Honor Thy Ancestors Actively

Toltecs are not the only tradition to make the honoring of ancestors a key duty of a good life. The “honoring” part is where it gets confusing. Does “honoring” mean say thanks, put up a memorial, bury them well? In part, sure, it says that – respect, venerate, all that.

From a toltec point of view, however, that level of “honoring” is not all that functional. It sounds close to worship, which we know can slow individual progress. We consulted a thesaurus to see what else they might say about the word “honoring.” The idea begs action.  

Within the world of honoring, we found three words, among others, that bring action, therefore, in a toltec way of thinking, bring increased functionality to the suggestion “honor thy ancestors.” Observe, heed and fulfill give us access to something more concrete.

Obviously, we can’t observe ancestors in life, so family stories are important, along with the religious norms of the times and our families. Toltecs take it a bit farther. We observe the ancestors in our blood, as they live in our veins, and as it plays out in the events of our life.

Once we can sense, or even just guess at, ancestral movement within us, we can heed what they tell us to avoid and what they tell us to embrace. And fulfill, must be about the purification of the blood, something we believe every human needs to work on from the moment he’s born.

Keeping the ancestors in mind as we move through the day allows us to grow from what they left us. Clearly our ancestors left enough information behind worth listening to. Now with the understanding of DNA we see they not only left us stories and memorials, they left us a large load of highly coded information which has a definite influence on our destiny. The stories and memorials open those codes.

There’s lots to talk about when it comes to the ancestors. We have their tendencies, their habits, their blessings and their curses.

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