60. Magic Words
Would you like to talk with me about Land + Spirit?
60. Words are the Expression of Soul into the World.
Craft magical words and phrases to speak your Indigenous language out into the world.
Samhain is coming. Build the Bridge to your Ancestors and invite them into Presence in this World.
đCome join the Magic Words Webinar on October 30 at 2pm on Zoom. Register here:
Speak Irish + Gaelic with me on Duolingo!
Transcript
Lezley (00:12):
Hi folks. Welcome to Radical Re-Enchantment. So I'm doing a webinar, it's the Magic Words Webinar. It's October 30th at 2:00 ET, and register through the links, register through whatever links are around. I'm not sure where you're hearing this. So there'll be a link to my website where you can register and there will be a playback if you miss it. If you're interested and you want to join or you want to participate, but can't make it to the live webinar, there will be a recording with all the resources and everything attached. So yeah, register if you want to participate in Magic Words. Magic Words are, it's using Irish and Gaelic. For those of us who are Celtic descendants on Turtle Island or elsewhere in the world outside of Ireland and Scotland and Wales, and Celtic descendants in the diaspora, which is Celtic descendants spread all over the world.
(01:23):
This is using our Indigenous language of Irish and Gaelic to create power phrases, basically Magic spells. They're Magic spells. They're spoken words of power and Magic in our Indigenous languages that call our Ancestors back into time and place and Presence with us. Now we're building the bridge to spirit fite fuaite, it's Magic words. Land and spirit are woven and sewn together forever. So if you'd like to craft your own, and this is really important about this process, is you have to find the words that are resonant within you. You have to craft your own phrases of power that resonate and have a frisson in your own body, in your own soul, or else it's useless. We're not speaking other people's words. We're speaking our own words of Magic, and that's really vital. So this webinar is going to show you how I do it, and that's all I can show you is how I do it, and then maybe it will inspire you to create your own. At the end of the webinar, everyone should have a small phrase that they can say during Samhain. This is the day before Samhain. Samhain is Celtic New Year. It's the opening of the door. It's the thinning of the veil between the scene and the unseen. So having Gaelic or Irish words of power to speak to your Ancestors on Samhain is like Pew! Pew!.
(03:10):
It's so magnetic. It's fantastically magnetic. So anyway, that's what we're doing. Magic Words, check it out, register. You don't have to be there in real time, but if you are, great, there will be a recording and it's free. It's free. Just sign up to get into the library. Anyway, links are around. Links. Links, register links. Okay, so on to Magic Words. Language is something that we don't often consciously think about. It is an affordance or a framework or a way that we think about the world that we are often unconscious of and unaware of. It's like fish not being aware of the water that they're in. It's us not being aware of the air that we breathe. Language is something that we absorb unconsciously and it formulates and shapes how we think about the world, how we perceive the world, how we perceive ourselves in the world, and how we perceive others and how we perceive and interpret our relationships with the physical world.
(04:24):
It actually, it impacts everything. It impacts everything about our worldview. If we remain unconscious and unquestioning about the language that we've inherited, we can be participating in power structures and institutions and models and symbols that we don't actually want to be supportive of, which we don't want be adding power to. So becoming aware of the language that we use is really powerful, and taking on the language of our Ancestors is a Magical transformation. I have been learning Irish and Gaelic for almost a year on Duolingo. I am terrible, but I'm doing it and it does change. It has been changing my mind. It's been creating new synapses and connections and understandings about language and about my place in the world and reconnecting me to my Ancestors. It is a very powerful process to speak the language of your Ancestors into the world. I started doing this because...
(05:42):
Dr. Willie Ermine in 4 Seasons of Reconciliation said, 'connect to your own roots, learn your own language'. And this is our language. This is the language of our Ancestors. We are descendants of the Celts. We are descendants of Irish and Scottish peoples. I'm a descendant of Irish and Scottish and Welsh and English peoples and primarily Scottish. And I resonate more stronger with Gaelic was the first ancestral language that I used. It was my Ancestors that I have come into a relationship with are Scottish primarily, and so that's just where my comfort lies, but whatever. So English is the language of colonialism. English is the language of the oppressor. English is the language that was forced upon our Ancestors to great pain and loss. English is the languages of colonialism of capitalism. It's the language of a power hierarchy. English is the language of the oppressor. English is the language of a global economy that's based in aggression, violence, resource extraction, and a cancerous never ending desire for profit and growth.
(07:12):
Re-Enchantment needs something different. Re-Enchantment needs a language of ceremony, a language of making sacred. And this is what we reconnect to. When we begin to speak our Ancestral language into the world, we are creating a bridge to our Ancestors that they can cross to become Present in this World with us. Here we are creating a reconnection to roots that are ancient, to wisdom, that is ancient. We are creating a life in lineage by speaking the language of our Ancestors. We're purposely and consciously choosing a language of ceremony. Ceremony means making sacred. So what I speak in the world in Irish and Gaelic are sacred words. They are words of power. They're words of Magic. They're words of Being and Belonging for Land and Spirit fuite fuaite gu brĂ th, and to my Ancestors, this is me standing in place connecting to the ancient past and the infinite future. This is embodied with intention.
(08:35):
When I speak Irish and Gaelic in the world; Tapadh Leat don Anam Mòr, Chi Miigwetch Gitchi Manitou - there's also braiding the roots, the roots of the people of the land speaking. The language of the people of this land, (Anishinaabemowin where I live), is powerful for this land, but we'll talk about that later. Right now we're talking about Samhain. We're talking about Ancestors and lineage. We're talking about Irish and Gaelic. Western society has uplifted and prioritized the written language, writing and books. And literacy has, I'm not saying it's not good, but it does have a fossilizing and a codifying impact on thought, on belief, on ideas "written in stone". That's pretty clear written on paper, it's written down, it's codified, it's fossilized, and there is a tendency for written words to be carried through as law, unchanged, perceived, and received as truth. Eternal never changing until world end, truth forever. This is the way it is stamped it no erases.
(10:12):
It's written in the book. It doesn't matter if it's good for you or not. This is the way it is because it's written. And I mean, no, no, no, thank you. Reading is a particularly solo individual enterprise. And when we read as individuals, without the guidance of Elders (Elders who care about the community - who create structures of thriving for everyone), or without the context of the community and the health of the community, things can be taken, interpreted, and perceived awry, and then proceeded to be taught to the next generation with a twist, with something that may not be good for the community. And this is highlighted often in Western society where individual thought and individual action and the individual hero persona is so glorified. The lone wolf figure is glorified. The individual genius is glorified. Whereas genius was never from the self. It was connection to the Universal Wisdom Principle that was available to everyone just saying. So.
(11:32):
Bibles are symbolic of this problem or can be a symbol of this problem where errors in understanding can be written down and then handed down to future generations unchecked and unchanged. And it's an error of belief, an error of thought, and an error of truth. Really, it's an error of perception and interpretation of the world. And as soon as it gets written down, there is a strength that's added to it, a power and authority that is added to it that may not necessarily be true or real. There's also a power dynamic of education and privilege and access in literacy in the written word, literacy across the globe, of course, has risen incrementally. The world is far more literate right now than it ever has been in the past. But in the past there was a privilege and an education and class access to literacy that wasn't available to everyone, which allowed for a ruling class to determine truth and belief through the word that wasn't available to the community.
(12:54):
It was a top-down authority that was delivered. This was really strong through the Protestant reformation, the reliance on the word of the Bible as it was interpreted by the elders, by a select few men of a particular class with a particular worldview and perspective and ideal, and a design for what the best type of world would be - according to only them. This is where this happens all the time with writing with words is a codification, fossilization of a particular worldview that can be handed down, unquestioned. Reading aloud becomes something different. It becomes collective, it becomes community. Now, I'm not saying that oral traditions are exempt from a codification, they're definitely not. But there is, or there can be a difference in an oral transmission where it is told to the group as a group where it is told to the community as a community where everyone is involved and everyone is participating in this active reciprocal receiving and giving of the communal stories.
(14:16):
Oral mythologies are not solely in thought in the mind. The way written, mythologies and written world perceptions are related with when they're read only is they become just thoughts. They are strictly in your mind. Whereas oral storytelling is felt in your body. Sound is literally a physical thing. Sound is literally land. Sound is literally spirit coming into land through the vibration of the voice. Our voices are literally the expression of spirit into the World of Form. And so oral storytelling, oral mythologies, take on a deeper significance for the people. It's why actually movies are so engaging and loved universally is because they are oral mythologies. It's oral storytelling. It's also why I love audio books. So ManchĂĄn Magan, who's a writer and author, an Irish writer, he wrote everywhere. He's written books. I just received my first book by him. It's called 32 Words for Land.
(15:38):
Is that what it called? No. It's called 32 Words for Field. 32 Words for Field; Lost Words of the Irish Landscape. So I'm pretty stoked about this, but he repeats over and over again and is very grounded in sharing his perspective that Irish is a Magical language, that using Irish in the world is Magical. That it points to a world that is living and conscious and aware of us and we are in relationship to it. Irish points to a belief in a world perspective that the Seen and the Unseen are both active and engaged and present in the world at all times. They are words of Magic. Irish is a language of Magic. Gaelic is a language of Magic and can be even ManchĂĄn says, a manifestation language where you can speak Irish and Gaelic into the world and bring about events and people and things.
(16:48):
I agree, and I use Irish and Gaelic as a ceremonial language. It is a spiritual language. It speaks my love and connection for the Unseen, for all those that have gone before us. It speaks them into the World with me right now, Tha na Cailleachan a' freumhachadh air Mishiike Minisi. The Cailleach are rooting on Turtle Island. Indigenous languages all over the world were prohibited and persecuted by oppressing empires again and again. Britain in particular traveled all over the world and persecuted and prohibited Indigenous languages.
So there's a Christian biblical, Judeo-Christian biblical prohibition to witches. And the interesting part is that the Hebrew word for witch has at its roots whisperers. So witches were people who whispered, and this came home fully and completely to me when I was practicing Irish and Gaelic because I need to practice. I need to say the words out loud and repeat them over and over and over again because it's almost like muscle memory.
(18:21):
It's building muscle memory about how to pronounce the words, roll the Rs, get the "ch" going on. Gaelic and Irish have sounds that don't happen in English. So we need to practice. And I practice a lot at work. I practice at work because I spend a lot of time alone at work. And I walk around and I whisper Gaelic and Irish underneath my breath as I practice. And it suddenly occurred to me as I was whispering under my breath, underneath my breath, I'm practicing. And someone looked at me sideways and I thought, oh, this is it. This is speaking to our Ancestors. This is talking to our Ancestors in our Indigenous language and the power and connection and building of that bridge that happens when we speak our Indigenous languages in the world. It builds a bridge to our Ancestors and we have available to us thou their power and their presence and their lineage and their wisdom. And of course, a spiritual institution like the church doesn't want you to connect directly to spirit. They don't want you to connect directly to your Ancestors. They don't want you to join land and spirit together and have access to that on your own and to decide on your own what that means and take that meaning into the world.
(20:18):
October 30th, 2:00 PM Eastern, Magic Words Webinar. There will be a replay. So just sign up. You'll get the recording, but learn how to speak the language of your Ancestors, just a phrase or two of power, and speak it on Samhain when the veil is thin and start the bridge. Build the bridge to your Ancestors. Build the bridge to invite the Ancestors here now. Okay, love you. Bye.
There is a powerful rooting and connecting to the unseen, to Ancestors. That happens when we use our Indigenous language, revitalizing our Indigenous languages, our rooting to our Ancestors, and rooting our Ancestors into the World. We are reconnecting to a reality that is greater than the one that we know right now. Revitalizing our Indigenous languages is reuniting again, Land and Spirit together. So Samhain is the time of the year of the thinning of the veil between the light and the dark, the Seen and the Unseen.
(21:38):
It is the Celtic New Year and it is the moving into darkness time. In Celtic worldview. Our days begin with the dark. The dark comes first in Celtic belief. The dark is the quiet, deep rooting and reconnection to true source - like a seed in the soil. This time is sacred and essential for reflection and returning to the Cauldron, to the Well of Being, to reconnect to the roots and the source of what you will bring into being in the spring. Do not be afraid of the deep and the dark. Do not be afraid of the quiet and the night. These are your inheritance. These are the source of your Magic. This is the beginning of your power.
(22:36):
Join me on the 30th at 2:00 PM Eastern to craft your own Magic Words in your Celtic Indigenous language. In Irish and Gallic, I'm sorry, I don't know Welsh and I don't know Manx. I don't even really know Irish and Gaelic, to be honest. Piobar agus salann. Sgian agus forca. I know basic things, but I know when I speak them, they go beyond me and they go beyond this world. They reconnect and build a bridge to something larger and older and more infinite than what we've allowed to be here so far.
Is mise Lezley. Tha mo sinnsearan an Alba ann an Earra-GhĂ idheal. Tha mo sinnsearan an Ăireann ann an Aointrim. Tha mo sinnsearan Sassanach ann an Shropshire. Tha na sinnsearan a' tighinn. Tha na sinnsearan an seo.
I am Lezley. My Ancestors are from Scotland in Argyle. My Ancestors are from Ireland in Antrim. My Ancestors are from England in Shropshire. The Ancestors are coming. The Ancestors are here.
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Craft magical words and phrases to speak your Indigenous language out into the world.
Samhain is coming. Build the Bridge to your Ancestors and invite them into Presence in this World.
đCome join the Magic Words Webinar on October 30 at 2pm on Zoom.