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RELEASED FEB 21, 2013
 
 
AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD 

  

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 music and lyrics by Kara Johnstad

 

 

Silence is a journey, is a hymn.
Soulful and passionate. 
It captures the pure essence of faith, hope and love.

This song gives us strength to continue through the darkest nights. 

Faith is a powerful prayer.
 

 

On the journey called life we experience trials we must master; burdens we must carry. Silence is a Journey, is a hymn. Soulful, it is the pure essence of faith, hope and love, If you have ever felt like you did not have the strength to continue, this song will uplift and inspire you to stay true to purpose and resolute that we awaken to the truth sometimes in the darkest of hours.   

  

Silence Is The Journey is the 12th. and last single in this years Naked Thoughts Album series.
a very special unplugged album of singer-songwriter Kara Johnstad's most intimate originals, capturing rare moments of Kara with Mr. Steinway, unplugged and pure.
 
All of it songs arose out of deep silence, and deep need to voice truth and a longing to share.

  

 

 

A powerful voice of unbridled passion and purity. 

Truly, poetry has never sounded so good.  

 

 

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... and while there, please leave me a comment.


"Truly, Poetry Has Never Sounded So Good." In spring 2012, Kara began releasing one new single of the album NAKED THOUGHTS each and every month through her Voice Your Essence™ eZine and live stream concerts, and available for download at all major music portals.  

 

 With more than 100 songs written, all of which she has produced and published under her own indie label, Kara Johnstad is an acclaimed artist with "... something of a female Leonard Cohen song writing sensibility with a bit of Renee Fleming mixed in, who is truly hard to categorize," as music critique Paul Wolfle best describes her unique signature sound.

 

"The voice of Kara Johnstad is truly outstanding. Whether soaring and exploring beyond the imagination or whispering gently as an angel, her lifelong training and love for her art are obvious".Jazzdimensions    

I welcome you to my Naked Thoughts Album series.

 

www.karajohnstad.com




February 21, 2013
 
Greetings!  
Kara Johnstad singing
Kara performing her latest song
"Silence Is A Journey" - click image & listen
 
So this week we are finalizing the Naked Thoughts Album release series where I have brought out one song each and every month. 12 songs that have wanted to be shared. 

With these songs I've taken a new direction as a songwriter, which is to return to the piano in concert. 
In my recent concert in Rome I saw that this works. 
 
I enjoy having musicians with me on stage and it is powerful to stand out front with pulsating rhythms backing me, and yet there is another quality I enjoy immensely. The quality of meeting you stripped down and pure. Sharing with you how I write and how my breath moves when I speak and share stories. 

This intimacy is rare to find in the entertainment biz and I am seeking it as a no-nonsense mystic and singing poet. So, how appropriate it is to end the year with a song that is close to my heart:

Silence Is The Journey

is a hymn. Soulful and passionate, it captures the pure essence of faith, hope and love, It gives strength to continue through the darkest nights. Faith is a powerful prayer.
 

click & listen to podcast

ENJOY TODAY'S FEATURE ARTICLE
 
SILENCE IS THE JOURNEY
A WRITER'S GLIMPSE BEHIND THE SONG
  
 

 

 


Stay Gold, 
Kara 
The 
Voice Your Essence™ Community
is growing every day and reaches around the globe.
 
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SILENCE IS THE JOURNEY
A WRITER'S GLIMPSE BEHIND THE SONG

 

Written by Kara Johnstad

 

 
Sipping poems and leaning into prayers.
Silence is the journey.
I travel it for miles. 
I am lucky. I have taught it how to sing.

In the beginning it was simply hard to grasp. At times jagged and rough. At times calming and dense. At times vast, and stretched so far into infinity that I myself thought I would lose the ability to stay with it. It was so deep that our connection might just snap. Like the twig I stepped on while walking through the forest that one freezing day. It broke in two. Snap.

The silence was icy cold that morning. Sharp. It had an edge. No snowfall to soften its edges. It was hard to penetrate.

The buddhist masters speak of silence as the ultimate place to reside in. Or have I misunderstood? Everything seems to move towards an idea that silence is holier than sound.

I sit in the back pew of the church, hard cold stone under my feet, and we have to be quiet and reverend.

I sit at school and we are suppose to be attentive and listening.

I sit in yoga class and I know if I giggle too much, the class could go off kilter. And yet I admit, there are times when I want to connect a deep stretch with a deep yawn and connect it to a deep tone.



I keep the deep long growls and sweet tones on the exhalation for my private yoga practice.Why, I ponder?

We live in a noisy world, full of radio and tv and many stories, and yet we are lonely.
Even in concert I long for the silence of an audience that is in deep listening. The deeper the silence the deeper I can open my throat. If they are listening, I know I am strangely protected. If they are noisy, I must not sing my deepest self.

Oliver Herford says  "A man is known by the silence he keeps." and yet is this good?

It is probably one of the half truths we have been fed as a kid.

Think before you speak. Don't gossip. Saying nothing is better than saying something that will hurt someone. Don't take up too much space. Think before you speak. Be respectful. Quiet. Silence is a virtue.

Yet, I never heard that creativity is a virtue.

And although it is wise not to chatter away and throw too much energy out without an awareness of what we are putting into this world, at the same time, we become stuck inside if we do not understand that silence is meant to be voiced. It is like a mountain.

We start from silence, we listen, we climb, we voice our deepest truths and then when they have been able to be materialized and manifested onto the earthly plane, we are emptied and pure and slip back into divine silence.

Only this time, the silence is not intimidating, this time the silence is golden. We can shape it. Move it to take any form we wish. It rides on the winds.  

O.K. Silence is groovy, but I will say it; and say it straight like an arrow: Many people hide behind silence. They are undercover. They actually think and feel things, that they do not dare to speak. They are chicken and the world is not a better place for it. The world is not more peaceful and meditative because we hold our tongues and keep hidden our deepest longings.

To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.
Abraham Lincoln

The world longs for the Martine Luther Kings and Maya Angelous, Nelson Mandelas and Helen Kellers, Billie Holidays, Janis Ians and Bobby Dylans.

Yes, enlightened masters have problems explaining the divine and putting it into words, so we gather in circles and darshans  and sit in quiet spaces sipping the divine.

Musicians do not have problems with silence. 
Voice Your Essence Podcast by Kara Johnstad
CLICK IMAGE & LISTEN TO PODCAST
Musicians understand the sound of silence. 

And they take the step needed to give silence a sound. True words can not always express the sweetness and dept. Sometimes it takes the high climb of a violin or the tap tap tapping of the djembe.

Painters paint on canvas. Writers write on paper. Singers sing on silence. With Silence. Through the silence. It is our backdrop. Between every tone, we have silence staring at us, just like the writer has the stark contrast of white paper.

Silence is a great source of strength.
Lao Tzu



We have to make friends with silence.. It can take us into the deepest forests. It can take us into musty smells and moldy rooms. It can take us into lost stars and creepy basements, and it can take us inside an owl feather or a river's babble or a lover's sweet scent of amber. It can take us into the center of bliss until we explode.

I know silence, like I know my crooked pinky. 
I can sit with it for hours.

I have lassoed silence and learned to ride it. To tame it. To use it. I have learned how to shape it and give it form and release it back to source. I know the winds.

Silence is the journey
Where my heart it travels great distances
Dark Landscapes uninhabited
I have no companion
To give this heart a glow
Just sometimes in the calm and holy night
I feel the pulse of God
Beating in my breast.

Lyrics by Kara Johnstad
 
The moment when the pulse of GOD rises into my breast and breaks free to take wing, this is the moment when the dark landscapes become lit, and faith and hope join in the merry dance.

Silence Is The Journey is the last single in this years Naked Thoughts Album series. 

We started with The Awakening and moved through so many deep emotions, from Wild Garden to Heal Me Hold Me, from Searching for An Angel to Blame Game. All of these poems and songs arose out of deep silence and the deep need to voice truth and a longing to share. To close the series we return from where we came.

We enter this world alone and we leave it alone. Blessed are we when we meet fellow travelers that can sense the deep oneness behind it all. The deep oneness I feel when silence sings, and songs descend and my voice lifts.

Stay Gold, 
Kara  

  

 

P.S. Share your own story, and feel free to join the Voice Your Essence™ Community over on Facebook: www.facebook.com/voiceyouressence. I'm really excited to hear what you have to say.
 
Thank you, as always, for tuning in, reading and contributing.

 

 

  

Voice Your Essence Podcast by Kara Johnstad
CLICK IMAGE & LISTEN
 
WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEBSITE?
Please do! Just be sure to include this complete blurb with it.
 
Kara Johnstad is a creative visionary, transformational catalyst and a powerful voice in the time and age of transition. She is a singer / songwriter, founder of the Voice Your Essence Community  and creator of the Voice Your Essence™  and Voice Your Biz™ Programs.  If you are ready to take your voice and your world to the next level, you can sign up for a F.R.E.E. subscription of her weekly eZine, at www.karajohnstad.com     
 
 

  

  

  

Image: "Beautiful Yoga Girl At Sunrise On The Beach" by samuiblue / freedigitalphotos.net 

Image: "Woman Doing Yoga On Rock" by adamr / freedigitalphotos.net 


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Me and my team are working as independent artists and visionaries... We believe in the freedom of artists to create at their highest level possible. We are not backed by the corporate world nor do we have big monies behind us ... We belong to the crazy ones, creating orchestra music in a time of reality t.v. shows... 

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Kara   

 

www.karajohnstad.com


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