The Meaning Behind the Words
Words have meaning. We all know that, and we all exercise them on a daily basis. Scholars have studied and researched the meaning and origin of language, and theologists romanticize it, but when it’s all said and done, individual words are associated with specific or multiple thoughts, ideas, or actions. As Shakespear so eloquently noted, “What's in a name? That which we call a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet.”
Of course, this was Juliet speaking to Romeo, that his name could be anything and it would still be him, just as a rose would still smell as sweet even if were called something else. Names and words can be transient, alive, and can change their forms according to societal norms. “Ug ock, click” may have been the accepted term for, let’s say, the word ‘fire’, before there were organized languages. Or the simple act of pointing at something, in itself, could be a word. If I were to point at a puppy and there were no words to use, the puppy would still be a puppy, and the gesture would define it as such.
Words are definitions.
How I Use Words
For me, words aren’t just things on a page. They’re alive. They breathe. They carry the weight of what I mean—and sometimes, the weight of what I can’t say. In my books, a single word can tip the balance of a scene, reveal a character’s secret, or linger in a reader’s mind long after the page is closed.
But words are slippery. Their meanings shift depending on who’s listening. A word that was harmless yesterday might be sharp today. Social media has made this obvious—some words get labeled as taboo, and suddenly everyone avoids them. Then new words pop up to replace them. Softer words. Cleaner words. But if the intent behind them hasn’t changed, if the meaning is the same, the new words can feel just as charged as the old ones.
In my writing, I pay attention to that. I choose words not just for what they say, but for how they feel in a reader’s mind. A name, a curse, a whispered confession—all of it matters. And sometimes, the words I leave unsaid are the ones that speak the loudest.
The Words We Fear
Some words are soft, some sharp. Some are whispered, some shouted. And some are forbidden. That is, until we soften them, only for society to eventually brand the replacement just as harshly. The meaning doesn’t live in the sound of the word, but in the intent behind it.
Take the word mad. Once a simple description of anger, it became shorthand for mental instability, taboo in polite conversation. Replace it with upset or distressed, and the social sting diminishes for a time—but the meaning, the weight behind it, remains. Or consider curse words themselves: an f-bomb today carries the same shock it did fifty years ago, while new euphemisms like “heck” or “shoot” attempt to soften it. Yet when the same fury or frustration exists behind them, the replacement becomes just as loaded, just as taboo in context.
Call it what you will—anger, shame, desire, violence—the word itself is powerless until it is heard, understood, felt. Replace it with a kinder syllable, and the danger does not disappear. It simply dresses differently, waiting for recognition.
Conclusion
The act of writing is a very personal, intimate act. As a writer, I feel a relationship to my stories, to the words used to create them. Until very recently, I haven’t completely understood the power of the words strung together to form sentences which go on to become paragraphs and chapters. I heard excerpts from one of my works read back to me aloud and unrehearsed. Just raw words spoken, calling into being certain feelings and associations. It overwhelmed me, to say the least, and solidified in me the fact that the words I used elicited emotions and that they were important.
They mattered.
And that’s all a writer strives to do. To make that connection through the words they use. The meanings associated with them. To touch a life and possibly make a small change to the world.