Sandra Joseph ______

The Voice of the Heart

When eight-year-old Sandra Joseph saw told myself that going forward, no matter how the limp Christmas stocking dangling by the afraid I felt, I was going to show up and figure out fireplace, she thought Santa Claus hadn’t come. a way to do this thing that I love.” But when she reached her hand inside and drew From that moment on, Sandra moved out a ticket to the musical Annie, her heart filled differently through moments of fear, focusing with the kind of happiness that takes a lifetime to instead on the love that propelled her. And in that fully grasp. The show was in February, and she commitment, she found a courage that carried her eagerly crossed off the passing days on her farther than she ever thought she’d go—from the calendar in magic marker. And on the night of the bottom half of a small duplex in Detroit to New performance, as she listened to the voice of the York City, and from performing only for the orphan ring pure and brave through the theater, stuffed animals on her bed to being the longest- Sandra heard another voice—the running leading lady in the voice of her heart. “I knew longest-running Broadway show immediately that that’s what I of all time, The Phantom of the wanted to do,” she remembers Opera. Now a keynote speaker today. “I wanted to be up there inspiring audience after audience acting and singing just like that to listen to the voice of the heart little girl.” when making the age-old choice But Sandra was a shy, between love and fear, she knows insecure child who feared the she would not be here today had spotlight. She felt the inner she not made that promise to conflict of her introverted nature herself at ten years old. “There wrestling with her dream, and are still so many times where I’m believed she’d never be able to go given opportunities that feel too on stage. She felt a glimmer of big for me,” she acknowledges. hope, however, when her fifth grade music teacher “Even though I’m afraid, I say yes every time. If I held private tryouts for a solo during the school’s show up and give it my all, it’s a success no matter Christmas concert. “Mrs. Maters was a sweet what happens out there.” teacher who had a way of making everyone feel But the key to true success, as she defined safe,” Sandra recounts. “I sang in front of her, and it, was figuring out how to bring along her own she gave me the solo.” authentic presence in those moments of courage But on the night of the concert, peaking and showing up. The Tibetan phrase for authentic inside the gym doors and seeing the big crowd, presence is ‘wangthang,’ which literally translates Sandra panicked. She told Mrs. Maters she to ‘field of power.’ “You can access your field of couldn’t do it, begging her to give the part to power through listening to the voice of your someone else. The teacher complied, but as Sandra heart,” she says. “But it took a long time—and a lot stood in the risers watching a classmate sing the of encouragement from my dad—for me to let solo she had practiced over and over in her myself really listen to what mine was saying.” bedroom, a profound sense of regret washed over Sandra was born and raised in Detroit, her. “It was a defining moment for me,” she says. where her father managed a car dealership and her “At the age of ten, I understood that when you mother took care of the home. He loved being quit before you try, you have to live with that around Sandra and her older sister, Monica, and regret and feeling of failure—all the things I was would do whatever he could to make them laugh. afraid I might feel if I got out there and blew it. I He performed magic tricks to entertain the

Sandra Joseph

neighborhood kids, and on evenings after the rest because she could hit the high note with such of the family had gone to bed, he and Sandra gusto. More importantly, he loved when her cast would stay up late having heart-to-hearts. “We’d mates, director, or crew would come up to tell him be watching a movie, and he’d turn off the TV and what a lovely person she was to work with. “He ask me what was going on in my life,” she was so incredibly supportive and encouraging, remembers. “He wouldn’t settle for ‘nothing wanting me to do whatever it was that made me much.’ He was genuinely interested, and that’s all happy,” Sandra reflects. “But he always made it a kid wants, right? It was so incredible to have clear to me that what mattered most was the kind parents that saw the best in me and loved me no of human being I was. From an early age, he matter what, even if I failed. He was my hero.” instilled in me that making your contribution to Growing up in the bottom half of a small the world is not only about what you do, but about two-bedroom duplex, Sandra and Monica shared a how you do it—what kind of person you are.” double bed when they were little. “We fought like In thinking what kind of person she all siblings do when we were kids, but my sister is wanted to be, it was important to Sandra to be able my soulmate,” Sandra says. “She is all heart – just to support herself in life, and she was eager to get an immensely loving person. Of my peers, she had her feet wet in the working world. She got a job as the biggest influence on me growing up, by far.” a receptionist at a hair salon when she was fifteen, Their father came from an incredibly large balancing her work obligations with school and Lebanese family, and over a hundred of their theater rehearsals. “I’m forever grateful to my relatives lived in the Detroit area, so Sandra grew mom, who taught my sister and me the up feeling surrounded by a loving tribe. importance of balance. There’s so much emphasis Sandra’s father loved theater and was an in our culture on working hard that we sometimes actor himself before the girls were born, forget the importance of laughing, having a good performing in local plays around Detroit until time, and just enjoying life. My mom is one of the fatherhood claimed his free time. At home, he most quick-witted, naturally funny people you’ll would point out movie scenes to his young ever meet. She brings the fun wherever she goes,” daughters, making sure they recognized especially Sandra reflects. “ poignant expressions in the eyes of Paul Newman Going to college out of state was not an or Marlon Brando. He would play Frank Sinatra option financially, so Sandra decided to attend and Nat King Cole albums in the basement, Michigan State University for the plethora of teaching them an appreciation for the crooners. options it afforded. At seventeen, she was too But he never pushed his daughters to perform— afraid to dare allow herself to consider performing rather, it was an innate love that drove each to the as a career, but she had no idea what else to stage. pursue. She considered hotel and restaurant The Josephs moved to a home in the management but opted to major in suburbs when Sandra was in fifth grade. She lost communications, all the while taking voice lessons three of her four grandparents through her middle with a talented professor, Meredith Zara, who had school years, marking a particularly trying time for spent two decades traveling Europe as an opera the family. In high school, Monica started singing star. “As I started learning what my instrument and doing shows, and when she landed her first could do, my confidence grew,” she says. “I lead in a musical, she told Sandra they’d let her started realizing maybe I had something I could into the chorus without auditioning if she just use. But I certainly wasn’t thinking I’d move to showed up after school. It was Sandra’s very first New York and become a Broadway star. That was musical. nowhere in my reality. I took it one day and one When Sandra was sixteen, her school challenge at a time, seeing how far it could take announced that the musical that year would be me.” Annie, so she started voice lessons with a mother in After college, Sandra moved to the mecca the neighborhood who had a background in opera. of musical theatre, New York City. She knew the Sandra landed her first leading role, a full-circle odds of making it as a singer were despairingly moment that would have made her eight-year-old miniscule, but her father encouraged her to go to self glow. Her success made her father glow as the Big Apple with a time limit. “He told me to well, but not only because her acting was stellar or give it five years and see what happened,” she

Profiles in Success: Inspiration from Executive Leaders in the Washington D.C. Area

says. “If it didn’t work out, I could always come dismiss eighteen of us based solely on how we home, but at least I would have given it my best looked,” she remembers. “So you might wait in shot.” With his voice in her head, Sandra line all day and then get sent home without ever auditioned like crazy in NYC and eventually having a chance to act or sing. It was brutal.” landed a European tour, where she spent a year Sandra was four years into her five-year overseas performing snippets of various musicals. plan when her agent got her an appointment to “It was decidedly unglamorous because we audition for the role of Christine in the Broadway sometimes spent eight hours a day on a bus, production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s megahit, traveling from city to city performing in the The Phantom of the Opera. She was terrified. After evenings,” she says. “But it was thrilling to be her first audition in a small studio for several earning a living as a performer.” supervisors, she was called back to sing on a When the tour ended and she arrived back Broadway stage for famed director Hal Prince, in the states, she stopped home in Michigan. While whom she describes as “the Steven Spielberg of there, her life was turned upside down when a Broadway.” “By that point I was completely broke disgruntled customer shot and killed a salesman at and living on my friend’s sofa, scraping by on a her father’s car dealership, and then came after her bagel in the morning and a plain slice of pizza at dad. Her father took two bullets and almost died, night for $3 a day,” she recounts. “Then suddenly though he made it through. “That was a huge there I was, beneath that giant chandelier, standing wake-up call for all of us,” she remembers. “He before this legendary director. I was so had had heart problems since I was fourteen, so overwhelmed that I was a total deer-in-the- this anxiety and fear of losing my dad—my person headlights. I was staying true to my commitment in the world—was always present. It contributed to show up, but my fear came in the back door and to the constant awareness I have of limited time.” I got in my own way.” Sandra stayed in Michigan for a while Sandra sang the song and hit the high note after the shooting until her father healed. Her next at the end, but her audition was not strong enough job was singing and dancing on a cruise ship for to land her a leading role on Broadway. She did, six months. With the money she made, she however, garner a part in the show – a chorus role returned to New York and auditioned until she ran on the national tour where she portrayed a out of funds again. She spent another six months mannequin and understudied Christine. “That was performing on a different cruise ship, and then the start,” she says. “Even though I was literally came back to New York to continue the vicious playing a dummy, it was so exciting to finally be a cycle. Competition for waitressing jobs was fierce, working professional actor with a consistent job. I so she worked whatever temp jobs she could find. had a contract doing eight shows a week, traveling She still remembers the time her father sent a all over the country and actually earning a living! check pretending to pay her back for a $5.00 loan, It was thrilling.” and included a note that said “Whoops!” because After a year in the ensemble, the woman he “forgot” the period and wrote it out for $500. playing Christine on the national tour left for “He didn’t have much to spare, but he knew I was another production, and Sandra was flown to New struggling,” she smiles. York to audition—her second time on the stage of All the while, Sandra withstood the the Majestic Theater. “I wanted it to be perfect,” grueling lifestyle of auditioning, which began with she recalls. “I preplanned everything and did the circling the auditions she might be a good match staged choreography Christine does while she for in each week’s edition of the industry sings ‘Think of Me,’ including waving a scarf. I newspaper, Backstage. Some mornings, she would wanted to show them that I could be expressive rise at 4:00 AM, warm up her voice and body, put and graceful, but as I was performing, I very on her best audition dress, fuss over her hair and quickly sensed that I was over-acting and trying makeup, take the subway to Midtown, and wait in way too hard.” line for hours amongst hundreds of other girls When her agent called the next day to tell who looked a lot like her. When the doors finally her she didn’t get the part, Sandra was crushed. opened, she was lucky if she got the chance to sing She felt she had blown her big chance for the last sixteen bars of music. “Sometimes they’d bring in time, and depression set in. She cursed herself for twenty girls at a time, line everyone up, and then getting in her own way and felt she would never

Sandra Joseph

get another chance. “That was a really tough herself, living in the moment, and singing from the period of beating myself up and hating myself,” heart. “I focused on being authentic, because she says. “I knew better. I knew the most whether or not I got the part was not up to me,” important thing was being believable and honest, she said. “If it wasn’t meant to be, then I wanted to but I got in my own way again—this time by be happy for the person who was meant to get it. I trying to control every moment.” did my best to stay in the space of gratitude. The Her father’s voice on the phone was the greatest gift in life had already been given to me: I only comfort. “Think of how far you’ve come!” he had people in my life that loved me no matter the said. “Remember just a year ago when you were outcome. I sang the song from my heart, trying to living on your friend’s sofa and working in the stay present every moment because I might never mailroom at the Bank of Tokyo?” His words get another chance to sing on a Broadway stage. I helped shift her perspective, reminding her that was able to touch into that flow place, to access there was still so much to be grateful for. “I’ve that field of power.” Simple, authentic presence always been a big believer in the power of allowed the director and supervisors to connect gratitude to shift your perception of things, so I with Sandra. Trust and honesty were the keys that started writing down everything I had to be brought about her best performance. “They called thankful for,” she explains. “I needed to get out of me the following day and said, ‘Congratulations! that mentality of lack and back into a space of You got the part,’” Sandra says. being grateful.” She played Christine on the national tour Sandra wrote thank you notes to people through 1996 and 1997, and will never forget when who had supported her in the Phantom world, they brought on a new Phantom that year. The including the assistant director, a woman who had tour was at the Kennedy Center when Ron Bohmer put in a good word for her with Hal Prince and joined the cast, and the sparks between Sandra and helped prepare her for the audition. Sandra felt she Ron were immediate. They only performed had let her down, so the note expressed her together for a total of four months, but they gratitude for all the help and support. “If this is as successfully maneuvered the chaotic lifestyle of far as I ever get,” Sandra wrote, “I’ve already seen show business and married in 2002. enough dreams come true to last a lifetime.” She Sandra was moved from the national tour knew how fortunate she was to be making a living to Broadway in 1998, where she poured her heart doing something she loved, and she had to let go into 1,300 performances over the next eight years of the disappointment. “I don’t know how it and came to understand stamina in a new way. works, but I really believe there is enormous “Grateful as I was to play the part, at some point power in gratitude and surrender,” she remarks. the dream becomes a job and you have to crank “Shortly after that, my agent called to let me know out the same songs and the same scenes night after they still hadn’t found a new Christine, and they night,” she says. “I had done well over a thousand wanted to bring me back to give me one more shows when I confided in an actor friend that I chance.” was really struggling, and that there were nights I Lit with new hope, Sandra wrote a letter to didn’t know if I could go on. He told me to meet Hal Prince, the words pouring directly from her him for coffee the following week.” heart. She described how she had gotten in her Sitting across from him in the coffee shop, own way before, but she really wanted the part, he handed Sandra the item that would become one and would work harder than she had ever worked of her most prized possessions—a purple box with to give the best performance, night after night. “I the word perspective stenciled on the top. Inside think it’s powerful to let people know that you were clippings he had unearthed from scouring want something and you’re willing to do the work the internet for stories from people all over the to excel at it,” she says. world who had been impacted by Phantom. The Heeding the advice of the supervisors, she stories recounted how families had saved up for a stopped trying so hard to get results and be what year to take their children, or how people had gone she thought they wanted her to be. Instead of the with a parent and created a memory that lasted a flowery dress she had worn at the last audition, lifetime despite that parent’s passing. Some she wore her typical outfit of a black sweater and mentioned Sandra by name, highlighting how her pants. She concentrated on showing up, being performance had moved them. “When we’ve been

Profiles in Success: Inspiration from Executive Leaders in the Washington D.C. Area

at it for a while and we’re deep in the day-to-day, life. “I had to ask myself, who am I beyond this it can be easy to forget why we’re doing it in the voice?” she remembers. “Who am I beyond the first place,” she recognizes. “I found my voice I sing with and speak with? Can I identify motivation in remembering that personal more with my inner voice—the voice of my soul? connection. I kept that box in my dressing room, That was huge for me.” and when I went out on stage, it was no longer a Surprisingly, Sandra felt no urgency to thousand strangers out there in the dark. It was record an album or speak into microphones. She that one person whose heart might be touched in a wasn’t concerned with the voice that had filled lasting way.” every corner of the Majestic Theater for a full As Sandra prepared to leave Phantom after decade; she was concerned with the voice of her ten years of being Christine, she knew she was heart. “I had heard wonderful, iconic women talk done with the world of Broadway. She considered about how, as you get older, you become more how she might use her voice in a new way, open to comfortable in your own skin,” she says. “You anything. She decided to take a retreat weekend accept and love yourself more. And as I away, and just a few hours in the peaceful, contemplated my own mortality and meditative space was enough to trigger the kind of impermanence, I wanted more than anything to mental download that changes lives. “As I lay inhabit that older, wiser, more self-accepting down to sleep that first night, my head hit the version of myself that I imagined I would get to in pillow, and I had a vision like I was watching a my elder years. I saw how important it was for me movie in my mind,” she recounts. “I saw myself to start living that way now, because what if I speaking and singing on stage, but for the first never get those years? They’re not a given for any time I wasn’t wearing a costume, and I wasn’t part of us, and if I didn’t get the privilege of a long life, of a show. It was a level of vulnerability I hadn’t I didn’t want to waste any more time beating faced before. It’s one thing to have a character and myself up for not being this idealized version of a script to hide behind, but to get out there by myself I thought I was supposed to be.” myself and as myself was a terrifying idea.” Thankfully, incredibly, the tumor was not Just as performing and singing in front of life threatening, and Sandra did not need people had frightened her as a child, Sandra saw radiation. But she was forever changed for the keynote speaking as a new challenge that could better for it, and she resolved to use the voice of lead to unparalleled levels of fulfillment and her heart to help others connect to theirs. Her first impact if she could find the inner strength to do it. speaking invitation came from her former high She imagined she would speak to high school school choir teacher, who had opened a charter students who wanted to pursue a future in the arts school for performing arts. To prepare, she but struggled with the same self-doubt and fear attended a speechwriting and speaking seminar, she had known when she was that age. “I knew it where she shared her story and immediately would be incredibly rewarding if I could just offer caught the attention of a man who happened to be some companionship to others on their journey a coach for financial advisors. When he told her and have someone recognize their struggle in my she had to come speak at his seminar, she was struggle,” she says. “If I could help a young artist nervous at first. “I knew nothing about his world, recognize that fear is a part of the journey and that but he said not to worry—I’d just tell my story on you can be afraid and brave at the same time, that stage, and he would draw the connections,” she would be worthwhile.” says. “I decided to do it, and I arrived early so I Soon after this vision, however, Sandra could get a sense of the discussions. I thought I’d came face-to-face with new struggles of her own. learn about investing, but it wasn’t anything about In the year following her departure from Phantom, that. It was actually all about the same personal she found out she had a tumor on her brainstem struggles I confronted as a performer—how to pressing against the nerve that controls the motor show up, bring your best, perform at a high level, function of the tongue. If the tumor were to require be authentic, connect with people, and build trust. radiation treatment, she would never sing again. It’s all the same journey.” For the several-week-period spent waiting for the Sandra has since marveled at how her doctors’ recommendation, she faced some of the story resonates in industries and audiences she hardest questions she had ever considered in her never imagined. From the world’s top insurance

Sandra Joseph

professionals, to financial advisors, to women’s nonsense. I hope young people trust that who they groups, to New York Times bestselling authors, she are is already enough. If they just show up and sees more similarities than differences as she keep moving in the direction of what they love, crosses sectors. “I want to go wherever I can be of what lights them up, what makes them feel alive, it service, so I don’t have a narrow focus on will lead them exactly where they’re supposed to audience,” she says. “I never dreamed that be and where they can make the greatest speaking would lead me to the corporate world, contribution.” Her old high school launched a and it’s been so rewarding because I’ve learned a performing arts scholarship in her name—a lot about other businesses. I’m staying open, and tangible example of how Sandra hopes to support in these incredible opportunities that have come young people in finding the courage to follow the my way, I’ve seen that we all have the same fears voice of their hearts. and the same hopes. We just want to be who we Beyond that, Sandra is a firm believer in are and use what we have to make a difference for the power of gratitude, and bookends each day by others. I do what I do now because it’s a way of writing down what she’s grateful for. “We’re bringing us all together—a way to make visible hardwired to focus on the negative, so I work to that connection that’s inherently part of all of us.” overcome that by taking five minutes at the Through it all, her husband Ron has been beginning and end of the day to focus on constantly supportive and resourceful in making gratitude,” she says. “Exercise, meditation and their marriage work across space and time. He mindfulness practice are essentials for me as well. most recently toured with The Book of Mormon, and There’s an old Sioux saying I love: ‘The longest could see even from afar that she had found a path journey you’ll ever make in your whole life is from in perfect alignment with her purpose. “It’s been your head to your heart.’ I try to make sure my quite a learning curve to go from being a part of a head and my heart are as connected as possible so big production, to being in business for myself,” I can live in alignment with my highest purpose. Sandra confesses. “As my speaking career has We have limited time here, so I do my best to be blossomed, I’ve had to learn how to operate as an intentional about how I’m spending my days. My entrepreneur. My husband’s support through this highest intention is to put love, gratitude, and joy journey has been invaluable.” center stage so that when the curtain comes down, Today, Sandra leads a workshop called whenever that may be, I’ll know that I lived life to Performing as a Path to Presence, designed to help the fullest.” people from all walks of life overcome their own self-limiting beliefs, to find their voice and show © October 2016 Gordon J. Bernhardt. All rights up as the fullest expression of who they really are. reserved. Reprinted by permission. Employing singing and speaking, individuals learn to move through vulnerability, inhabit their  By Gordon J. Bernhardt, CPA, PFS, CFP®, AIF® authentic presence, and find their inner courage. She plans to expand these workshops into About Gordon J. Bernhardt destination retreats in the future. Sandra also President and founder of Bernhardt Wealth supports The Girl Power Project, a branch of a Management and author of Profiles in Success: non-profit called Just Like My Child. Inspiration from Executive Leaders in the In advising young people entering the Washington D.C. Area, Gordon provides financial working world today, Sandra emphasizes the planning and wealth management services to affluent importance of staying true to yourself and your individuals, families and business-owners throughout own definition of success. “Achieving a life of the Washington, DC area. Since establishing his firm fulfillment, contribution, and happiness is an in 1994, he and his team have been focused on individual journey,” she says. “There are a lot of providing high-quality service and independent voices out there in our culture that try to define financial advice to help clients make informed decisions what a successful, happy life is supposed to look about their money. For more information, visit like—fame, money, looking a certain way. It’s all www.BernhardtWealth.com and Gordon’s Blog.

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Profiles in Success: Inspiration from Executive Leaders in the Washington D.C. Area