When the story pauses, then what?

I lost my voice months ago. It hasn’t fully come back

Author

Stephen Stanberry
June 8th, 2025

Hey friend! Yesterday I took a blanket and laid under the ackee tree in our backyard.
No journal. No plan.

Just grass under me.
Sky above me. Birds chirping and a few lizards doing their thing.
And the quiet in between.

If I’m honest, I wasn’t resting.
I was avoiding.

Because lately, I’ve been living in the “what if.”

friend, a few months ago, I lost my voice.
Literally.

It started as a sore throat.
But it never fully came back.

Now, if I speak too long, my voice breaks.
Cuts out mid-sentence.
Sometimes I sound like a frog.
Other times—like we say in Jamaica—”like when dem sand dawg” (meaning sand was thrown in the dog’s throat).

It’s unpredictable. And it’s messing with me.

I paused the podcast.
Avoided video.
I still write daily. Still ghostwrite. Still show up here.

But let’s be real
when your whole life revolves around helping others express themselves...
and you suddenly can’t speak for more than a few minutes...

You start asking different questions.

This is the spiral no one sees
❝

I’m a storyteller without a voice right now. And the silence is teaching me more than I expected.

→ What if this is permanent?
→ What if I’ve built a brand on something I can’t sustain?
→ What if I’m losing the one thing that made me valuable?

It creeps in quietly.
Not dramatic. Just… constant.

You cancel more calls.
Speak less during meetings.
Say “I’m good” when you’re not.

But here’s the shift I’m practicing

Instead of spiraling deeper, I ask better questions:

→ What if my story isn’t broken—just paused?
→ What if this silence is teaching me how to listen better?
→ What if my voice isn’t gone… it’s just finding a new form?

These don’t fix the fear.
But they help me stay grounded.

And they remind me of something I teach my clients every day:

Your story doesn’t disappear just because you go quiet.
Sometimes, it gets clearer.

If you’re in a quiet season, too—read this twice

You don’t need the perfect hook.
You don’t need a bigger audience.
You don’t even need to be “on.”

You just need to be honest.

Because the stories that matter most
aren’t always the loudest ones.

That’s all for today.
See you tomorrow.

Cheers,

Stephen

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