Words Are Spells — Have We Been Casting the Wrong Ones?

By Virginia Underwood

Language shapes our reality.
The words we speak — and the meanings we assign to them — create the lens through which we see the world, ourselves, and each other.

And yet… the English language (and most “Roman” or colonizer languages) is shockingly limited when it comes to emotional depth, relational truth, and spiritual nuance.

Take “love.”
In English, it’s a catch-all term — we use it for our partner, our pizza, our pets, our favorite song.
But in many Indigenous and ancestral languages, there are many words for love — different expressions depending on whether it’s the love of family, divine love, romantic love, the love that exists between a human and the land.
Each one carries a different frequency… and a different understanding of what it means to be in relationship.

Even something as simple as “Good Morning” — look at the word: Mourning.
We say it without thinking. But encoded in it is the vibration of grief.
Are we really saying “have a good grief”? Or did it once mean something deeper — a reverence for the new day, for the sun rising again, for another chance to heal, love, and remember?

So much of what we say — and how we say it — is shaped by systems that were never designed to honor wholeness, connection, or spirit.

Think about it:
✨ In English, “self-love” was once synonymous with selfishness.
✨ “Selfishness” is still treated like a crime.
✨ “Weird” originally meant mystical — of fate, of destiny, of the otherworldly.
✨ “Witch” was a wise woman — until the word was poisoned by fear and patriarchy.
✨ “Crazy” gets slapped on anyone who dares to feel too much, know too much, or speak inconvenient truths.

But in other cultures?
There are languages where a single word can mean “I see you, I hear you, I honor your being.”
Where trees and rivers are referred to as relatives, not objects.
Where a prayer isn’t something you say — it’s embedded in how you speak.

Colonization didn’t just steal land — it stole language.
And with it, the sacred meanings that could have taught us how to live in harmony with ourselves, each other, and the Earth.

It’s time we remember:
🌀 Words are spells.
🌀 Labels can liberate or limit.
🌀 Language is not neutral — it carries power, pain, and possibility.

So let’s question the words we’ve been handed.
Let’s reclaim the ones that were twisted.
Let’s make space for deeper meanings.
And let’s speak like every syllable is a seed we are planting into the collective field.

Because it is.

What words have shaped your life that you're ready to reclaim, rewire, or release?

#LanguageIsPower #WordsAreSpells #DecolonizeYourVocabulary #LinguisticHealing #SelfLoveIsSacred #ReclaimTheWitch #WeAreTheWeirdOnes #IndigenousWisdom #WordsMatter #RememberingTheSacred