self expression caught in my throat

This winter I spent a bit of time with an eccentric older guy who I told that I was having a hard time getting into the groove of some musical/theatrical presentations. He took me through a 15 minute exercise to find out what was blocking me, asking me to start with the most recent memory I could pull up where I had a similar feeling as when I was blocked with the presentations I was giving now. From that he asked me for an earlier memory, and then an earlier, and so on until I couldn't think back any further. Some of the memories that leapt to mind didn't really have the same feeling associated with them, but he said to never mind that and just throw out whatever came up.

I can't recall now the examples I brought up, but there were about 4 or 5 of them, and for the most part they didn't involve performing, but rather feeling like I was shut-down or criticized when I said or asked something. As I shared with him the examples from childhood - some of the few memories I still harbour from my pre-school years - I became emotional; my eyes welled up with tears and a painful lump formed in my throat that I couldn't swallow away. While I was overcome by this emotion, and surprised at how powerfully and quickly it had come up, I was also very conscious of the people at the tables around us, and felt self-conscious about sitting with this man and crying. But I thought that what we were doing was important and I began to consciously ignore the other people in the room.

My friend told me that it seemed clear that I had a block with my personal expression, and asked me if I was feeling pain anywhere. I nodded and croaked that my throat hurt; he nodded back and asked if it was alright if he made an attempt to release the block. I didn't think I had much to lose at this point, so I said okay, and he held his hands up about a foot away from me as though he were warming his hands in front of a fire emanating from my throat. I had to re-focus on ignoring the people around us at this point and tried to focus on my throat and his hands and imagining the painful lump melting away. I honestly don't remember if it did, but we soon finished our meal and went our separate ways, with me thinking that perhaps I should pursue some way of addressing my block with personal expression.

The pain in the throat returned to me tonight as I cycled home from the bar in tears. I wanted to call out to the night to fill the empty space with my voice, my frustration, my passion. But my voice stuck in my throat and the tiny sound that I made just pushed me further into despair. I left a group of my friends playing music, all of them concerned about how distant I have been from the group and the music since I got back into town.

I don't know if I fully understand myself why I have distanced myself from the group, but watching them play tonight I just felt like I wasn't a part of it in any creative way, but was just the girlfriend of the lead singer who comes out to rehearsals and has a nice voice but kind of floats in the background most of the time. So what? So I don't actually know much of the kind of music they play and without playing an instrument I am kind of lost when we're doing a song that I don't know how to sing, or that someone else is singing. So what? So whenever they make a point of playing something that I sing I feel like they are just doing it to make me happy and it never quite fits with the mood of the night and I hate to think that they're just humouring me.

I have been explaining it to myself as just a case of not feeling like that venue is where I can get my musical self-expression, and need to spend my music time playing the piano and playing/writing my own songs, which I have neglected seriously over the past three years. But that doesn't explain why I can't get down with the guys every now and then doing something other than my own stuff. They have given me plenty of opportunities to suggest songs that I would like, and I just shrug it off and suggest they play one of the songs they have been practicing together. Lame lame lame.

One of the things that I hated the most about this evening was when I got up to say that I was leaving and give my quick good-byes, and even though I was on the verge of tears with my boyfriend urging me to sing something before I left and me resisting fiercly, I had this smile practically frozen on my face. The guys knew something was up and were asking me if everything was alright, but all I could do was smile my stupid fake smile and say that it was fine and I hoped they had a good rest of the night.

So, I don't know exactly what's going on, but there's some serious block in my self-expression alright, when I can't wipe a fake smile off my face, or even vent my frustration to the night.