Guatemalan Odyssey

I first saw Don Alejandro across a crowded hotel lobby in Guatemala City. Joseph, our coordinator, moved to hug him before introducing me. I hugged him also and was amazed by a surge of pure pink energy that leapt from my Heart into his. He excused himself quickly and retired to a nearby gents’. I could see that he was shaken. I too had been startled by this unexpected eruption but felt reassured by its utterly benevolent nature. 

When Don Alejandro (Tata) reappeared, he spoke only to Joseph. Then as our group assembled, he shook everyone’s hand but turned away on catching my eye. This was the opposite of what I had been hoping for. I hadn’t considered how our meeting might be but would have welcomed some sign of recognition.  I knew his sense of boundary had been violated and assumed this had happened for a reason that would eventually become clear.

The next morning we travelled to Tikal. It was late evening by the time we left our belongings at a hotel and walked to the Plaza at the heart of this old city. Once a splendid human habitation, Tikal was mysteriously abandoned by the Maya in the 9th century. It had been reclaimed by jungle but was now slowly being restored. Its ‘great square’ feels surprisingly familiar when we reach it. 

I kneel before the Jaguar Temple, as I had done many times in meditation over the preceding months. Connecting with what Tata calls the Heart of Earth and Heart of Heaven, I introduce myself to the place and its guardians. My meditation goes well up to a point where I am moved to relay energy from the Heart of Creation into Earth. 

This was necessary to trigger an opening that had been envisaged when, early in October, my meditation reached a stage of calling energies of Creation into my Heart. I then saw an image of the Jaguar Temple in which its crown was blown open, making it available for renewed cosmic communion. Human amnesia, violence and neglect had evidently decommissioned it in this respect.

It was just before this point in my meditation that the sense of blockage arose. It felt like an inhibiting force that was coming from me rather than the place. This had to do with respect for my Mayan hosts and was certainly exacerbated by Tata’s wariness at my early enthusiasm. I had prepared carefully for this moment. Nevertheless it felt appropriate to stop, so I did. 

It is pitch dark on our way back to the Lodge. I walk the winding path alone, with no aid from artificial light, following a course laid down by fireflies flickering intermittently before me. Guided in this way, from one evanescent beacon to the next, I find my way to the edge of the jungle and a road leading to our chalets. 

After dinner Tata tells how his Ancestors, while living underground during the interval between the last world and our present one, followed subterranean tracks that opened for them via the appearance of mysterious lights in the darkness. It felt as if, by this telling, a measure of indirect acknowledgment had been given or at least received.

The next morning Tata addresses us before the Jaguar Temple. He says he was once told that the voices of his ancestors could be heard here. He felt uncertain and needed to find out, so one evening he hid in a side-building before the complex closed for the night. Later he came down into the deserted square and climbed to the top of the temple. There, in darkness, he tried to communicate with the stones. 

He found that he could hear his ancestors’ voices, but they were speaking a language he couldn’t understand. This was all he could tell us. If he said more he would be lying and if he lied to us, he would be lying to himself. These words brought me to a sudden realisation. I too had spent many hours, day and night, communing with the stones of my home place. The coherence of my tradition had also been devastated by invasion.

In a flash I see that I too come from an indigenous people whose colonisation has been so thorough that we can’t yet acknowledge the extent of our loss! We debate versions of political history but refer these to a past we believe to be complete, interpretations aside. And we so resemble our colonisers that there is little to distinguish us from them in terms of appearance. Our genetics have long been mixed but race is not the issue. Depth of cultural memory is. 

Specifically, the wisdom of ancestors who once resonated with the genius of my land has been destroyed. We have no teachers who admit the perils of lying to themselves. No one read my stars when I was born or blessed my other-worldliness and applauded my efforts to remember. This sensibility has effectively been lost. It is to rectify this that I have come to the land of the Maya, the keepers of memory. 

After a fire ceremony I am drawn back to the Square. Following the lead of my meditations and Tata’s example I sit facing the Jaguar Temple, hoping to sense what must be done. All my preparations are intact. There is nothing I can do but wait. For three and a half hours I sit, doing nothing, looking at the stones. Then, out of the blue, I am directed to the Temple of the Moon, located at the opposite end.

I ascend a wooden stair and am guided to a point opposite the upper levels of the Jaguar Temple. As I sit, I feel a gentle rumbling in the Earth below, followed by a wave of energy that rises up my spine and through the Temple’s pyramidal form. A vortex spirals gently down from the heavens in response. I feel then like a sailor drifting in a boat of stone. Gradually impressions stabilise and I know that something has ‘switched on.’ 

The Moon Temple feels alive in a way that it didn’t before. Its reconnection with Earth triggers an influx of sky energies. This restored confluence also triggers an activation of the Jaguar Temple. I sense a line of light running the length of the Square from the Temple of the Moon to that of the Sun. It too starts resonating. The whole structure seems to vibrate, sending waves of energy out in all directions. This feels like a message, indicating that a new level of preparedness has been achieved.

I glimpse the Light Geometry of the whole Plaza, which tells me that the temples operate in unison. I don’t often ‘see’ such detail but I did on this occasion and it was very clear. Singing will help to bridge the gap with ancestors and women working through the Moon Temple would be particularly effective in restoring lost lines of communion. I say this to Elizabeth, an English-speaking elder. I do so because I feel impelled to and don’t want to act like a thief in my hosts’ house.

The following night Tata invites questions from the group. I tell him how I spent years searching for teachers in my country and, finding none, had taken to visiting sacred places where I tried to learn by communing with them. My Heart gradually opened in this way. Eventually it led me to visit Guatemala. The most remarkable thing I had found since arriving was how much I loved his people. I asked if he had an explanation for this.

He answered that the Maya don’t negotiate; only Mayans can truly appreciate Mayan culture. He told us of an American woman who asked to be his student. He told her she was welcome in his house but advised her to return to the land of her ancestors and seek teachers there, not necessarily physical. She hadn’t been offended.

I wasn’t either, although I hadn’t asked to be a student and had already spent years doing what was now advised. I replied that while it is important for a flower to be rooted in its own soil, it blossoms for the whole world. Tata closed his eyes. After a while he said we should meditate on the image of human beings stepping out of flowers and thanked me for my question.

Then someone asked about the return of ancestors which had been prophesied for this time. Tata said we should not think of this in physical terms but in other ways (such as voices speaking through stone). Later he quoted a prophecy: ‘We are the ones of today, we were the ones of yesterday and we will be the ones of tomorrow.’

This struck me as a genuinely mystical statement that far exceeds its literal sense. Tata had previously said elders are born, not made, and that he himself was a returning ancestor whose mission had been recognised at birth and codified in his astrology. This suggests that ancestors incarnate repeatedly, contributing their wisdom in newly challenging times.

He was referring to Mayan culture specifically at that moment but it is clear that former Mayans might incarnate in other cultures too, especially in times of great awakening. Elisabeth had already said that this is why so many people now feel drawn to visit. Indeed, Tata said on another occasion that ‘ancestors’ are now returning as ‘people of wisdom’ who are moved from within to remember knowledge that has largely been forgotten. 

I understood then why he felt disposed to see me as a student but there is also more involved. The Mayan precept ‘In lak’sch’ (you are another myself) isn’t constrained by racial boundaries but healing is needed to secure this awareness now that boundary violation (invasion) has occurred. 

Oneness asks us to open beyond wounding in such moments. Being spiritual doesn’t mean that problems won’t arise but rather that they can be processed as they do. I think of my first hug and Tata’s response. Politeness might have prevented this transmission had it not happened innocently. The only thing conveyed was love, yet it raised issues of mis/trust which evidently needed raising.

I recall visiting Egypt with a spiritual group some years before. We were warmly greeted then as returning ancestors. It felt wonderful to be accorded this status of belonging and welcomed Home. I realise that my soul has been hungry for specific acknowledgement on this occasion and that Tata has seemed at pains to withhold it.

Later that week I ask him about the history of the Maya and its significance for other peoples. He tells a ‘creation story’ in response. His recitation is clear, eloquent and unfaltering. I am caught in a cleft between worlds: that of a people ruthlessly exploited by outside interest and that of a returning prodigal for whom no feast has been ordained.

Tata pauses then and looks at me. Unbidden, my fingers trace an opening of my Inner Heart and extend its blessings to him. He looks down and resumes his story. After the Maya of Central America, civilizations with the same source arose in Egypt, China and India. This is the significance of Mayan history for other peoples.

After his Creation Story, I see that Tata speaks from the authority of Tradition. He does so as a Voice for all First People, true humans who pray to remember who they are and where they are from. As custodians of this deep memory, the Maya can’t negotiate; nor can Tata as their leader permit dilution of a Truth they have struggled for so long to preserve. This Truth runs deeper than our facts. Hence I don’t protest his tale as a non-Big Bang account of literal creation. 

Indeed, Mayan mythology describes a series of Worlds that existed prior to ours. Each was destroyed by the gods as it became clear that it would not produce full human beings. Survivors languished in underground caves during dark intervals between them. Tata’s story refers to human re-emergence after the last such interval, most likely that between the Third World and our waning Fourth.

The next day we reach Lake Atitlan. I perceive it as a vital centre from which civilisations might once again spring forth. That night, I dream of being kissed by a beautiful woman. At first I see only her face. Stepping back I see that her body is immense and made of stars. Tata says it is a good dream and means that the Earth is welcoming me home. 

Later he reads my astrology. As he speaks, my brow opens 360 degrees. I say nothing.  All the questions I had been saving for this moment fall away. Everything feels intrinsically, inherently clear. Next morning, we sit together on a long bus ride back to Guatemala City. No words are spoken.

[From The Calendar and the Grail, volume 1- Tantra of the New Grail (2013). See under ‘Books.’]