Finding the Voice That Was There All Along
Faith Alpher on The Voice You Forgot You Had
Faith Alpher has worked as an actress, radio personality, stand-up comedian, keynote speaker, and educator. Looking back on those experiences, she sees preparation for the work she does today. “Those were all training grounds,” she says.
Writing The Voice You Forgot You Had, her debut collection of twenty-five spoken-word poems, brought its own challenges. Faith had spent years communicating with audiences, but putting personal experiences on paper required her to slow down and consider what she wanted to share—including the parts of her life that weren’t funny.
Every Stage Was Training
Each kind of stage taught Faith something different. “Comedy taught me timing and how to read a room. Radio taught me how to connect with people I couldn’t even see. Acting taught me how to step into someone else’s story with empathy.”
Today, whether she is speaking to students or professionals, she wants to connect with the people in front of her. “And what I’ve learned is that confidence isn’t about being the loudest person in the room or even having it all figured out,” she says. “It’s about being willing to show up as yourself, share your story honestly, and trust that it matters to someone.”
That willingness has existed alongside self-doubt. Asked whether there had been a season when she minimized or second-guessed her own voice, Faith’s answer was immediate: “Yup, my whole life!”
Waiting for Permission
When Faith considers what prevents people from speaking confidently or showing up as themselves, she keeps coming back to permission. “We want someone to tell us, ‘It’s okay to speak up. What you have to say matters.’”
She believes some of the messages that discourage people begin early: they are told they are too loud, too much, too emotional, or somehow not enough. “So we learned to shrink,” she says. “We started editing ourselves before anyone else even had the chance.”
Faith recalls one such experience in the book. After receiving an F on a seventh-grade writing assignment, she came away believing her teacher had told her she was not a writer. Years later, she chose to put her words and stories on the page anyway: “In my own voice. My way,” she writes of that decision.
Her mother, Rev. Lucy G. Rodman, encouraged her. Faith’s biography in the book describes Lucy as her best friend and biggest believer, whose words included “Use your voice. Keep looking up.”
Faith honors her mother in the opening dedication, “For Mommy, I did it! I miss you every day.” She also writes about losing her in “In the Room,” a poem about saying goodbye. Her mother’s encouragement and her grief have a place in the collection alongside poems about identity, self-doubt, and hope.
The Parts That Weren’t Funny
Humor is woven through Faith’s work and personality, but when asked what she wishes people would ask her about the book, she points to “the parts that weren’t funny.”
She names “I Am Enough” and “Divine Disruption” as two of the pieces that took the longest to write. “Putting it on paper was challenging,” she says, “and honestly the most healing part of the whole process.”
Another particularly personal poem is “Late Bloomer.” Faith has heard that description throughout her life. Rather than fight it, she says, “I decided to lean into it.”
The collection continued developing late in the process. “Healing Hope” was a last-minute addition, joining poems such as “Hot Mess” and “Perfectly Imperfect.”
Faith describes her voice as “raw and very honest.” She wrote with both the person struggling to find the words and the person who has survived something and is ready to share the experience in mind. Her hope is that readers recognize that it is okay to be “perfectly imperfect.”
Knowing When to Speak
For Faith, using your voice also involves judgment. She questions the familiar advice to “use it or lose it.”
“I believe you have to use wisdom when it comes to speaking,” she says. “Sometimes you speak and other times you’re quiet. Same voice.”
When it is time to speak, fear may still be present. “Confidence isn’t the absence of fear,” she says. “It’s deciding your voice is worth using even when your knees are shaking.”
If readers remember one thing after finishing The Voice You Forgot You Had, Faith knows what she wants it to be: “You don’t need permission to use your voice. Start where you are.”
The Voice You Forgot You Had by Faith Alpher is published by Abundance Books and available wherever books are sold.
The Voice You Forgot You Had
The Voice You Forgot You Had: 25 Spoken Words from a Woman who Found Hers
by Faith Alpher
