My Nawal

Nearly everytime I spend a few hours hanging around the Tecnico Maya school I seem to pick up a little more knowledge of what exactly modern-day Guatemalan´s believe are the religious, spiritual and cultural foundations of their Maya ancestors. At the school they teach the mathematics, calendars and language of the Maya, developing much of their curriculum from the Consejo Nacional de Educacion Maya (the national Maya education council), which conducts research, publishes educational materials and advises Maya education programs, such as Tecnico Maya.
The teachers at Tecnico Maya and other indigenous peoples of Guatemala are currently in a common position for Native American groups in the 20th and 21st Centuries. They are attempting to accurately and sufficiently preserve their culture in the new generations, while adapting and assimilating to the rapidly changing modern world. Thus, the curriculum at Tecnico Maya has shed much of the ritualism and superstition that it is still practiced and preached by many Maya priests.
So, for example, they teach that the beheading of a chicken in a sacrificial ceremony, a fairly common occurance at many Maya ruins here, is an antiquated practice, that is not in agreeance with the Maya belief in respecting all of God´s creations in nature. The teachers at Tecnico Maya also tell me that the Maya believed in one, universal God, which they call Ajaw. This is in contrast to what is taught academically in the U.S. about the Maya, which is that they were polytheistic in the pre-Colonial era, worshiping the many gods of the different natural elements of the earth. I have been told that the Spanish colonizers assumed the Maya were polytheistic because they had ceremonies for their maiz crops and for rainfall, and therefore the Conquistadores assumed they were praying to individual Gods on each occasion. In reality, the Maya believe in one God, who is the universal creator, and the Maya Nawales or Gods of fire, rain, healthy birth, and abundant corn-crop, for example, the images that can be seen carved into the sides of the great Maya pyramids, are earthly essences or representations of the one God, Ajaw.
The other day I was fortunate enough to have my Nawal told to me by the teachers. A persons Nawal in the Maya religion is the equivalent of someones Zodiac sign, as they are believed to determine a persons personality and life path. The Nawal is determined by one of the three Maya calendars. There is a lunar, solar and purely mathematical calendar, the last of which is used in this case. There are thirteen Nawales or characters which represent different personality traits or destinies. These thirteen symbols are numbered one to thirteen as well, with thirteen being the strongest number and one the weakest. A persons Nawal is then broke into three groups, 1)Nacimiento-Birth trait, 2)Origen-Your purpose or calling in life, 3)Esperanza-Your destiny for later life.
Being born on April 9th, 1984, I have a 12 No´j, 4 Toj, and 7 Kan. A 12 No´j in first category is apparently very good because it means that I have a strong number, 12, and No´j means sabiduria in Spanish or wise, intelligente, or thinker. 4 Toj is pretty good as well. It means I have a small debt to God, and have to do some of his work throughout my life. The last, 7 Kan, sounds good to me as well. It means that I will have a decent amount of peace when I am old. Here´s hoping all of your Nawales are as good as mine.