My name is Caryn Maxim. I live in NJ but spend 2 weeks of each month in Cajola, a Maya Mam community in the western highlands of Guatemala. (The Mam people are one of the 22 Maya ethnic groups in Guatemala.) I have been helping a group of women start a weaving cooperative, MayaMam Weavers, over the past years. I would like to share with you some of their work, some of their stories, some of their wisdom, as well as why fair trade -- or trading fairly -- matters.
Thursday, March 7, 2013
MayaMam Weavers Our Destiny
You know that many of the symbols we embroider come from our collective memory -- sometimes without our knowing really what they mean! Here are two embroideries of the symbol for destiny. You can see that they also resemble a path! We Maya believe that we each have a "star" to follow, a mission in life. Part of our life's work is to figure out what that is! It means each person is born with certain talents (and weaknesses) that suit us for a particular role in life. One of the ways that we can recognize when we are NOT following on our path is that we are out of balance. That can show itself in illness, not getting along with our family or friends, just feeling miserable. We can look for a solution to our illness or other problems with the aid of a spiritual guide, most probably in a ceremony. Because of our close relationship with nature, nature communicates with us to indicate what we need to do to bring ourselves back into balance. Through ceremonies, reflections, and counseling by the spiritual guide we can identify what exactly is out of balance and work to correct it. that might mean that we discover we are not yet doing what our life's work is supposed to be, so we need to change our path.
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