The Magic Words Webinar
Faclan Draoidheil / Magic Words
The Invisible Cage
Language is like the air we breathe; unconscious and unquestioned.
A society’s language isn’t static. It’s intended to evolve and change as the needs and interests of the society change. Being unaware of the impact of the language we use makes us subject to upholding and maintaining societal institutions and structures that we don’t actually want to support or strengthen.
English is the language of hierarchical power. English is the language of colonialism, capitalism and Empire. English is the language of the global economy. English is the language of oppression and resource extraction and the never-ending infinite growth of the cancer of corporate profits.
ReEnchantment needs something different.
ReEnchantment needs a wedge to prop open the door to delight, prop open the door to magic - a door that this crumbling world view is determined to keep closed.
ReEnchantment needs a new language to use in ceremony (making sacred) to take us out of the everyday world of our task-filled to-do list lives and return us to the liminal state of tir agus anam (land + spirit) and invite the presence and experience of Spirit back into our world.
Written in Stone
(Caveat: I love writing, I love books - but this is all still at play to manipulate perceptions of power and belief.)
Knowledge used to be transmitted to the group orally. We were told stories as a group.
Then we got books - which apply a fossilizing, codifying character permanence onto the knowledge received by the individual. Books have a way of imparting “true forever, no erasies” knowledge of the past onto our collective future, regardless of what is actually needed for the good of society in the present and in the future. Books codify and cement the authority and legitimacy of the current order and project it, as is, into the future.
©Lezley Davidson “Words” 2025, ink on cotton rag
Reading is highly individualist. Reading is a solo adventure that is lacking the guidance and context provided by Elders of the group within the context of complex community and reciprocity. Mistakes and errors of judgement and understanding get handed down without question and can be distilled and intensified into unquestioned dogmatic truth.
“The word” in Western society is held in highest esteem and holds more weight and reverence than any other way of knowing - especially around myth-making and meaning creation in a Western world view.
There is an historical power dynamic of education and privilege that determines who has access to literacy in a society. Who is permitted and encouraged to “write the truth” and who is expected to accept whatever truth is written, is a product of, and a reinforcing of the structures of power in that society. Who writes the stories and who tells us what those stories mean are all in service of maintaining the unquestioned structure of society as it is right now, and forever in the future.
Speak your Soul into the World
We used to hear our collective mythologies told around a fire in winter. We gathered as a community to be knit together as a community through the tales of wonder about our common gods, goddesses and ancestors. We listened together to the stories that told us who we are and where we belong and what is important and meaningful about our lives.
The voice is the medium of meaningful embodiment. The voice is an expression of Spirit through the Land of the body. Speaking is sharing through feeling. The voice is felt in the body and not held solely in the mind. The voice is shared and moves into the world through vibration. The voice is bringing the interior world into the outside to share and be counted in the exterior world of form. The voice is in active participation in creating myth and meaning in the world. The voice walks the bridge between Tir agus Anam.
The Magic of Irish and Gaelic
Click image to open in a lightbox for easier reading.
Manchán Magan often and emphatically promotes Irish as a magical language.
He writes about Irish language and culture and how the language points to our deeply intwined relationship with land and the world of the Unseen. There is a hidden magical world known to our ancestors. We call our Ancestors into Presence and Being with us right here, right now by using the language of our lineage.
The prohibition to using Indigenous languages all over the world, points to their power. Irish, Gaelic, Welsh, Anishinaabemowin - were all prohibited, persecuted and attempted to be shamed out of use to sever the connection to the power of roots and the magic communication with Ancestors. Our Indigenous languages hold the Presence power of Ancestors and the ancient wisdom of Land + Spirit intertwined forever.
Magic Words at Samhain
Samhain is upon us and it marks the end of another year and the time of the thinning veil to the Otherworld, and to the Deep and to the Dark. (Be not afraid of the Deep and the Dark.)
Our ancestors knew the deep as the still, dark time before birth. Celtic days start in the night, in the dark, like seeds in the soil of infinite time and space. This is the time of quiet contemplation and reconnecting to the Deep Root Source within.
Join me to craft Words of Magic in our Indigenous Irish + Gaelic languages. Create your own phrases of meaning and call to your Ancestors in our Language of Lineage. Build the bridge between our world and the Unseen, and invite your Ancestors to be present with you in this world. Right here, right now.
“Tir agus anam Fite Fuaite Gu Brà th.
Tha na Cailleachan a’freumhachadh air Mishiike Minisi.
Tha na sinnsearan a-tighinn. Tha mo sinnsearan an seo. ”
I love how the internet can serve you up exactly what you’re learning and deliver a beautiful piece of pie right into your lap. 🌀💜🌀
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. 🌀Come join the Magic Words Webinar on October 30 at 2pm on Zoom. Register here: https://lezleydavidson.ca/writing/the-magic-words-webinar