Mayan Calendar Countdown

I change my background image every week at work & I was looking for something for the New Year.

There's a mini Aztec Sun Stone in a glass case over my desk, so I found a big picture of the stone from the museum in Mexico. After added some lighting effects, extending the background, & cropping, I had a desktop image -

click to enlarge

I am always amazed by the stark differences cultures can have in things like keeping time or cosmology. There's endless ways to describe the Universe, & humanity has experimented with all kinds...

"Maya Shamanism and 2012:
A Psychedelic Cosmology"

In the video below, Daniel Pinchbeck describes the Mayan intellectual elite as "shamanic scientists."

I think is a great description because the scientific knowledge of Mayan culture was extremely accurate - it just had crazy creative mythic themes intertwined with it.

The mystical aspect of reality is something all of history's most brilliant scientists have pondered, even in the West. You can't look closely into the reality we inhabit without being overwhelmed by the sheer craziness of our situation.



All the talk of 2012 being either a Doomsday or an Ascension of some sort will hopefully amount to nothing. I think there are an infinite number of cosmic disasters that could happen at any second & wipe this entire planet out- regardless of what 'B'ak'tun' the Mayan calendar is running on.

Still, it is amazing that these ancient people encoded their perception of the universe in such an elaborate way. Looking at something like the Aztec Sun Stone is amazing just from the perspective of a powerful image. When you study the glyphs & the layout and start to understand the symbolism, it's an even more impressive work of art.