Commentary: Searching For Aztlán—Part IV (final part)

By David Magallanes/ Guest contributor

When I was young and my parents would take me and my siblings to Mass on Sundays, we would pass through the main doors at the back of the church, entering the vestibule as the ushers handed my parents the weekly bulletin. At this time, we children knew that we needed to start transitioning from our normal rambunctious behavior (i.e., taunting and tormenting each other) to a more serious demeanor, because once we passed through the inner set of doors and entered the sanctuary of the church, we had to be on our best behavior because we were going to be in “God’s presence,” as it was explained to us.

The ideas and concepts presented in this series of articles over the past three weeks have brought us to the vestibule of the Kingdom of Aztlán, historically a place in Mesoamerica whose geographical location is not quite nailed-down by historians. In one form or another, Aztlán was the ancestral home of the Aztecs, the de facto rulers of Mexico, in their Camelot days before the thrashing — not to mention “trashing” — of their existence at the hands of Hernán Cortés, Conqueror of Mexico, and his soldiers.

But as we peered deeply into the existential questions surrounding Aztlán, we discovered that for all of us, but especially for Chicanos and Mexicanos, Aztlán is the shining city within our minds, a structure of such great magnificence that it gives us the ability to realign our thinking — and hence our lives — with all that the universe provides to make our lives a more joyful, peaceful, meaningful experience. “Peaceful” doesn’t necessarily mean “pacifistic,” for we may be called to fight the good fight against discrimination, unfairness, racism or any of the many forms of evil. But we will be more “peaceful” in the sense that we will know that with our access to the keys of Aztlán, we are accomplishing what we were born to do, opening the unique channels of creation with which we were designed. Once we are firmly entrenched in the mindscape that is Aztlán, we will grow in age and wisdom. We will rejoice and grieve and live in the aura of the greatest philosophers, poets, teachers and sages of all time, including the likes of Nezahualcoyotl of Texcoco and Xayacamach of Tizatlán, who had laid a foundation on which their contemporaries and future generations could perceive a reality not apparent to the casual observer (and most of us are “casual observers”!).

I recall my recent visit to the Griffith Planetarium in Los Angeles. I was sharing with my grandson my love of all things astronomical. One of the displays depicted the wide spectrum of electromagnetic waves emanating from myriad sources in our known universe. However, we humans can see what we perceive as light only within an exceedingly small window of frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum. Most of this spectrum is invisible to us. We may see a source of heat, for example, but we can’t “see” heat. For this reason, it wasn’t until recently with modern instrumentation that we became aware of “X-ray stars” and other fascinating, other-worldly objects that heretofore had been hidden from us. When things are hidden from us, our knowledge base and wisdom are limited until such time as those things are rendered visible. Kind of like the time one of my young stepsons had thrown an apple into the toilet and of course flushed. Until that apple was rendered visible, why the [expensive] drain specialist couldn’t unstop the toilet was a mystery…

In the same manner, an Aztlánian existence gives us access to a very wide spectrum of reality that was previously not available to us, thereby limiting our ability to experience the life for which we were intended. Why work miserably say, as an accountant (don’t get me wrong — accounting is a noble and necessary activity), when we could instead expand our natural talents joyfully as a scientist or elementary school teacher?

Living in Aztlán means being able to work through the challenges (as opposed to “settling” or “giving up”), choosing relationships that help us grow (rather than those that make us despondent or angry), pursuing careers and vocations for which we are uniquely suited and that give us great satisfaction. It means raising children or influencing youth to pursue their dreams, for those dreams are the very essence of Aztlán.

Having an awareness of Aztlán means that when the ride is over, when we have spent our lives according to the template in our souls forged in Aztlán, we will look back, declare that it was good, and prepare to merge with the gods, whether to us “the gods” means the Buddhist Nirvana, the Aztec Tamoanchan, or the Christian heaven with God and all the saints.

This concludes our series on “Aztlán.” Searching for Aztlán never ends. It’s just like studying math or science (or accounting!), or playing golf or tennis: there’s always more to learn, no matter how long you do it.

— David Magallanes is the creator of his own enterprise, Real World Projects, a business primarily dedicated to building distribution outlets for highly reputable products that offer a healthier life and a more vibrant lifestyle.  An emerging branch of Real World Projects is Edifiquemos, a Spanish language enterprise dedicated to teaching the Spanish-speaking how to create a profitable international (U.S./Mexico) enterprise with low investment and high earning potential.   David may be available for speaking opportunities.  To contact him and for more information, you are invited to visit and explore his web sites at www.realworldprojects.info and at www.edifiquemos.com