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Appropriate Activities for Maya Tzolkin Days
The references are few and far between, but the following is a compilation of ethnographic accounts pertaining to what kinds of activities are appropriate for any given day. They are gathered primarily from three sources - "Time Among the Highland Maya" (Tedlock 1982), "Choltun" (Guoron Ajquijay 2003), and your author's personal communication with various people in the highlands.

The statements were taken from indigenous communities, so they are at times not directly applicable to the western lifestyle. They also contain an imploring quality, many of the suggested actions involving prayer and asking for aid from the world.

IMIX
A Good Day to:
  • Ask for water
  • Be creative
  • Receive messages from beyond
  • Cleanse oneself of negative energy
  • Humble oneself to avoid crazy behavior
  • Ask for power to combat witchcraft (high numbers)

IK'
A Good Day to:
  • Ask for protection for family and friends against natural disasters
  • Ask for protection against the anger and rage of human emotions
  • Use high number Ik' days to call out destructive energies in nature and people
  • Ask that our illness, suffering and sorrow be taken away
  • Cure respiratory problems
  • Ask for protection for pregnant women

AK'BAL
A Good Day to:
  • A man to plan a wedding - both planning and meeting the girl's family
  • Declare love
  • Introduce babies to their ancestors
  • Make a fire during the sunrise and pray for renewal
  • Protect one's self from thievery and lies
  • Discover the underlying causes of problems

K'AN
A Good Day to:
  • Pay off your debts, socially, financially, and spiritually
  • Help disabled people
  • Work on community projects and labor
  • To become more mature
  • Make offerings towards lack in one's duties
  • Indebt or enslave another
  • Perform witchcraft
  • Catch a thief

CHIKCHAN
A Good Day to:
  • Diagnose and cure illness
  • Seek justice
  • Put aside jealousy
  • Cause illness - on high number days
  • Low number days are good for asking protection against illness
  • Seek wisdom
  • Remember the power of female intuition and knowledge



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KIMI
A Good Day to:
  • Ask for tranquility among your colleagues and extended family, both living and deceased
  • Taking care of equipment
  • Ask for and give forgiveness
  • Lower number days are good for marriage proposals and weddings
  • Remember the dead

MANIK'
A Good Day to:
  • Ask for a good harvest your crop - especially 6 and 7 Manik
  • Schedule a meeting of elders
  • 1 and 8 Manik are days when priests name novice students to the mundo
  • Focus on unborn children - 1,2,3, and 4 Manik
  • To avoid gossip and enemies
  • Go hunting
  • Hike or camp in nature

LAMAT
A Good Day to:
  • Feed the mundo and ask for good crops
  • Tend your crops
  • Begin a new project
  • Honor past works
  • Star watch and think about the universe

MULUK
A Good Day to:
  • Make up for missed obligations
  • Ask for water or rain
  • Work to stop the suffering of others
  • Give offerings to the Earth
  • Pay debts

OK
A Good Day to:
  • 7 Ok is the day before 8 Chuwen, the possible beginning of the sacred year
  • Ask for freedom from our vices and sexual deviance
  • Look for the hidden truth
  • Dispense justice
  • Seek counsel

CHUWEN
A Good Day to:
  • Possible beginning of the 260-day year - 8 Chuwen
  • Plan a marriage and get married
  • Begin a new building project
  • Present an apprentice to the mundo - 8 Chuwen
  • Follow the ways of our elders and take their advice
  • Start a new business venture

EB
A Good Day to:
  • During an Eb year, fireworks and feasting celebrate each of the 13 Eb days
  • Consider ones future and destiny
  • Ask for protection for the crops from destruction or thievery
  • Begin a business deal
  • Ask for luck in spiritual or material pursuits

BEN
A Good Day to:
  • Ask the ancestors for help in teaching and caretaking
  • Follow your intuition and listen to your dreams
  • Study and investigate things
  • Ask for health and good life
  • Ask for rain and growth



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IX
A Good Day to:
  • Specifically dedicated to the mundo
  • 6 and 7 Ix are good days to ask for money, land, and materials to build a house
  • Use magic powers
  • Protect animals, both domestic and wild
  • Give thanks for the Earth and pardon for exploiting nature
  • Take care of one's home
  • Use feminine energy

MEN
A Good Day to:
  • 7 and 8 are good days to ask for money and buying things
  • Protect oneself from financial ruin
  • Ask for protection of the milpas and bird livestock
  • Work towards solidarity
  • Sacrifice for the future

KIB
A Good Day to:
  • Wash formal clothes
  • Prepare for unborn children
  • Ask for forgiveness for ignoring moral teachings
  • Be a good example morally and socially

KABAN
A Good Day to:
  • In Kaban years government will propose new building or tax plans
  • During Kaban years, each Kaban day is a good day for solving long standing problems
  • Think creatively
  • Work in groups on scientific investigations
  • Be connected to the Earth

ETZNAB'
A Good Day to:
  • 1 and 8 are good to start training
  • Avoid jealously and concealment
  • Let go of the past and move forward
  • Make predictions of the future
  • To diagnose and cure mental or physical illness
  • Pay back life the debt we owe
  • Break with people and things that cause us pain and anguish
  • A bad day to plant

KAWAK
A Good Day to:
  • Ask that the actions of your enemies turn against them
  • Work as a midwife
  • Ask for rain
  • Ask for family unity
  • Use one's authority

AHAU
A Good Day to:
  • Ask for the blessing of the ancestors
  • Deliver justice
  • Build a house
  • Contact the dead
  • Be patient and grateful
  • Be brave against the things that scare us



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