secret world of sound.

Abdullah Boulad 01:05:21  Yeah, I can see that.

Bea Palya 01:05:23  He said it too. And then I close. I close my eyes and I opened when I kind of half back, half there, half here. And he said, what's to be in there? What's to being there? Like, what's the how is the other side? So he completely got it.

Bea Palya 01:05:41  And yeah, yeah, we were not that close there yet. But then he got the whole thing and Then we started to, you know, really, you deep talk like. No, like kind of no bullshit talk like no small talk. Just go. Go to the depths of the things. And somehow I started to really trust him. And also he trust me. And which is a great thing because he's, full of people and full of things in his life. But it's really an honor to to know him and to to be able to, you know, to trust him and also to see how he was pretty directly, you know, pushing me towards, like, teaching and and also, you know, Oxford, you know, just, he was asking, hey, can you open for me? Like, can you do your voice work for a couple of minutes? Couple of exercises. Just. And it was a beautiful thing last year. So. Yeah. It's, it's a, it's a very deep thing for me and of course for me.

Bea Palya 01:06:54  Gabba gabba. You know, it's cowboy and and to see how he's dealing with this celebrity thing and to be seen. But it's too much. But then he wants to have privacy. But it's it's a big topic. So I have that as a singer. But honestly I, I'm saying a secret here in Oxford during the conference. I'm very comfortable because I mean, people recognise me of the singing, but not, as, you know, celebrity in Hungary. And it's it's just so good. I don't have to sign, you know, every paper and everything. So it's.

Abdullah Boulad 01:07:29  Yeah, in Hungary when you, when you're, when you're there so people recognize.

Multiple Speakers 01:07:34  Yeah. Yeah, yeah. When you walk around. Yeah yeah yeah okay.

Bea Palya 01:07:36  But it's also shifted because last time in June, July we were walking with Gabor on the street. And I was so happy because usually I am the one who is recognized. isn't. It? Was more him, so I was okay. Meant that I had his on the way.

Bea Palya 01:07:50  Young guys were like, hey, God. And I was so happy. Oh my God. What he does is so meaningful and so important. And also the Hungarian team, does a great job to make this work, you know, spread and and and and known. And I'm just I'm just so grateful I can be his friend.

Abdullah Boulad 01:08:11  I cannot imagine how how this also affects your sense of safety being out there and always recognized.

Bea Palya 01:08:19  Oh, it's a big topic. it's you mentioned before the boundary settings, which is a big topic for me. So about that topic, I what I would put here is that it's, it's a game of how and where to put my boundaries because partly let let us be honest, it's also part of my job because people who come to me, they are not adoring the famous celebrity. Probably they know my song in depth and also to you. When I enter to the room. You said you were listening to my song. So usually people who got to me, they are really deep into my work.

Bea Palya 01:09:03  So it's it's also a reciprocity in the honour. So I, I give them the, the, the signature signature and the photo. But also it happens to me that I'm in a difficult place, in a bad mood. And it happened to me that in an elevator a girl wanted to, you know, jump on me. And I said I was like, you know, almost freezing, like I'm not there. And then and so I developed the kind of, regarding the I don't look at me, you know, like, and I'm, I'm living a pretty introvert life, so I'm not going out so much, partly because I, my children are still young and I just love to be with them. And many times my teaching time zone is in the evening. But besides that, I have my, you know, in Hungary I have my boundary setting, soft techniques. Like sometimes you just I just see my fans are blowing the head and I just do it back. But don't go further.

Bea Palya 01:10:01  When I feel I'm open, I can I can do what they asked. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's a big topic to and and and I always like got like here. Oh sorry I if I didn't recognize you as a speaker. Oh do I have to you know, you know I, I'm just new here you are in another culture. It's okay. You know don't you don't have to feel like. And even in Hungary, if someone doesn't know me, it happens. You don't have to I, I don't, you know, I'm not wearing my coat and I'm not sleeping with in, you know, so it's I can't just take it off and being free. By the way, it was a big thing when I was in my actually, I was just turning 30. I started to travel for the sake of traveling. Before, I was traveling for touring and singing, and I was when I started to travel for the traveling itself, for the joy of seeing the world. That's what I call.

Bea Palya 01:10:56  You know, there's this saying saying you step up to the stage of the world when you, you know, that means the world for you when you perform. Yes. And for me, the big shift was to step out of it because I was I was six when they put me there. I was singing in competitions and dancing when I was eight. So for me, the big thing to step off from the stage and see the world from a different angle, and I see coming back to Garba, I see in in him also that he got that later because he, he always says saying to me like, hey, what? I started to do my work when I was 46. I mean, the work I'm doing now. Yes. And you are much younger, so you have time, so don't rush. Yeah, yeah. So it's it's a big topic for, not just for singers.

Abdullah Boulad 01:11:48  No, no, we see this also a lot with our, our clients. So we, we treat like, very often celebrities, known people in their countries.

Abdullah Boulad 01:11:59  They find release by, by traveling out. Yeah. But I just last week, had had a nice conversation with it. Also well-known celebrity. He could not be anywhere in the world without being recognized. And that's the difficulty.

Bea Palya 01:12:17  That's heavy also, because also it's like a mask. And you want.

Multiple Speakers 01:12:21  Yeah.

Bea Palya 01:12:23  I share something personal just for the for the topic, because it can help to give an angle. Like when I divorced my main three fear were no one wants me. Me, two kids, two young kids. Even if they want me, they see me as the celebrity so they don't see behind the mask. Yeah, I mean, I don't wear a mask, but still, as a as a public figure, I still am a projection surface for people's mind in life. That's how these things work. Always. And and even if I'm not wearing my coat, they see me and they they bring in all these projections that they have about me because they like my work. So I think it's a big topic because more and more and more the word goes push us towards being a public figure and being a celebrity and influencer and sharing everything.

Bea Palya 01:13:23  But at the same time, it's never the, the, the whole, the whole picture. It's never it's never the real me. So my second fear was like, but okay. Do you want me? But do you really see me? Are you willing to be the container of the whole Bible? Who is not always nice? Who is not always singing nicely? Who is not always dressed up like a diva? Or not just a famous teacher? Are you willing to let this all in? Because if. If it's a yes, then let's contain each other.

Abdullah Boulad 01:13:59  Well, that's the difficulty to stay always also authentic and accept each other. That's, that's the burden of, coming with with fame and recognition.

Multiple Speakers 01:14:09  Yeah.

Bea Palya 01:14:10  Very big topic.

Abdullah Boulad 01:14:11  Yeah. It becomes sad because this person I was talking about from last week, he told me. Yeah, I can only go out when it's dark so people don't recognize me. So it's, It's a big burden. It can be a big burden also.

Bea Palya 01:14:29  And it's loneliness.

Abdullah Boulad 01:14:31  Yes. It's loneliness. what? You also said I'm happy to be, in this, in this country because they are more discreet. Yeah, but I don't know anyone. And if I go back to where I live, then I have this overwhelming. Everyone is overwhelming. so also the finding the right balance. So I, I understand when you said before. Yeah. you're afraid partly of, of of the too much. I agree, and I don't I don't want to be there or replace my position with them.

Bea Palya 01:15:09  I think therapy and, the mental health work I I've done in the last 20 years helped me incredibly in this topic as well, like finding a healthy balance between being the famous person and and also being the, the normal, no one or normal someone. And I deeply, if I may say, or it's an invitation for every famous person, because many times fame is like you become, you know, somehow insulated by like, oh, it's beautiful now.

Bea Palya 01:15:50  Then it, you know, then it satisfies something in you, an aspiration for you to be seen. Yeah. But then and I, I might say that because I, I have 40 years in, in what I do as a singer and then in what I do as a teacher, I have a lot of experiences in this field that really the more I share, of course, in different containers, but more I share at least. For example, in my program I share many things about me just for the learning, for the people there. They don't see me as possible bear anymore. And it's so beautiful because it takes a little time. But then my student sees me. Students see me as a mentor. Yeah, yeah, a person who I am and a strong mentor. A very honest one. Very loving one, but very challenging one. Also, I'm not for everyone, but they they see me as a whole, as a more, you know, I show more of my sides there.

Bea Palya 01:16:51  On the other hand, in the media, I'm not playing with my eye. I'm not showing my kids. I'm not showing my partner. I'm not I'm not playing my celebrity cards. And this is also something you have the right to do. There are 1001 ways to be as a famous person in the world. You decide you. You decide how much you give and how much you. There's no one like. Typically, I hear the media wants me more. You say just no.

Abdullah Boulad 01:17:22  Yes.

Bea Palya 01:17:22  Yeah. And it's part of my job. I know, but then I can still play with the idea. How many journalists were like. And how about your partner? How about your children? Can we just. One photo of the child, Josefa? No, it's a simple no. Maybe it's less TV show invitations, but who cares? It's not my true self, you know. So there is a decision to make. And therapy is very helpful in that.

Abdullah Boulad 01:17:48  Thank you for sharing that. you mentioned also language.

Abdullah Boulad 01:17:56  English is not your first language. It's not my first language. I have my experiences changing countries and languages and dealing with this. it affects self-esteem. Obviously. That affects who you are. Are you different persons if you speak in a different language?

Bea Palya 01:18:14  I'm much younger, probably when I speak in English. So it's it's funny because I would not say childish because I, but I know I make false, but I also I use my imperfection. My, you know, my not perfect English to give permission to others to do what they do. Of course, I'm not saying that I don't have to polish my my my English. I am doing it. But it doesn't doesn't give me an obstacle anymore to teach the voice wisdom I have on the other side. And I so many of my Japanese, Chinese, Belgian, Croatian clients to get this courage for me to do what they do. Because I do what I do in the language I know and emotions, though they are going through the voice. So even now I'm changing a little bit of tone just to give an example of what I do.

Bea Palya 01:19:15  So I don't really know what's the what is the next word I'm saying, but I do know how to alter my voice and how I put more colors in my voice. So this is, you know, this is my expertise. And yeah, so in English, I'm much younger. Maybe I seem less mature, although I think the wisdom is there still. And of course, I read much less poetry in English than in Hungarian. It's not just that just it's not just that I read them, but I know them by heart. So in Hungarian literature, you know, as I said, thousands of songs and thousands of poems. So it of course affects my Hungarian speaking. It's rich, it's colorful, it's it's beautiful. It's it's elegant in English. I don't have this yet, but my first, second language was actually French. So I'm a French speaker. And it happened to me that I. Yeah, I got two invitations actually to play in French films as a gypsy character. Okay, 1 in 1 is Tony Gottlieb's Transylvania 20 years ago, and the other one is Django from Etienne Kumar.

Bea Palya 01:20:32  It's a biopic of Django, where I play the wife of Django. And so even moving between cultures gave me a lot of opportunity to develop exercises like one of my main exercises, which is that like opening when we inhale and closing when we exhaling. So I say to my student, and we are not always like, come and see me. We are not always like that. Sometimes we are like that. Leave me alone. And it's totally, completely valid. But then there's the inhalation again. So we do this pumping movement. I do know a couple of times and we are there. But you know how I find this exercise? I was in the first, you know, it was a kind of, trying me out in the shooting situation for Django. And in the very first, rehearsal, there is Cecile de France, the beautiful, great actor, beautiful person. In and out. She's in front of me. And so I have to say my text in French, and oh, I got it.

Bea Palya 01:21:38  I have a good French, but I my heart, really heart beat really went up. I couldn't make it, you know, push it down. And what I did, I started to. Okay, if I'm anxious then let it be. But then are you here that I can. And after I didn't know. 20 to 30 opening and closing I looked better. Okay, then I can say we will. We will. Django. It's just. I don't know what was the exact word anymore, but it was so funny that even these cross-cultural, crazy situations. Hungarian Jeep. Seger playing a gypsy French woman, in French and in Romani language in Paris, in front of Sicily, France. And then one of my main exercises coming from that situation. So it's it's only giving me, more colors, more ideas, more creativity. and I really don't care anymore that much of my own perfect expressions and, and, you know, the missing s of some words or sometimes say I have because I, you know, instead of has or, you know, I don't know what I say, but I do know that I'm present and I'm with you and and what's under its is polished.

Multiple Speakers 01:23:03  Yes.

Bea Palya 01:23:04  Maybe I don't have the language yet. As polished as the material itself, the teaching material or the thoughts. But, you know, each interview gives me, you know, one step closer to my.

Abdullah Boulad 01:23:18  I like that you said. You said twice. Not yet. So this this is also a good mindset. You're you're getting better developing, and, you're doing your best. I think that's the that's what we can do. I mean, my as I said, English is also not my primary language, and I don't feel fully comfortable as I would speak in German, for example, because that's the language I spoke the most. Even though I speak also Arabic and French also some part, and becoming in the last years more to speak Spanish or to learn Spanish. But then, you know, it's kind of trying to transform ourselves into every language is an invitation to become a new person somehow.

Bea Palya 01:24:08  And I feel on your aliveness that it's so beautiful just to touch the subject you become different in your body.

Bea Palya 01:24:14  And it's it's because it's liberating to not to be perfect and just say what I want to say. And just, you know what? I translate body sensations into some words that I find in the moment. It might not be perfect, but the body sensation and the connectedness to the body is definitely there. So like and and it's funny because you're mentioning language I speak. So I've never learned Spanish neither. But I've been to Mexico 19 times. And so after the French I just figured out the, the, the rules of pronunciation. And I started to bargain or like, like speak somehow Spanish. And again, it's another character of me, like even younger, even more, I don't know, hippie, someone who has some, some words in them, you know, so it's it's fun.

Abdullah Boulad 01:25:06  That's something we can, we can say now at our age, possibly that, we. We can accept ourselves with our imperfection.

Multiple Speakers 01:25:14  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 01:25:15  that's something which come through life as well. And, and by, by seeing that that others are also imperfect and also the people we look up to probably as well.

Abdullah Boulad 01:25:28  most of the time, if children look up to people and oh, this is and this is my idol and so on, but we, we, we learn that no one is perfect. And that gives oneself also a sense of, yeah, we can be who we are.

Bea Palya 01:25:45  It's and it's very human also like also coming back to one second to the celebrity. It can be so dehumanizing because they see you as God's and perfect. And we are just not. And and it's so it's a relief. Oh, she's a human too. He's a human too. Yeah. Very much. And it's it's it's very liberating for the other. So I and the biggest one I like Gabor to they are playing with their own breath and imperfection from moment to moment. Like Gabor is the great example of that. He is the one who is just putting his own, you know, errors and and.

Multiple Speakers 01:26:25  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 01:26:25  That's the beauty about him. I think being authentic, showing the world and everyone out there. what still he, with all his knowledge and and and information and knowledge he is giving further to, to other people still have some issues to deal.

Multiple Speakers 01:26:47  With.

Abdullah Boulad 01:26:47  In his life and that's, that's what we are.

Bea Palya 01:26:50  And, and the reason at the first place, we started to teach at least I can say to myself, and it's the first question, what was the motivation is to heal myself? And so I might be a teacher. Yes. Because I teach, I don't know, three times a week at least I have a method. Yes, but I'm not perfect because it's still a process of of the healing. And you know, I needed that medicine. So just think of it like Gabor or Esther. Tell anyone who is in the conference. They themselves needed their own medicine, so they needed to create something. But then there they are, maybe two steps ahead or ten steps ahead, but they still have issues. And I like love the humanity in the in the big ones. And it makes me very, you know, relaxed. Oh my God, he's not perfect.

Multiple Speakers 01:27:43  Oh so good.

Bea Palya 01:27:44  I am not, I'm not. Neither is it.

Abdullah Boulad 01:27:47  You're a singer.

Bea Palya 01:27:48  Yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 01:27:49  Can we hear something from.

Multiple Speakers 01:27:51  Oh, yeah.

Bea Palya 01:27:51  Yeah, yeah. With pleasure. Is there any specific thing you want?

Abdullah Boulad 01:27:57  your favorite song?

Multiple Speakers 01:27:58  Favorite song?

Multiple Speakers 01:28:00  Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh! Oh. Oh! And anthem. Oh, God! Oh, God. God. Meet us for the fire hoses of Basra. I was wrong and I was happy. I go, oh my God damn you! To make sure you mother come of Dhaka Tina to Naga. Demon. Because it's God as is blue. God is a shadow. Naked. Ramla. Tipu. And Jam Lizzie Borden. Muscadet. Borden. Namesake. Tandem. Sukta College. Carbon lock ni. Got its cover, but no country to jam. Let's put any must go to Bertini. Jeux de. La. Oh, the. Nipple. Yeah, well, the night night and the. Day to day are. All about visiting. They. Are visiting for the. Trucks to look to see.

Multiple Speakers 01:31:55  An indica. He touched me. Enough! You see the tree? I.

Abdullah Boulad 01:32:31  Thank you so much for that. That's very powerful. What meaning has it?

Bea Palya 01:32:44  Well, it's one of my. One of my Ars poetica. It's like the main mission. It's about a bird who was put in a cage and was told to get food and golden cage and good wine. And she says, I'm not used to good wine and and good bread and golden cage. All what I do is flying free from branch to branch and singing and making good heart for my sisters and brothers. And so it's it's a very interesting state I became because usually I when I sing that I, you know, I know what I do, but after this deep conversation with me, get you between me and you and people, I feel that we touched so many deep layers of me, which made me beautifully, elegantly vulnerable too, which is good for singing. But then in the end I decide I don't want to contain and and swallow back my tears.

Bea Palya 01:33:44  So I just, I know you see it. I just let it out because it's also part of who I am. And it might be something meaningful to experience for the listeners that when we go deep, we find soft, vulnerable, teary stuff. But that's where the true gold lies.

Multiple Speakers 01:34:11  Yeah, yeah.

Bea Palya 01:34:12  True treasure is.

Multiple Speakers 01:34:13  Hard.

Abdullah Boulad 01:34:14  It does. It does. And you could feel it in your. In your presence. In your voice. it's, it's powerful in a way that's so authentic and and, sensitive at the same time. It, it has the high power intensity, but the softness.

Bea Palya 01:34:38  And, you know, I'm talking to someone who is maybe grown up with Fairuz or with.

Multiple Speakers 01:34:42  Beautiful.

Bea Palya 01:34:43  Songs of the Arab or Arabian culture, which I, you know, I was a fan of. And, and so, so I'm always very moved by open ears and open hearts. So I really like this reciprocity in the singing to that. What I give you can feel and what you feel.

Bea Palya 01:35:05  You give me back somehow. Because I felt the heightened the tension in the room. So it gave me more wings to fly, you know, in the, in the songs. So in the song. So thank you so much for this.

Abdullah Boulad 01:35:17  Thank you for allowing this and, and and allowing us to be part of it. What do you better do in your daily life to stay in balance except singing.

Multiple Speakers 01:35:33  Singing? Yeah.

Bea Palya 01:35:34  Well, I do a lot of movement, so it's like an unshakable, non-negotiable thing I move every day. Can it be yoga? Can it be walking in nature sometimes high intensity training, you know, pom a little dance. I do work with ice cold ice. So I jump in the cold ice. So it's pretty much the most layer you see on me, maybe one leather jacket but that's it. So I just give all my coat.

Multiple Speakers 01:36:04  Yeah I gave all my coats to, to charity.

Bea Palya 01:36:07  Because I don't wear them anymore. So I do that. I go to nature a lot.

Bea Palya 01:36:13  I, I am hearing dancers of my introverts inside me, so I don't go out if I don't want to, and it's very rare that I go. I spent time, I spent time with my girls and with my cats and with my partners. So I'm surrounded with loving, loving relationship. I also do, meditation, breathwork, yoga also, but it's part of the my movement practice, and I just use all the grounding exercises I created for the program. So it was a big moment when I started to use my own exercise on me.

Multiple Speakers 01:36:54  Because sometimes when you innovate and create.

Bea Palya 01:36:56  Something, it takes time until you really see that it works and it works on me. And I like my favorite exercises. I'm Bill and I'm here. Just this exercise that I'm. Which is a statement of me being here and then reminding of the body connection. I do that a lot. I also, you know, treat at least try to treat myself as a queen and my body as a temple. And it's not always perfect as I'm not perfect ever.

Bea Palya 01:37:34  But I, I learned how to take good care of myself, my body and soul and and nurturing it with good food, physically or mentally. So these are the main pillars, but a lot of movement, a lot of lot of connectedness with my loved ones.

Multiple Speakers 01:37:52  Nice. Yeah, yeah.

Abdullah Boulad 01:37:54  What about if you can speak now to everyone in the world? Yeah. What is the one thing you would give them, tell them to do implement in their life.

Bea Palya 01:38:07  As I'm a voice teacher and a singer, I would emphasize the voice, the healing power of the voice in our lives, which is there is this English expression is handy. So it, but it's throughout, it's in your body. You don't need anything for that. So you use your voice for conveying your true, authentic message. And the only way and the only way you can do that is to fully pack your words with emotions. Either you speak or sing. So back fully those words with emotions so people can feel what you are saying, how, how, how you do that.

Bea Palya 01:38:52  You connect to your own emotions from moment to moment. Because if you want to convey joy, you have to feel.

Multiple Speakers 01:38:58  Where joy is.

Bea Palya 01:38:59  And you have to know what to put in your voice to convey joy and how to do that well. To connect, reconnect to your body from moment to moment. So if I might say, just use your voice because it's way more than just saying words to another head. Yes, it's not just, you know, information transfer.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:23  Knowledge.

Bea Palya 01:39:24  No, it's a body to body connection. And we do know that that if someone hears you, this person judges you within two seconds. If this person gives you trust or not. So use your voice in a colorful, open the way, because it does much more to your connection than you think.

Abdullah Boulad 01:39:47  And you can always train under the shower.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:49  Always.

Bea Palya 01:39:50  And in the car.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:52  In the car.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:53  Yes.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:53  Yes, yes.

Abdullah Boulad 01:39:54  Very nice. Thank you so much.

Multiple Speakers 01:39:57  Thank you so.

Abdullah Boulad 01:39:57  Much. It was so beautiful to sit here with you and to feel your presence, your energy, and also, what you have given us today or your life experience and the training you do.

Abdullah Boulad 01:40:12  I appreciate it very much. Thank you for the time you have gifted us today. And, yeah, very much.

Multiple Speakers 01:40:20  Thank you.

Bea Palya 01:40:21  Thank you, and thank you for your ray of attention, which was a very open and and beautiful light. So I could, I could myself we could let myself go. So thank you so much. It was a truly, a joyful, meaningful moment for me.

Multiple Speakers 01:40:37  Thank you, thank you, thank you.