Energy available to conscious beings drives and fuels the impact or consequences of their intentions.
Storms, volcanoes, earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, lightning, blizzards, solar flares, comets, meteorites, tsunamis all harness or release immense energy, and have enormous consequences (from our perspective).
These events' appearance, occurrence, and magnitude have been and continue to be consistently unpredictable and surprising.
These catastrophic events are either constructs of collective consciousness or the direct results of the intent of one or more individuated forms of consciousness or (entities).
That is to say, the Earth is alive and aware. The mountain that erupts does so by choice. The wind blows because it wants to, or the Earth wants it to, or a cloud intended it so.
It is as plausible that an entire planet or star is a self-aware conscious being or entity as it is that your dog or your ficus bonzai or a plankton is.
Attention and intent aimed inward and out fit neatly into the character of an enormous planetary body, or a moon thereof, or of a star fusing oodles of atoms maniacally to heat the system.
Just as it is with whales, whose brains outclass ours in processing power and whose bodies could swallow us whole, why too could not the barrier be language? Or really couldn't the barrier be attention (or lack thereof) between we meager but triumphant self-obsessed bipedal opposable meatbags and the monsters of the depths and the heavens?
As for the Old Gods and the New, all are conscious just like me and you.