Year of the Hummingbird

“The hummingbird may be tiny, but its energy is powerful and impressive.” -Kenneth Johnson

The Mayan New Year began yesterday. It’s the Year of the Hummingbird, as the year bearer is 13 Iq’.

Each day in the sacred Mayan calendar consists of a number between 1 and 13 combined with one of the 20 nawales, adding up to 260 unique days. In the sacred calendar, the 20 day signs (nawales) always cycle in the same order, and each carries certain themes and meanings. Each day sign is paired with a number from 1 to 13, and the numbers also have unique significance.

The nawal Iq’ represents the winds of change, imagination, and communication. It brings renewal and purification through the element of air. Iq’ takes numerous forms, from a raging tornado to the gentlest breeze, reminding us of the constant presence of Spirit.

When embodied, Iq’ is breath and therefore life itself. By paying attention to it, we thrive and become fully present in the moment.

Iq’s spirit animal is the hummingbird, which also relates to the path of beauty and imagination. Iq’ invites us to let go of the concepts and beliefs that no longer serve or benefit. Iq’ beckons us to the creation of art in all forms.

The Maya also have a 365-day solar calendar that they use to assign a “year bearer” or “year lord” each February. The year bearer affects us as a macro, big-picture influence on collective consciousness. It helps determine the ethos, zeitgeist, trend, or sign of the times. It is a subtle energy underlying our main nawal.

According to Kenneth Johnson’s book, Mayan Calendar Astrology: Mapping Your Inner Cosmos, Iq’ “is one of the four Year Lords; and, according to the Maya, it is the most potentially dangerous of the four. During an Iq’ year, one may expect events that batter the world with the force of a tropical storm. This is a year the Maya associate with revolutions, insurrections, and political disturbances of all kinds.” (Sounds about right.)

Thirteen is the number of spirit, ancestors, channeling, and divine connection. As the highest number in the sacred Mayan calendar system, 13 represents our cosmic connection with life and other dimensions beyond the veil. The high charge of this energy brings a strong push of guidance from the spirit world and the ancestors, giving us messages, signs, and directions on our path if we are open to it.

Thirteen days (and years!) invite us to surrender to the higher purpose of life. They may bring strong changes that catalyze us into evolution. The year 13 Iq’ gives us a powerful ability to bridge the spirit world into the physical world and to cultivate beauty, clear communication, and meaningful change.

Ode to Iq’, Oscar, and Yoga

Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve loved cats, writing, and yoga. Practicing yoga and conscious breathing has saved, enhanced, and transformed my life in myriad ways. Likewise with journaling. I loved keeping a secret diary as a child and I still have a suitcase full of old notebooks starting from age 10 documenting my adolescent whims, thoughts, and feelings.

Moving to Guatemala in 2009 immediately opened up my schedule and emptied my life of social and familial obligations, giving me the precious time and mental space to do more personal yoga practice, meditation, and writing. That’s when I started writing for Elephant Journal and launched my personal blog. Having pet cats around me has also been a lifesaver. 

I love dogs, but I’m for sure a cat person. When I moved to Guatemala, I brought my five-pound teacup Chihuahua, Lucy, who was in some ways more like a cat than a dog. About six months after her tragic death in late March 2011, I adopted a kitten. Oscar was a beautiful black cat that I adopted in Panajachel on a whim when he was a four-month old kitten.

At the time, I was still living in Guatemala City and teaching at the American School, so I loaded Oscar up into my car and drove us from Lake Atitlan back to the capital. As a baby kitten, he’d been thrown away with the rest of the litter of his brothers and sisters at the garbage dump, evidently by some people who think black cats are bad luck or simply did have the means to care for and feed the cats. Hence my roommate suggested the name Oscar for Oscar the Grouch. He was not a grouch though; he was quite loving, perhaps because kind humans rescued and bottle-fed him.

I was fortunate to cross paths with Oscar and live with him for over 13 years. Oscar was ultimately patient and calm. He actually brought me great luck: a few months after adopting him, I met my partner, moved to Lake Atitlan, and started a family. Oscar and I moved back to his hometown, Panajachel, in June of 2012, and moved in with my partner. Our daughter was born in January 2013. Oscar withstood the invasion of not only a human child, but also our adoption of numerous dogs and cats over the years with relative ease and equanimity. He loved hanging out with the fur and human family.

The older he got, the more voracious he became about eating human food. He really appreciated it when we dropped our vegetarian diet and began eating more chicken and fish and even the occasional pizza hawaiana (with pineapple and ham). He adored canned tuna and wet dog food and would meow incessantly at the sight (and smell) of those foods. Otherwise, he was quiet and stoic and rarely meowed. Oscar was intuitive, affectionate, and wise.

Oscar was a unique and special kitty. He was a zen master in a black fur coat and a lover of many human foods—olives, yogurt, peanuts, cantaloupe, and refried beans, to name just a few. Era un gato fino. He was a fine cat.

Last summer, when my family and I were embarking on a road trip from Texas to California and Oregon, our house sitter alerted us to the fact that Oscar had been missing for several days. I immediately began to sob upon receiving her message, feeling certain that Oscar had died. Our family went into grieving for Oscar, knowing that he rarely left the house for more than a few hours.

He was always around us, as he loved people. I’d never known him to disappear even for one day, much less five. Then, eight days after his disappearance, he came home as good as new, although notably skinnier. It felt like a miracle!

Then, on 13 Ajmaq in the sacred Mayan calendar (January 23), Oscar disappeared again. For several days, I held out hope that he would return unscathed as he had before. Then, thanks to the guidance of a dear friend and Mayan spiritual guide, I was able to accept the fact that Oscar is no longer with us in his physical form.

Now he is free and a part of everything. This ending with my beloved cat is also the beginning of a new cycle that is yet to be defined. While I am sad that he will no longer be sitting on my lap, begging for a bite of peanut butter, or lazing with me in the hammock, I’m so grateful for the sweet and meaningful years we spent together.

Gracias por todo, Oscarincho. Te amo por siempre. (Thanks for everything. I love you forever.)

Two more magical stories about things that happened the week after Oscar’s departure.

So, 32 years ago (this month!), I found yoga in the form of a paperback how-to book by an author named Richard Hittleman. I was in seventh grade. Roughly a decade later, at age 22, I started teaching yoga. I’m now 44.

When I was in college at UT-Austin, my parents gave me two books for Christmas, circa 2000. They were Power Yoga and Beyond Power Yoga by Beryl Bender Birch. I read those books religiously and learned sun salutations from them, as well as many other things beyond asana (all the other limbs of yoga, such as pranayama, yamas, and niyamas). So on February 2, I went to Villa Sumaya to an afternoon orientation meeting to meet that week’s retreat group—which was led by none other than Beryl Bender Birch.

The guru herself, now in her early 80s, was in attendance at the meeting and I shared the story with her and the other people who were there. Beryl and I connected after the meeting and she expressed interest in having a personal Mayan reading with me. I decided to offer it to her for free, as a way of saying thank you for helping launch my personal yoga practice and yoga teaching career.

We had the session that Friday, February 7, and it was such a brilliant moment of sharing, insight, karmic connection, and joy. I am forever grateful and am even considering attending Beryl’s yoga retreat in Oaxaca, Mexico this year during Day of the Dead. I’ve long wanted to go to Oaxaca but haven’t yet been.

That same week, my close friend and neighbor invited me to do a sauna at her house, along with a yoga teacher named Alison who’d led a retreat the previous week at Villa Sumaya. Long story short, I’ve signed up to attend Alison’s retreat in Glastonbury, England, during the first week of June. I lived in London for the fall semester of 1999, so this return to the UK will be another full circle moment and one that I’m greatly looking forward to for myriad reasons.

May you embrace the winds of change and walk the path of beauty with imagination, clear communication, and creative flow during this potent Mayan year of the Hummingbird!