We Are All Students, We Are All Teachers

Since I don't have T.V. out here in the woods where I live, I miss those few programs that are worthwhile. I get Netflix, which allows me to be selective about what I see and when I see it.

I came across this DVD of a show put out by PBS NOVA that is a must see and a must have for anyone interested in studying Mayan Culture and the Hieroglyphs - Cracking the Maya Code. I highly recommend it.

Watching it, I realize how far the study has come since I was a graduate student studying glyphs for the first time in the early 80s. Watching the DVD, I saw many people I knew and associated with then. For just a moment, I regretted my decision to abandon that path. I might have become one of those people in the program.

At the time, however, and ever since then, I realized I could not play academic politics (nor any politics for that matter). This has never been possible for me. I have not felt it was worth becoming a false person or changing just to please people or get ahead. I'm not saying the people in the DVD did that. It's just that I didn't feel I could be myself in that environment.

My path has been of a different order. With that in mind, about 15 years ago, I got deeply involved in a spiritual path. My whole life was committed to it. I began to take on responsibilities and minor leadership, but, once again, politics (yes, even in spiritual groups there are politics), drove me out. Even though I was becoming part of 'the in-crowd', I was disappointed to see people jostling for a seat next to the Teacher. Competition turns me off.

I don't think there is anything wrong with accomplishment. People who work hard and achieve goals, of all types, merit reward or at least acknowledgement. But that is different from situations where people are put on pedestals and regarded as superior.

The Mayan rulers claimed the divine right to rule, as many rulers have through human history. They wrote about their connections to ancestor gods which made them 'special' and therefore entitled.

My favorite part of the DVD is at the end where they show Mayan children learning to read and write in hieroglyphs. That would have been worth working toward.

Currently, I am becoming the author of my own life. I bow to no authority. I have a direct relationship with the Spirit of Guidance. I don't need any intermediaries. I sit at no one's feet. This requires a level of trust that sometimes alludes me. I am challenged on a regular basis. There is no one else who has THE ANSWER. Some have a piece of the puzzle. I have to follow my inner guidance system, known as Intuition, to see what is true and what is not. We all do.