The Muse :: Issue Four :: December 2012

Farewell 2012. So long Sandy and lingering denial of climate change. Goodbye costly, drawn-out, exhausting election campaigns and the last shred of worry that the US presidency may go to the wrong guy. And adieu, at long last, to the hysteria about the supposed end of the Mayan Calendar that has been intensifying for the past several months (this is something I know a thing or two about). On December 22, the world will peek out from under its pillows in the underground bunkers and realize those credit card bills, gosh darn them, are still due.

Our own Gregorian calendar ends each year this month. And each December, we wind down, slow down, relax; spend quality time with our holiday shopping lists; hand-sew reusable gift bags so as not to pollute the earth with more packaging whose lifespan makes centenarians out of mayflies; politely yield to other calm holiday shoppers in ample parking lots; and loll about in lavender-scented bubble baths planning a perfect 2013.

Ha, ha. In our dreams! A few days before Thanksgiving my inbox exploded with sudden requests from current clients, past clients, even new future clients. It's ramp-up time. Press releases, product announcements, holiday drives, and yes, eLetters (mine is exempt of course!)

The end of the year has this curious bell curve that rises exponentially starting around mid-November and crashing just before Christmas.

It's normal. We realize how little time is left before "the end" and rev up accordingly.

Here's the secret. LET IT GO. All the stress, all the headaches, all the rush. If you can make one more shopping trip, great. If you can send out one more press release, fabulous. If you can secure one more client for 2013, power to you. If not, no worries. At the end of the day (er, year), what do you think you will remember—and enjoy remembering—more: the mad blur you can't distinguish from the mad blur of any other year, or times spent doing the things you really want with the people you really love—or simply on your own?

Speaking of 2012 and all of the shifts in consciousness, awareness and human evolution that December 21 is supposed to usher in—and since I did write a book about the Mayan Calendar—I figured I'd do a blog post too while I'm at it. It's called "Only once in five thousand years."

It's already attracted a bucketful of comments. Enjoy! I'll see you on the other side of the next 5,125-year cycle.

Update on the Limited Edition gift set of "The Serpent and the Jaguar" and the Camino del Sol CD: the gift sets are flying off the shelves and we now have a truly "limited" number of them left (as in, only 11 as of this writing!)

So if you're still scratching your head about what to get your friends and loved ones for the holidays, do the personal unique signed-by-my-friend-the-author-on-the-eve-of-2012 thing! They'll still talk about it next year.

And the CD is great by itself. As heavily into music as I am, I wouldn't have picked anything less than Camino del Sol for the companion album to my book.

Send your loved one a giftset today.

The mystery location for my writer's retreat is revealed! Read on!

NOVEMBER 21, 2012. Well, this is just too sweet not to mention. My little sister presented my book The Serpent and the Jaguar to her 7th grade class for "Show & Tell". Of all the talks I've done and will ever do, this is the kind of thing that melts your heart. I really wish I could have been a fly on the wall for that one!

DECEMBER 2012 - JANUARY 2013. Now about that mystery location I'm running off to. A few hints... I'll be wrestling giant black piranhas (aka "capa-burros"), braving the twists and turns of some of the world's most ancient rivers, and writing my next literary work in a hammock strung among wild guava trees.

Sound like a National Geographic extreme adventure? Nah... that's baby stuff! The place is Colombia, and I'll be there for most of December and January. Will report from the field in the next issue of The Muse--and on the Pen Parentis blog as a special guest.

DECEMBER 15-22, 2012, dawn local time, Copán, Honduras.
Shannon Kring Buset, director of the lauded documentary "2012 The Beginning", will read the daily energies from The Serpent and the Jaguar on each day of the tour "The Great Return: Copán 2012" in Honduras. Wish I could be there in person but... as I said I'll be wrestling giant black piranhas.

FEBRUARY 21, 2013, 12:15 - 1pm.
"The Maya in All of Us: Living in Sacred Time"
Center for Latin American Studies (CLAS), Stanford University.
The title says it all—the Maya live in harmony with the natural cycles of time and nature; there's more than a little we in the West can learn from that. I'm honored to have been invited to speak at CLAS. It's a long way since my undergrad years attending cultural meetings in that same building — even before I spoke Spanish.

This event is open to the public.

FEBRUARY 28, 2013, 9 – 11am.
"The Sanctity of Time: Why Modern Society Needs the Ancient Tzolk'in"
Divine Science Community Center, San Jose, California.
I'll be spending the morning of Feb. 28 talking about our most precious commodity—our time.

This event is open to the public but an RSVP is strongly recommended: contact the Divine Science Center with your name and contact information.

For more on my talks and presentations, visit my author's site.

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