Voice: How to find yours

Voice: it's what we always hear about at any book club, writer's conference, and critique group.

The voice was so well done I didn't care about the writing.  
The author's voice was so well defined that I felt like I knew each character like they were my friends.
You need to work on your voice.  You transition from sarcasm to drama and back again...it loses the reader...blah blah blah

We've all heard people say things just like this, usually the last is directed at our work and the former two are about some other wonderful, successful, published author.  We've been told countless times that until we get our voice nailed down and solidified, our work isn't going get any serious attention.  I've even been told that finding my voice is the single most important technique to develop as a writer.  And it's all true.

And yet, after all of the conversations about voice and ways to develop it, we're still just as lost as ever in regards to how to tie down our writing voice.

My experience has been one of those long, painful, learning curves, without which I wouldn't be at the level of writing I feel like I've come to today.  When I first started writing, I wanted to show just how many words I knew and just how artfully I could craft sentences.  I was so focused on making each phrase wonderful that I missed out on the underlying reasons for writing: a story, a plot, a theme, character development...etc.  I didn't have a cohesive story, only pretty sequences of phrases that didn't make much sense or even catch anyone's interest, not even my own.  I knew what I'd done wasn't anywhere close to being a novel, so I basically scratched the whole thing and started over.  I focused on the plot rather than on the writing and by the time I finished the book, I actually had a book.  But it still wasn't acceptable.

Why?

Because there was no defined voice in the novel.  It was all over the place.  The characters reacted in volatile ways because I didn't understand them and that led me to write them reacting to whatever situation the way I was feeling the day I was writing that particular scene.  It was like being in a relationship with someone who hadn't been taking their medication to keep them balanced.

I had to do another major revision.  Instead of starting over completely though, I could keep the theme, plot, and story.  I just had to develop that one aspect of writing that had been so elusive to me over the four years I've been working on my writing: voice.

I researched voice, reading as many blogs by authors, agents, editors, and publishers that I could stand.  I was still clueless though until I thought of my writing as a person.
What does that even mean?
I'll try to break it down in the way I finally understood it.

Take any person you know well and think about their personality, think about them.  How do they react when they are happy?  What kinds of words do they use when they're angry?  What about the way they express their feelings or deep desires?  I bet you knew the answer to every single one of those questions because you know that person so well.  And because you could answer those questions with confidence, that means the person you thought of is consistent.  They are defined as a person and that definition comes out depending on the situation.  But that person also isn't monotonous, emotionless, or boring.  They simply are consistent.  So it is with voice.  It is consistent and must be throughout your entire novel.

That was it.  All I needed to do was think of voice as a person and once I did that, it became consistent.  And remember consistency doesn't mean monotonous or emotionless.  So now I've finished another major revision that revolved around consistency: consistency in my characters (due to the amazing tool of character sketches), and consistency in voice (which came easier once I understood my characters).  Consistency has been the key to my development as a writer.  Hopefully it's something that can help you too.