What If Words Mattered More Than We Thought?

Water, Words, and the Magic of "Ah" ✨

Me, asking questions and collecting feathers since the 80s

I believe in the power of words, but I’m not the type of person to get granular about things like understand vs. innerstand, a turn of word choice I heard on a podcast a while back.

Initially, I rolled my eyes. “Okay, that’s a stretch. I’m not convinced swapping words like this will change much in the grand scheme of my life.” It felt like trying too hard.

But maybe I’m wrong.

There are other spaces where altering language has created entire worlds of identity and peace for people, like they/them rather than he or she. On the other side of that same coin, this shift has caused confusion and discomfort, even rage, for others.

I’m curious; perhaps it isn’t the words themselves that hold the power but the meaning we attribute to them. After all, f*ck is just a sound in other languages that means something totally different than this one.

Here’s a solid example:

Hungarian: “Fák” (pronounced “fahk”)

Meaning: Trees

In Hungarian, “fák” is the plural form of “fa,” meaning tree.

Same sound. Very different experiences.

But then there are times when sound seems to hold a deeper power or magic, like in the case of God.

And what about God?

That “ah” sound is found everywhere. Yahweh, Allah, Brahma, Ra, Abba, Quan Yin, etc.

“The AH sound is a sacred seed syllable—a sacred mantra in many Eastern traditions including Tibetan Buddhism. It is also a vowel sound—a divinely inspired sound considered sacred in many different traditions including Hebrew Kabbalah.”

-Jonathan Goldman

In that case, can uttering “ah” change something we can’t see? Or call in a force we can’t sense? Are there “magic sounds” all humans can utter to evoke something?

I don’t know. But it’s interesting to me.

In yet another language-power mystery, take Dr. Masaru Emoto’s water experiment. It went like this:

• Dr. Emoto placed water in different containers, labeling each with words like “love” or “hate.”

• He had children (and sometimes others) say these words aloud to the water or simply project emotions.

• After freezing the water, he claimed to observe that water exposed to positive words (like “love”) formed beautiful, symmetrical crystals, while water exposed to negative words (like “hate”) formed disordered, unattractive crystals.

  “The Hidden Messages in Water” (2004)

  

  Before and after prayer. masaru-emoto.net

I want to believe this, and indeed, some distant part of my body knows that water is not fully understood.

But it begs the question:

If I said “f*ck” or “fák” to the water, would it know the difference? They sound the same, but one is an expletive, and one is a tree.

The logical conclusion, I suppose, is that intentionality is the real thing at play. The energy that pushes the sound out of our mouths certainly counts for something.

This whole thing was inspired when I caught myself thinking, “Tomorrow’s going to be a long day.” Before saying it aloud, I remembered recent losses in my life and that I’m lucky to be here at all. So I said instead, “I get to experience a lot of life tomorrow.”

My partner asked where that came from. I explained it to him. We decided that there was a noticeable energetic change between the two and that tomorrow’s busy day didn’t seem nearly as bad when approached with an undertone of appreciation.

So, should we be examining our words? Getting granular about our choices? Or is the real magic the energy and intention behind what we say?

Maybe that person saying innerstand knows something I don’t understand about the power of language. I still think it feels weird to make big linguistic surgical cuts like that one, but I’m open to the power of it.