We are born into a world of words.
Like countless others, words define my life — first as an avid reader of stacks of Archie comic books, later as an educator, later as an author.
It’s easy to think of words as tools, mere instruments of communication, or sonic stepping-stones to transmit ideas. But as the years pass, I realize they are not mere implements. Rather, they are tectonic plates. Words are born, expressed, and the ground beneath our feet shifts and moves.
Spending days in a classroom, I usually can be found at the front with a smart-board pen in hand, a hum of restless energy of learners before me.
One simple phrase—“Have I told you all that you’re brilliant today?”—uttered with conviction, can reshape a learner’s sense of possibility. Watch and you will see shoulders straighten, eyes widen, and trajectories shift because someone believed enough to voice encouragement.
Conversely, I have seen the damage when careless words cut sharply: “You won’t.” “You will never.” “Why try?” They haunt longer than bruises.
A single phrase, shouted or whispered, can define the story a mind carries long into life.
History affirms this double-edged truth.
The late Martin Luther King Jr.’s words lifted a movement and gave rise to possibility. On the steps of DC’s Lincoln Memorial, he spoke of dreams. The air itself vibrated wth hope. Now more than half a century later, his cadence echoes – still carving highways toward justice.
In contrast, speeches in 1930s Germany ignited fear. Bent a nation. And set the world ablaze.
In both instances, the same instrument – voice tempered by language – summoned both liberation and devastation.
How impressively thin the line is between words that heal or words that corrode.
As an author, I wrestle with words in the churning rapids of writing. A page, once filled, becomes an artifact. A time capsule. Books outlive their creator. They whisper across generations. The words of Carl Jung, Hunter S. Thompson, Christopher Hitchens, and Friedrich Nietzsche (common names on my bookshelves) remind me that literature is alive. It confronts us with truth – stellar, poetic, or unsettling.
Writing is not decoration, but revelation. Awareness lingers. One’s words may stand before someone they will never meet – shaping perception of self, of others, of the world.
This is both a luminous honour and an overwhelming weight. Blindingly hopeful (yet as heavy) as a collapsing star.
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The power of words is not confined to voice, teaching, speeches, or writing. It lives in the quiet ceremony of reading. Bedtime stories once whispered to us softly conjured worlds more real and vivid than walls around me as I write this tonight.
The right story at the right time teaches empathy, offering a mirror and doorway into other lives.
A learner who reads Anne Frank doesn’t merely learn history. They encounter the unbreakable and undefeated spirit of a girl whose words have outlasted those that silenced her.
Words are fragile as paper. Sharper (and as lustrous) than volcanic glass. Stronger than time itself.
And of course, there is song. Lyrics married to melody bypass thought and strike the heart directly. The Doors’ introspection, Pink Floyd’s anthems, Halestorm’s or Corey Taylor’s fiery hymns—they do not merely entertain. They unsettle, stir, inspire, call forth tears, or provoke courage and memory. A verse carried on melody can outlast the strongest monument, the tallest spire, the deepest buried treasure.
Does humanity carry anything more promising, more dangerous, more divine, more magical than the human voice aligned with truth?
Perhaps this is why freedom of speech, conscience, and expression are held sacred – and must remain so.
So, what gives words their force? Is it syllables? Silence? Well, both. Yet neither only in themselves. Their power lies in the place from which they are spoken.
When words align with passion, tempered by reason, rooted in authenticity—they ring differently. Learners can sense the difference between a teacher who recites and one who believes. Crowds can feel the divine divide between manipulation and conviction.
Ultimately, words draw their white-hot, arcing electricity from the spirit of the one who releases them from within.
Honestly, this realization often unsettles me. It reveals none of us are exempt from responsibility. Every sentence or phrase ripples, resonates, and moves concentrically outward. Language can open doors or slam them shut. Unlock them or lock them forever. Ignite sparks or extinguish them eternally.
In the classroom, it is never exams or lesson plans that remained bolted to memories. It was always the words. The shy student who found a voice after encouragement. The learner who returned with a poem about courage. The countless notes scribbled in margins – “Excellent.” “Keep going.” “You matter.”
These are not small gestures nor classroom etiquette, but rehearsals for life.
Learning the road of an author, I know the fear every writer wrestles with: What will be the echo of my voice? What will these words do once they leave the heart and the pen? Will they lift? Diminish? Stir reflection? Deepen silence? Heal? Destroy?
To write, to speak, to sing—none of these are simple or neutral acts. They are tremors in the soil. What will the aftershocks be?
Again and again, I return to this paradox: All things great and horrendous, beautiful and destructive, are born from words.
Declarations begin nations. Threats begin wars. Pamphlets spark revolutions. A whispered “I love you” arcs lightning to a heart and soul. The courage of “I forgive you” begins healing.
And that’s the crux. Perhaps the task of every educator, author, lyricist, poet—or any human being who conjures their voice—is to remember this gravity.
Words are not leaves scattered by the wind, but seeds. They take root, sprout, and grow into forests of possibility – or weeds that choke all which comes too close.
And so, with each class taught, each page filled, each conversation shared, I desperately try to remember this: the world does not change in silence.
It changes when words (born of truth and passion) spark from the spirit, rise from our lungs, and land upon another soul.
That is where revolutions begin.
That is where healing begins.
That is where everything begins.
– Robert Horton is an educator, author, orator, and linguist. He is a member of Rainy River First Nations.
