Imagine the Maya’s who developed their calendar many centuries ago and concluded that December 21st, 2012 was going to be this exciting date at the beginning of a new era. How eager would they have been to be part of this great transition. Well, you are part of it!
When Alberto Villoldo was in the Amazon earlier this year, he found the shamans who live there in a deep state of preparation. They believe that beyond the end date of the Mayan calendar on December 21, 2012, lies the chance for a reinvention of humanity. Therefore, they are fasting and praying, says Villoldo, who has spent more than 30 years in the Andes and the Amazon training with them. The shamans are preparing their brains and bodies for the coming of a new age.
There are people who speak of December 21 as the end of civilization or humanity. Villoldo stresses it’s not. “The Mayans and the indigenous people of the Americas saw this time as a tipping point,” he explains. “It is the beginning of a new cycle.” An important characteristic of this new cycle is that people will not experience a difference anymore between their inner and outer worlds. This has enormous consequences for all of us, Villoldo believes, because “in the new cycle, you can only change the world by changing your inner life.”
December 21 is the end date of a more than 5,000-year-long cycle in the Meso-American Long Count calendar. This calendar was used by several cultures that lived in the Americas before Columbus; the Mayans are the best known. It is a date that people have been looking forward to with anticipation, joy, fear or dread. For Villoldo, December 21 represents the advent of a new world, which he—a modern medicine man, trained in psychology and old shamanistic wisdom—doesn’t dread at all. He sees it as a time filled with opportunities. “There are predictions of hunger and plagues. But I’m still optimistic. I believe that everyone is born to make a difference,” he told The Intelligent Optimist in a 2006 interview.
Don’t miss the interview with Alberto Villoldo about the meaning of December 21, 2012, in our upcoming November/December issue, and this interactive online course we are organizing with Villoldo about what December 21, 2012 could mean in your life.
Photo: flickr.com/sashapo
