We’ve spent this entire month pulling at the roots of language, not the polished SAT words or the grammar rules we were taught in school, but the inherited phrases, scripts, and soundbites that either build bridges or reinforce bars around our becoming.
This final episode in the Word Is Born arc is an invocation, a return to the truth that every relationship we are in, from our lovers to our lineage, is shaped by the language we’ve inherited and the language we dare to reimagine.
Liberation isn’t just in what we believe, it’s in what we say. And every time we choose clarity over control, vulnerability over performance, and connection over coercion… we speak the sacred into existence.
Let’s break it down.
Word Is Born, we anchored ourselves in one simple but radical truth: Our words build worlds.
All month, we unraveled the layers of language — how it’s been weaponized under supremacy culture, how it carries the weight of colonial inheritance, and how it can also be a tool for reclamation, restoration, and revolution.
We dissected thought-terminating clichés. We named the ways language enforces dominance and erasure. We offered reframes rooted in consent, clarity, and connection. And now, we bring it all home — into the most intimate places our words live: our relationships.
Because what good is liberation if we don’t know how to love each other through it?
✨ Monthly Recap: Word is Born
From Teaching a New Tongue to Decolonizing the Dictionary, this month has been an excavation of the ways we’ve inherited a colonizer’s vocabulary — one that taught us to shrink, control, and silence.
But we also remembered: language is not just about grammar — it’s about cosmology. About the beliefs and blueprints encoded in our speech.
Liberation is not just in what we do — it’s in what we say.
How we name ourselves.
How we correct with care.
How we return to each other with tenderness after rupture.
Today’s episode was a sacred invitation to bring that liberated language into our homes, our parenting, our partnerships, and our community agreements.
Three Talking Points for Liberated Language in Relationship
Each reflection below moves through a thought-terminating cliché, a reframe, and a ritual prompt to carry into your daily life.
TALKING POINT 1:
Language That Controls Is Not Love — It’s Conditioning
→ Explanation:
Supremacy culture taught us that love and care should come with conditions. That control is a sign of concern. That violating boundaries “for your own good” is just what love does. But that’s not love — that’s manipulation in a costume.
Thought-Terminating Clichés:
“It’s for your own good.”
“That’s just how I am.”
Reframe:
“If love requires shrinking, it’s not liberation — it’s rehearsal for oppression.”
💭 Reflection Prompt:
Where in your relationships has control been mislabeled as care?
What might love sound like if it honored consent, not conformity?
TALKING POINT 2:
Liberated Language Honors Nuance — Not Scripts
→ Explanation:
We’ve been taught to speak in pre-approved phrases that avoid discomfort. “I’m fine.” “You always…” “That’s just the way things are.”
Scripts protect our egos but sabotage our intimacy.
Liberated language isn’t about being eloquent — it’s about being present. It asks us to risk truth in service of real connection.
Thought-Terminating Clichés:
“You always…”
“That’s just the way things are.”
Reframe:
“I trade rigidity for relationship. I speak with nuance, not nostalgia.”
💭 Reflection Prompt:
What scripts do you hear (or say) in moments of tension?
What would happen if you paused for presence instead of performance?
TALKING POINT 3:
Liberated Language Makes Room for Repair, Not Perfection
→ Explanation:
In relationships, we will misstep. We will say the wrong thing. We will center ego over empathy. But liberation doesn’t require perfection — it requires presence.
When we get it wrong, the most revolutionary question we can ask is: “Can we try that again?”
Thought-Terminating Clichés:
“I said what I said.”
“I’m not explaining myself again.”
Reframe:
“Love isn’t proven in being right. It’s deepened through repair.”
💭 Reflection Prompt:
How do you respond when you’re called in?
Where might you practice staying present instead of defensive?
Practice Your Praxis
Here’s how to carry this language work forward:
SELF:
Choose one relationship where your words have defaulted to scripts. Try a new phrase that honors nuance and consent.
HOME:
Start a family dialogue about one cliché or saying that no longer serves. Ask: What new language would invite more care here?
WORK:
Offer a reframing practice at your next team meeting. Challenge the idea that “that’s just how we’ve always said it.”
Word Medicine: Cosmology & Connection
Remember:
Language is not neutral.
It’s not just vocabulary, it’s a worldview.
When we use words rooted in hierarchy, we recreate domination.
When we choose words rooted in care, we create refuge.
It’s not about canceling people for the “wrong” word… it’s about calling ourselves into deeper awareness of how we wield language in power or in presence.
VOICE Liberation Spiral™
Want to go deeper? Practice the V.O.I.C.E. Liberation Spiral™ in moments of conflict or rupture:
V – Vibration: Tune into your body. Where does your truth live?
O – Opening: Speak it, even if messy.
I – Impact: Let it land. Let it change something.
C – Care: Soften where it hurts. Truth-telling is tender.
E – Evolution: Speak again. Speak freer. Let your voice grow.
Supporting the Work
Become a paid subscriber to help sustain this liberation work:
✨ $8/month
✨ $80/year
✨ $120/year Equity Partner
Scholarships available: scholarships@desireebstephens.com
Or gift a subscription to someone reclaiming their voice.
Final Reflection: Liberation is a Love Language
You weren’t born to rehearse someone else’s script.
You are here to remember a different tongue, the one your ancestors sang in the dark to call down the dawn.
The one your children are waiting to hear.
The one that doesn’t demand perfection, just presence.
The one that lets love be a liberation, not a leash.
Liberation is not just an action.
It’s an articulation.
It’s what we name.
What we reframe.
What we speak when no one else has the courage to say it first.
So if you’ve ever been told your words were too much, too sensitive, too angry, too direct —
Remember this:
Your voice is a liberation technology. Use it with care. Use it with courage. Use it until the cages crack open.
Speak it.
Stumble in it.
Return to it.
Because your voice is a portal. And you’re not too late to learn a new language of freedom.
In love, liberation, and lineage,
Desireé B. Stephens
Founder, Make Shi(f)t Happen
Liberation Educator | Cultural Reclaimer | Community Builder💌 Closing Blessing
Thank you to everyone who tuned into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.
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