THE AMAZING MAYA: Could the Secrets of the Maya hold the Key to our Future?

Are you feeling as though time is speeding up and there just isn’t enough of it anymore? Concerned about earth changes, global warming, and the future of humanity and the planet? Perhaps the cosmovision of the ancient Maya and the Mayan Calendar can provide some
answers – and clues to our future.

Maybe you’ve heard something about predictions for 2012. Will there be a human evolutionary leap of unprecedented proportions leading to a golden age of peace and bliss? Will there be apocalyptic global catastrophe? Astronomers tell us that in December 21, 2012 our sun will be in alignment with the center of the Milky Way galaxy. This alignment of the December solstice sun with our galactic equator occurs only once in every 26,000 years.* This is bound to have a profound effect on our earth. No one is quite sure what, at this point.

According to independent researcher and Mayan calendar expert John Major Jenkins, December 21, 2012 marks the end of the Long Count of their sacred calendar, a period of 5,200 years beginning in 3114 BC.* Other cultures have similar prophecies about some kind of major ending in 2012: the Hopis and other Native American peoples, the Vedic astrologers of ancient India, the Egyptians, Kabbalists, Essenes, Qero elders of Peru, the Dogon Tribe in Africa, and the Aborigines in Australia. There are even alchemical inscriptions purported to describe the end of the world on a 300 year old Cross monument at Hendaye, a small Basque town..

International Mayan Elder and Mayan Calendar researcher Barbara Hand Clow writes: “We are on the brink of powerful changes and the Mayan Calendar actually describes how each being on Earth will coalesce into oneness as the spiral of time propels our species into enlightenment during a few short years.”** That is, she and others believe, if we raise our consciousness, create peace in the world and transcend whatever happens on the physical plane in 2012. For the Mayas, this will be the fourth time the world will “end” and a new cycle, a new “sun,” begin. Their idea of evolution was – and is, for there are still indigenous Mayas who remember and practice the old ways -- that the Creator has been trying to create a being who could worship and communicate with the Gods properly. Up until now His/Her experiments have not succeeded.

There is much mystery about the ancient Maya. How could these people, who had no telescopes, no metal, not even the wheel (except as a child’s toy!) have built such complex and awe inspiring temples and cities, have known more than we do (with all our science) about time and the cosmos? For the Maya, science and religion were one and the same

The epic movie “Apocalypto” exposed millions of people to images of Mel Gibson’s version of ancient Mayas as savage and violent worshippers of Gods that demanded bloody human sacrifice and torture. According to contemporary Mayan elders, this is a sadly distorted and false picture of the essence of Mayan culture. Leonide Martin, author of the visionary novel “Dreaming the Maya Fifth Sun,” writes: “The true legacy of the ancient Maya is a vision that connects humans intimately with the galaxy. They were master astronomers who understood the cycles that tie earth life to the movements of the stars. All the forces of nature were alive to the Maya, they were consummate observers and based their conclusions on meticulous observance of nature’s laws. They also knew how to communicate with these forces through mystical techniques of spiritual development.” (www.mayafifthsun.com)

Did you know that there are Mayan statues showing priests in the full lotus position, meditating? The ancient Mayans clearly practiced a system of mind/body cultivation. Hunbatz Men, the internationally renowned Mayan calendar daykeeper, shaman and authority on Mayan culture, writes in “Secrets of Mayan Science/Religion”: “The very word yoga exists in Mayan. Written yok’hah, it combines yok, “above” or ‘on top of ‘ and hah, ‘truth.’” He says the Mayans had a sophisticated understanding of the body energy centers and the function of this spiritual energy in the process of human development and enlightenment.

According to Hunbatz Men, the Maya were the first to recognize and use the value of zero in their mathematics. The Mayan calendar has been proved to be uncannily accurate in predicting past lunar and solar eclipses and, according to Swedish Biologist Carl Calleman, also predicted just about all of the movements of recorded history.^^

Hunbatz Men finds evidence that the antecedents of the Mayas actually seeded the great cultures of the world such as Egypt, China, India and Greece. ### Did the Mayans come from Atlantis? Miguel Angel, former Director of Tourism at Chichen Itza and Nagual Master, says they definitely did. He refers to evidence from satellite photos of granite pyramids and boulevards and giant crosses inscribed in stone, taken by National Geographic in 2001 (and discovered by underwater expeditions before then) which prove conclusively that Atlantis is not just a myth. It once existed between the Yucatan and Cuba on the former island of Poseiden, in the Burmuda triangle area. Images of the catastrophic eruption that sunk Atlantis were found inscribed inside Mayan pyramids. *****

There are still many questions unanswered questions about the Maya. There are an estimated 3,000 archeological sites related to the Mayans in the Yucatan peninsula alone, only about half of them excavated. Yet, most of these Mayan sites were abandoned between 800 and 900 AD and large numbers of Mayans disappeared. Granted there is new evidence of a great drought at that time, where are the bones, the burial sites? Few exist.

Here are just a few more intriguing questions:

How did the Maya come to their understanding of a system of temporal and spiritual time, intermeshed like gears, including the movements of the sun, moon and Venus?

Why did the Maya value crossed eyes and flatten their foreheads by strapping boards to the heads of their babies?

Why did the Mayas and Aztecs so readily accept the Christian cross?

Women were just as important in ancient Mayan society as men, but represented in a more hidden way. Priestesses and important queens are documented. What was it really like to be a woman in an ancient Mayan city, and how were the feminine deities represented?

If you really want to understand the Maya, and experience first hand some of the mysteries built into their ancient temples, you must be lucky enough to meet and study with an authentic Mayan shaman and ceremonial leader. If the idea of such an adventure captures your heart and imagination, Turtle Island Coaching of San Diego is offering an eight day trip, January 21 to 28, 2008 to Merida on the North coast of the Yucatan where you will have this opportunity. You will meet Hunbatz Men who will give you a tour and a preview of his visionary international community Lol Be, not far from Merida, which he is creating to provide a place for the indigenous Maya to do ceremony and to establish a residential international community (www.themayas.com.mx).

Hunbatz Men will explain some of the basics of the Mayan cosmovision, and participants will have the privilege of joining him to be initiated into the spiritual energies of Chichen Itza, the post class Mayan site, about an hour from Merida. Dominating the center of Chichén is the Temple of Kukulcan (the Maya name for Quetzalcoatl). This step pyramid with square terraces has stairways up each of the 4 sides to the temple on top. On the Spring and Fall equinox, at the rising and setting of the sun, the sunlight falls in such a way as to make it appear that the serpent God Kukulcan is descending the north staircase of the pyramid to earth, symbolizing the joining heavenly and earthly powers, witnessed by thousands each year.

On the Turtle Island Coaching tour, you will learn about Mayan goddesses, most of them unfamiliar to us moderns but very important to the Maya. Lenonide Martin will lead a tour to elegant Uxmal, one of the best restored and appealing Mayan sites. Each Maya temple city has its own unique character. Uxmal was built mostly between 700 and 1100 AD, and was known as a “university” for the Mayans, a center of learning and initiation. The surprise you will find here is the special balance of male and female forces. This is evident when you first enter and view the imposing feminine temple (a fact not even mentioned in most guide materials) with its rounded corners and cervix-like entranceway, which forms the back half of the well-known masculine “Pyramid of the Magician.” At Uxmal, you will experience an absolutely amazing energy effect built into the stone throne of the Ruler in the courtyard in front of the Palace, and still completely active today. This is just one example of a spiritual energy “secret” you would be highly unlikely to discover without an initiated guide or shaman.

On this week long tour there will be time as well for you to explore the culture-rich town of Merida, with its charming Spanish colonial architecture. You can shop for indigenous crafts at the local Mercado, enjoy the fabulous prices for clothes and gifts at other stores, stroll on the tree lined walks of the pleasant town square or “zocalo”, join locals for a drink, delicious Mexican food or a sorbet at a sidewalk café. Merida offers all the comforts of any international big city, plus the old colonial landmarks and Yucatan cultural charms. You will especially want to take a house tour, which leaves every morning from the square around 9:30, to see the elegant and unusual architecture of some of the old colonial homes, stylishly renovated by American and other international residents who came to Merida for a visit, fell in love with the city, and bought homes there. Merida is built on an ancient Mayan city, Ich’cantiho a Mayan name that means “Those who were born in the face of the sky.” The Maya believed the original settlers here were Star people connected with the Pleaides.####

Although Merida is inland, in forty five minutes by bus you can be in the laid back and inviting port town of Progreso, with its jade green sea, craft shops, and seaside open air restaurants offering fresh fish.

There are only five short years before 2012. My experience with the shamans of Mexico and Guatemala has convinced me that learning what the Maya have to teach us is paramount to understanding what is going on in our world and how we should live our lives during this crucial time. My hope is that people of many different faiths will join me on this spiritual adventure.

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*see the works of John Major Jenkins, eg. “Galactic Alignment: The transformation of Consciousness According to Mayan, Egyptian and Vedic Traditions”, published by Inner Traditions, 2002 and other works

** article in “Vision Magazine” Sept 2007, “Time Acceleration and Awakening the World Mind,” by Barbara Hand Clow

^^ “The Mayan Calendar and the Transformation of Consciousness” by Carl Johan Calleman, Bear and Company

**** Hunbatz Men, “Secrets of Mayan Science/Region” Bear and Company 1990
#ibid

*****Leonide Martin, “Dreaming the Maya Fifth Sun: A Novel of Maya Wisdom and the 2012 Shift in Consciousness,” Infinity Publishing, 2006, website, www.mayafithsun.com.

****** Miguel Angel Seminar on Mayan cosmology, Merida, 2006.

## Wikepedia

###Hunbatz Men, “Secrets of Mayan Science/Religion”
#### notes from Miguel Angel (Former Director of Tourism at Chichen Itza) lecture, April 2007

Article Source: http://www.spiritarticles.com

Caite Mathis is a Life Coach and Founder of Turtle Island Coaching in San Diego, California. For information about her coaching and tours, including the "Journey to the Wisdom of the Maya" Jan 21-28, contact her at www.turtleislandcoaching.com. 619.565.5264 Part of her mission as a coach helping people to discover and follow the path of their heart is to educate them about the Mayan cosmovision. Caite has studied both Eastern and Western spiritual traditions, and lived in Mexico two years.

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