Thanks man. I actually got the idea of speaking softly through my experience of singing. My voice is not loud, and the microphones at my place of worship aren't that good. So for some time, I tried to force my voice out. That caused an uncomfortable sore throat that lasted for about a month. To avoid that, I decided not to force my voice out again, not even when I'm forced to by someone. I also stopped trying to sing with a manly, low pitch voice. When I sang softly, couldn't believe how comfortable it was and how long I could sing this way. Perhaps the entire throat, shoulders and stomach regions were relaxed when I stopped pretending to be Luciano Pavarotti and embraced the 'feminine' side of my voice. Perhaps this is also why male stutterers far outnumber women; we're culturally ingrained to be stiff and appear strong, which is bad for our voice, whereas its better for women to be softer. When I translated all that knowledge to speaking, it seems to produce very good results, at least for now.