M any readers will be familiar with the works of Barbara Hand-Clow, who since the 1980s has been at the forefront of spiritual exploration having produced ten books, including The Pleiadian Agenda, The Mind Chronicles and Catastrophobia: The Truth Behind Earth Changes.
      Barbara Hand-Clow is also an international Mayan elder, Cherokee record keeper and internationally acclaimed ceremonial teacher. Her website is www.handclow2012.com.
      It is hardly a coincidence that her latest book has been written and presented in what the Mayans call the Xi Balba Bih, “the Road of Awe,” and the information Barbara presents is indeed awe inspiring.
      It’s hard to find anyone who would not agree that time is accelerating, but most of us are only vaguely aware of how, or when or even why.
      In this profound overview, Barbara Hand-Clow simplifies but does not demystify the delightful wisdom of the Mayan people of Central America laid down in stone centuries ago.
      During the past thirty years, three ancient calendars cycled to their end points. Currently the final ancient calendar, the Mayan Calendar, is due to end in 2012, or in 2011, depending upon the interpretation.
      The Mayan people were an amazing people with a profound civilisation. They made incredibly accurate calculations without the use of computers and their multi-level calendars map the spiritual energies that echo from the past into current time.
      For the most part, these calculations and codes have been a mystery. Whilst there are many interpretations, few have truly understood exactly what the Mayan message is.
      For Barbara Hand-Clow, their message is that we, as a species, are collectively caught up in a rapid spiritual acceleration and wave of evolution. This book is a deep exploration of how – as the end of the Mayan Calendar approaches – we can understand and embrace these huge changes.
      Through the use of Carl Johan Calleman’s information, as well as the ideas of other Mayan Calendar scholars, Barbara Hand-Clow examines 16.4 billion years of human evolution and decodes the creative patterns of the Earth world-mind. Time acceleration culminates in 2011 and then major consciousness changes occur towards the end of 2012. Hand-Clow believes that significant astrological influences will inspire us to attain oneness and enlightenment.
      One of the most valuable aspects of this book is that it codifies energy. As most spiritual seekers are aware, energy has a flavour, a feeling, a resonation, which is often hard to put into words. Some people appear to be more aware of energy than others, and there are those who tend, through fear and anxiety, to always colour any description of energy with negative connotations.
      What the Mayans accomplished is to put a stamp, or a code, on each energy layer, allowing those who came after to sense and understand what the energy is likely to produce as it flows through us, the “Earth-based energy transformer units.”
      There is no doubt that energy in of itself is neutral, but through our interpretation, and regurgitation, it is formed into physical expression. Therefore, it is vital that serious spiritual seekers understand universal energy, attune themselves to it, and train themselves to work or manipulate it in healthy and life-supporting ways.
      You might say this is our collective karma, or the collective soul-purpose we share with one another in this world. Each generation, each timeframe, has a different energy, ergo a different challenge for those who are awake to it. In essence, we are all alchemists both on a personal level and an inter-personal level.
      This book provides the serious spiritual alchemist with enormous basic information. It compares how the time cycles of the calendar match important periods in the evolution of the earth and the Milky Way Galaxy.
      Hand-Clow believes the earth and the Milky Way are inexorably linked in this evolutionary spiral. For instance, according to her calculations, we are currently in the Galactic Underworld (CE 1999-2011) and in the Third World. This parallels the Planetary Underworld of 1883 to 1947 and also 552 BCE – CE 730.
      If we look at the known history of those times, it indicates a similar energy or vibration. The time period between 1883 to 1947 saw key wars and revolutions, but also the end of traditional warfare. War since that time has been fought very differently, particularly after the use of two nuclear bombs in Japan during World War II.
      She believes these stages of evolution are converging during the final time journey between 1999 and 2011. War, resource management, and separation from nature, are part of daily events we must process during these years. This, says Hand-Clow, is evidence of the tightening spiral of time that we experience as time speeds up.
      Currently we are in Night Five of the Galactic Underworld (November 19, 2007 to November 12, 2008). This energy indicates that an inner process is gestating, slowly but surely. Hand-Clow believes that the world will not change during this time, but our minds will.
      This energy makes the upcoming United States presidential race even more interesting, and indicates a huge surprise. That is certainly the case with the current candidates, for indeed we have the first African-American candidate, who, incidentally has the middle name Hussein. Hand-Clow predicts a financial crisis, and again this is proving accurate as the United States faces a recession.
      We are now embarking on a critical leap in human evolution that she refers to as the awakening of the World Mind. It is vital to understand that we must remain grounded within our own energy fields and not allow the collective fearful interpretation of the energy stimulate the repetition of old, dysfunctional patterns.
      As previously stated, it is vital that serious students of humanity begin to truly understand and process energy consciously. So often we have been the unconscious dreamers of dark worlds filled with despots, disease and disaster. It means we must develop a strongly aligned will and a determination to think differently.
            I highly recommend the book to alchemists, spiritual adepts and seekers of mystery. The Mayan Code: Time Acceleration and Awakening the World Mind is indeed the handbook of spiritual alchemy as Barbara Hand-Clow provides us with copious illustrations, maps, diagrams, and dozens of references and cross-references, allowing this complicated material to be disseminated easily.