May 11, 2017

In Charles Fillmore’s metaphysical classic The Twelve Powers, he delineates twelve inner creative faculties with which each one of us is divinely endowed. Among these are the powers of love, faith, imagination, understanding, wisdom and will. We also have powers of strength, order, renunciation, zeal and life. The last of these twelve powers is the power of power itself, which is associated with the creative power of your word.

No, that is not a misprint. As Fillmore sees it, you and I have a power called power. He also associates the power of power with dominion and mastery. To Fillmore, the key to having dominion and mastery over our experience is through the conscious and responsible use of our power of power, which, in practice means through the power of our word.

In The Beginning Was The Word

These famous words, which kick off the Book of John, recall the beginning of the Judeo-Christian creation story told in Genesis. John 1 reminds us that the “word” was there in the beginning with God and was God. In Genesis 1, the process of creation kicks into gear when Elohim speaks the words “let there be light.”

Created in the image and likeness of God, we are, each one of us, created to be creators. Therefore, like God, our word has creative power in the same manner. With our voice, we make sounds and express words to communicate our thoughts and feelings. The words we speak reveal our thoughts and feelings, which reveal the quality of our consciousness. More than this, it is our word, our power of power, that ignites the creative processes that ultimately define our personal reality.

Be Impeccable With Your Word

According to Toltec traditions, words have power. They are magic itself in terms of their creative power. However, for the Toltecs, words can wield either white magic or black magic. In Don Miguel Ruiz’ bestseller, The Four Agreements, he articulates one of the agreements as “Be impeccable with your word.”

For the Toltecs, words should only be used for good. Ruiz describes that words will either spin “black magic” or “white magic.” Words that have the creative power of white magic are words like Love, Wisdom, Strength, Faith, Power and Imagination. You can likely easily imagine words that would equate with black magic. Words can hurt. Words can heal. Words can create. Words can destroy. Words have energy and creative power and they can be used for good or ill, white magic or black magic.

In terms of the Western mindset and Judeo-Christian traditions, we don’t really believe in “magic.” Yet, we also demonstrate a deep, abiding capacity and propensity to believe in illusions. One of the biggest illusions we entertain is that we have no real power to affect change in our lives, or by extension change in the world. However, nothing could be further from the truth.

Matrika Shakti, The Little Mothers of Creative Power

The Toltecs are far from the only religious or spiritual tradition to acknowledge the creative power in words or sound. In the Hindu mythology, the inherent power in sounds and words is encoded into the Sanskrit alphabet. The Hindus believe that each individual alphabetic sound that makes up a word has creative energy. The combination of these energies defines the creative power in the word itself. In Sanskrit, this power is called Matrika Shakti, the inherent creative energy behind the letters that make up words.

In the Hindu creation story, Brahma, the Creator, first revealed himself as a “golden embryo of sound.” The sound he made was the equivalent of a vowel, vibrating outward from his beingness, reverberating off the membrane walls of the embryo, echoing back upon itself and becoming the water and wind. In like fashion, all of creation continued and progressed as a result of sound and the inherent creative energy embodied within the sound.

As We Think, So Shall We Speak

Thoughts are always the precursor of words. Words give creative power to our external reality. Both thoughts and words carry the power to influence consciousness and reality, for ourselves and others. For instance, the words love, peace, or joy open us to experience the vibrational energy of those qualities. If we desire to create the experience of love, peace, or joy in our lives, we must be mindful that the inner dialogue we allow in our consciousness also resonates with those same qualities.

The same holds true for how we think or talk about others, whether they are present or not. Because we transmit the inherent creative energy underlying all of our thoughts and words in all directions, at all times, we can and do affect others, both directly and indirectly. Even when the other person is not present, we transmit the energy of our thoughts and words to them telepathically.

Though they may not know we are thinking or speaking about them, they still feel the energetic effects. This same principle is effectively the basis for all prayer intended for others. We believe that the energy and intention of our prayers will travel wherever it needs to in the universe to be answered and received.

The same holds true for the negative criticisms or judgments of others we express in words when they are not present. Like Don Miguel Ruiz reminds us in The Four Agreements, the thoughts and words we transmit work both for or against ourselves and others, depending upon the seeds we sow in the activity of our thinking.

We Are Co-Creating With Truth

The third principle in Unity teachings essentially states that, we create our experience through the thoughts and feelings we hold in mind. There are many variations of this statement throughout Unity. However, what they all have in common is the idea that whatever kind of experience we are having, we are choosing how we experience it by the thoughts and feelings we nurture and maintain in the activity of our consciousness. This implies an awesome power to affect our reality, along with which comes a mighty responsibility.

The activity of our mind creates a dynamic and powerful field of energy that emanates from within our own selves and radiates outward into the external world. The vibrational tone of this energetic field, and the creative power it implies, is the effect of the thoughts and feelings held in consciousness. This is not a new idea, though it has often been misunderstood and misapplied throughout history down through today.

Words always follow the thought. Though the way some speak in today’s world, it would seem there is often no thought before the words. Yet, there always is thought before the word. In truth, it might be more appropriate to say: In the beginning there was the thought. In other words, before Elohim spoke the words “let there be light,” there was the thought or idea of light.

Ye Are Gods

When we become vigilant to the thoughts and feelings active in our own consciousness, we set the stage to use our power of power more responsibly, and ultimately more powerfully. When we assume responsibility for the effects and consequences of the words we speak, both to ourselves and others, then we are using our power of power to uplift our own selves, those whom we encounter and, ultimately, the world at large.

So, the real question we should be asking of ourselves before speaking is: does the word I am about to express align with what I believe to be true at the deepest point of my being? Muse, meditate, contemplate or think on this as you will, in your own way and in your own time. However, whether you do or not, be willing to inquire of your own self: how am I using the power of my word, my power of power? Pay attention to the response from your own consciousness, and then align your future words accordingly.