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Altar and Sacred Space

People often ask me what exactly is on a Meso-American themed altar? This was my altar 29 March 2005. It changes often but it looks something like this most of the time.

This is my whole altar, which is in my meditation room. The picture is called "jaguar devouring a human heart" and it's painted on leather. I bought it in Belize and had it framed up here. The colors are even more amazing in person. The original carving is at Chichen Itza and I love it so much it's the basis for all the covers of my Jaguar Nights series of books.

Other objects: a singing bowl, a huge quartz (called Mom), my obsidian butterfly, a dragon, a feather fan, an obsidian ball (on the dragon's tail), candles, chalice in which to burn copal, crystal skull, Bast, and various other crystals and candles. My staff is leaning against it, and the cloth is a slinky metallic lizard skin fabric (which I originally used as wings when I was a fairy for Halloween a few years ago).

Here you can see the dragon, Bast, the skull, and the obsidian ball more clearly. Bast is wearing a selection of silver and gold scarab bracelets--she likes to feel pretty.

In one of the Call of Cthulhu (a role-playing game based on the writings of HP Lovecraft) rule books, in an entry about Bast in the monster section, it says something like "no people worship her anymore, but all cats worship her in their hearts" and for some reason that just makes me so sad for her. If you read the book Small Gods, a Discworld book by Terry Pratchett, it's about that very subject--gods who men have forgotten. It's also very sad, but my favorite Discworld book so far.

Here's my staff, one of my many Tibetan singing bowls, Mom the giant quartz, the feather fan, and the ashtray and chalice where I burn incense; also an obsidian egg. Next to the red feathers of the fan is a translucent 3d Flower of Life sphere I made a few years ago (it looks kind of like a lumpy ball in the photo)--it's used for manifestation. I teach how to use it (and give a template) in my Shamanism class.

Next is my sacred space, which is a nice way of saying I have too much stuff on my altar and it's spilled over onto the book case!

The green and gold plaque is also from Belize, it's the lid of Pacal's tomb from Palenque. The gray circular plaque is a Mayan calendar wheel (from Tulum, I think). Mom's in this picture too--she gets around--plus a pair of gargoyle book ends which are also candle holders, a dragon, a lot of shells and crystal wands (used for Reiki grids-when I have an active grid it's in this space), Reiki runes, a leather tray for grids, a round box made of ancient wood from New Zealand, and in the square wooden box is a turquoise-colored volcanic glass Reiki heart my friend gave me years ago.

This is the temporary altar we made during the last Shamanism class, 21 September 2013. It is based on the Earth Mask.

You can create your Mayan-Aztec altar in any way that pleases you. You can base it on the Earth Mask, or you can set it up like a Wiccan altar but with Mesoamerican themed implements, or a combination of the two.