Lannan, Digital Wisdom Keeper

Episode Transcript
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Nicte-Ha (00:00):
Pia Ali, welcome, bienvenidos to another episode
of the Rainbow House.
Today you're listening to aninterview that was recorded
earlier in the summer with mygood friend Lan, who is an
artist and a wisdom keeper and adigital shepherd for those of

(00:20):
us who are connecting andreconnecting through the
internet.
Please enjoy.
I did this little poll from theJade Oracle, and four cards
popped up.
So we have some veryinteresting cards.
The first one that came out isthe one that always pops up, and
it's La Grandiosa, the greatgoddess.

(00:42):
So she's made appearances inseveral of my previous episodes.
So this is kind of exciting.
And then we have the Jaguar.
If I'm saying that right.
And then you also, we alsointerestingly got Tochtli, the
rabbit, and Shilonen, the youngcorn.
Ooh.

(01:02):
So we have some kind of coolones here.
Do you have this deck?

Lannan (01:07):
I don't have that deck.
No, I haven't actually bought adeck in a long time.
Um I've been eyeballing themini one, though, for a few
years now.

Nicte-Ha (01:15):
Yeah, I know.
And I I bought it because Idon't really do a lot of tarot
work, but I liked that they weresort of oracle decks, so I
didn't have to feel like I hadto do all these crazy spreads
and all this interpretation.
I felt like I could do sort ofjust like pull a couple and it
would inspire thoughts oremotions um or like inspire
questions or give me a littlebit of internal guidance around

(01:37):
what I'm talking about when I'mtalking to somebody or doing
writing or something.

Lannan (01:40):
Yeah, I like the less structured decks a lot.

Nicte-Ha (01:43):
Yeah.
Dan, I'm so excited to haveyou.
Um, I feel like we have knowneach other for a long time,
although we haven't ever reallytalked in real life.
Side effect of modern life.
So um I have been asking myguests to just give a short
introduction to the listeners ofthe podcast and just give a

(02:05):
brief statement about who youare, where you're from, and any
other things you want to shareor on an introductory basis.

Lannan (02:13):
Yeah, basically, I just want to start off by saying
thank you for having me.
I know this this getting me ongetting me on the pod has been a
long time coming.
So I just I appreciate youcontinuously reaching out to me
to see if I'm free to do this.
So that's that's muchappreciated.
Um my name is Lenan.
I go by Lan a lot of the time.
I'm a Chicano from originallyfrom Los Angeles.

(02:36):
I now live in British Columbia.
Um, I have been a practicingpolytheist for the majority of
my life now, since I was, Ithink, 11 or 12 years old.
Um, been moving throughdifferent traditions, uh
different uh pantheons, I guesswe'll call them, uh different
just ways of sort of uhdifferent like cultural

(02:59):
approaches to worship and stuff.
And but it wasn't until like2010, 2011, I started
approaching Islamic spiritualitythrough the traditions of the
Yucatec Maya colonial era stuff.
I was introduced to the deityChuck, and I've sort of been a
devoted uh follower of Chuck'sfor many years now.

(03:22):
But I did it wasn't until 2020that I really kind of got the
push that I needed to look alittle closer to home, which is
the uh Aztecs and Chicayot anduh that whole thing.
I I got the push from myancestors.
So they're like, Yeah, you needyou need to come home.
You need to come home for abit.
So that's kind of what broughtme onto this path.

(03:44):
Um sorry, would you say?

Nicte-Ha (03:45):
No, I'm just curious.
So when you when you say thatyou were introduced to Chuck,
especially in in college, youknow, was that through
conversations with yourclassmates, through academic
study, or just dreams, or kindof what was the what was the
genesis?
Because I know people might notknow this, but because
especially right now, a lot ofpeople think that most of the

(04:06):
folks in in LA are from Mexico,which is true, but there's also
a lot of Central American umimmigrants and refugees from
Central America, from Guatemalaand from areas that have been
more at that that werehistorically were Maya.
The Mayan people are stillaround, folks.
Very much so.
And so what how were youintroduced to Choc at that time?

Lannan (04:30):
I was actually going to school in New York City at the
time, and I was um I took aLatin American art class, and it
was mostly focusing on uhcontemporary, contemporary arts
uh from the 20th century.
But we did get sort of a crashcourse in some of the
pre-Columbian history and and alot of like uh Mexican

(04:53):
Revolution era art, thepolitical stuff.
So that was really cool.
But then like something justreally grabbed me about the um
the pre-Columbian Maya artistictradition, specifically like the
sculpture and relief work, um,just really just dug in my

(05:13):
brain.
And so I started collectingbooks, art books, just these
beautiful, beautiful, you know,like museum quality books, just
full of photographs of of allkinds of archaeological pieces
and stuff, and and reading aboutthem.
And um the the deities justkind of also started to grab me.
But folks familiar withpolytheistic spiritual practices

(05:35):
uh will kind of know what I'msaying when I say that I
approached them more than theyapproached me.
And so I I learned, I learned alot, and I did some worship of
them.
And then after a while, theywere like, you know, okay, you
know, you're you're very cute,but you know, we're you we're
not your people, you're not ourpeople.

(05:57):
So you should probably keepmoving, keep learning.
And so I stopped and and Chuckwas the only one that stuck
around.
And at that time, there was,you know, yeah, a lot of dreams,
a lot of subtle, more woo-wookind of things, messages that I
was getting.
So that solidified thatrelationship for me.
And I think that the reasonthat Chalk kind of stuck around

(06:20):
is because he's part of a veryancient complex of deities that
spans the entire region.
So, in a way, he is more, I'dsay, more versatile, more
adaptable.
Um, and his embodiments, hisnature, it goes very, very, very
deep into history.
And so I can kind of carry himwherever I go, basically.

(06:41):
I think is the best way to saythat.

Nicte-Ha (06:43):
Is is Chak because Chak is rain, right?
Rain god.

Lannan (06:47):
Rain, storms, hurricanes, his there we go.
There's the words, there's thewords that I'm I'm forgetting.
That's okay.
One of his other names isHunakan, so that's where we get
the the actual word hurricanefrom.
So at least to the the lowland,the lowland maya, he was
hurricanes specifically.
Also groundwater, because inthe Yucatec area it's all the

(07:11):
limestone shelf, right?
And so there's really not muchin the way of rivers or lakes or
streams, but you have thecenotes, and that's where most
of the fresh water is.
And so he he's actually, youknow, both the rain and also
terrestrial water, which is veryinteresting too, um, because he
sort of embodies this binaryduality within himself as an

(07:36):
individual god, which is veryinteresting to me.
Whereas most of the otherdeities, they have, you know,
they have wives and husbands andpartners and things to embody
that duality, right?
But he embodies it withinhimself.

Nicte-Ha (07:47):
And is he related to Tlaloc at all?
Is that because Thlaloc is alsorain, right?
So is Tlaloc connected to thatlarger Yes, absolutely.

Lannan (07:57):
Yes.
They both came from, you know,they both have the same origins
basically.
But they there's a there's a umthere's a graphic that I'm
thinking of that I've found in acouple different books that
sort of shows the evolution ofthe deity um or the deities
through sculpture and theirmanifestation through sculpture
throughout time.
And you know, you can kind ofgo back and see kind of around

(08:22):
when they separated from eachother, and you get these other
deities like Kosiho, and yeah,I'm not remembering the other
ones, but uh, yeah, there's allthese different rain deities,
and they all really came fromthe same place originally.
Um, and with Chak and Tlalokspecifically, it's really
interesting because they bothtechnically existed at the same
time, just separated bydistance.

(08:44):
And there was a point inhistory where Lalok's cultus um
was reintroduced to the sameregion where Chak still existed.
And it was very interesting toread like how they were treated
differently, even though theythey came from the same place.
Yeah, Thalok became instead oflike a rain deity, they saw him

(09:06):
as this deity of like meteorshowers and sort of things
falling from the night sky asopposed to just rain.
So those that was like reallyinteresting.

Nicte-Ha (09:16):
So you said that you've been a polytheist since
you were pretty young.
And I think, you know, a lot ofus folks who are on this
spiritual journey outside ofChristianity in European
colonial countries start to seekpretty early.
And so were you raised in atraditional Catholic family?

(09:36):
And how did that journey startfor you into exploring
polytheism?

Lannan (09:42):
Well, that's such a good question.
Um, when I was really young, myfamily went to Catholic Mass.
My dad was not Catholic.
My dad was my dad was white.
He came from he came fromChristian science, actually.
That was his childhood, whichis a whole, which is a whole
other thing.
Um, but uh yeah, so like withmy like my grandmother's
generation, my grandmother'swas, you know, Catholic when I

(10:04):
was younger, and she's notCatholic anymore.
Her sister uh was prettyatheist.
So like my great aunt is veryatheist.
I don't know what religionactually, you know, my
grandmother's generation wasraised with.
I don't know if they went tolike mass every Sunday, but I
know I do have big parts of thefamily that are still very

(10:24):
Catholic.
You know, they still do thebaptisms and stuff, um, still do
godparents and things likethat.
But sort of my my arm of thefamily that I spent more time
with, um, not so religious,actually, not so Catholic.
Like my mom and my grandmotherare still Christian, but they're
not Catholic, no.
So it wasn't, it wasn't that II feel like Catholicism at least

(10:46):
kind of primed me a little bitfor polytheism, you know, with
all the saints and stuff, right?
So there's sort of like a it'ssort of like a gateway drug
there.

Nicte-Ha (10:55):
Yeah, I think the other Christian denominations
would agree with you.
That's why they did away withthe saints and the and the uh
they find them very highlysuspicious, I think the
Lutherans and the Methodists andthe Baptists of the world.

Lannan (11:09):
Yeah, right.
Just don't get them started onthe Trinity.

Nicte-Ha (11:12):
Right, right, right.

Lannan (11:12):
But I just I remember being like a little kid and like
I loved going to church.
Like I loved, I loved religionwhen I was a little kid.
Um and I loved going intohouses of worship because they
felt um they felt separate fromthe mundane world, which is what
they're intended to to be,right?
I just remember going up to uhum I don't know, I must have

(11:36):
been like four or five orsomething, going up to um uh an
altar in a Catholic church, Idon't know, on a weekday or
something.
Nobody was there.
And I remember like bringingsome rocks with me.
And I'm like, oh, I'm gonnagive these to Jesus or I'm gonna
whatever, give these to God orsomething.
And so I like put them, like Istashed them somewhere near the
altar, and uh that was like myoffering.
I made an offering because thatmade sense to me, right?

(11:59):
Like I am I am given things Iwant to give back, right?
And so that sort of animistic,polytheistic head space has just
always been with me.
And a lot of kids, I think mostkids probably have that innate
sense of the world in them, andthen they just, you know, they

(12:20):
grow out of it or they aretalked out of it, or you know,
society imposes different valueson them or or what have you.
But like that's that's mostpeople have that sensibility
when they're young.
I just never grew out of it,never had the decency to grow
out of it.

Nicte-Ha (12:35):
Do you think that it made it easier for you to
explore the polytheism growingup with your immediate family
being less bound into one Chrislike solidly Catholic or solidly
Christian?
Because I do think thatatheists' parents and families
can be as dogmatic in their ownway sometimes as ultra-religious

(12:57):
families, because they're theydo not believe in a god, period.
So I think in some ways thatcan be just almost as inflexible
as being a religiousconservative.
So do you think that it made ita little bit easier, or did you
just not talk about it withyour family when you started
exploring that?
What was that like?

Lannan (13:18):
Yeah, there wasn't.
I kept it very private justbecause it like I didn't know
how to talk about it because Ihad a lot of very personal, very
intense experiences.
And a lot of people in theWestern world aren't, they don't
know how to talk about thosekinds of spiritual experiences
either.
They just, you know, even ifthey are very devout, we we
don't really have the languageto talk about, you know, I'm I'm

(13:38):
having a conversation with agod.
Most people, you know, eveneven like devout Christians are
gonna be like, uh, have youtalked to your doctor?
Like that's gonna be like mostof what they think, right?
Um, so I just didn't reallyhave the common language to
discuss what it is that I wasdoing and experiencing.
Um, but on in a more generalsense, um, if my mom freaked

(14:02):
out, I was like, I was like 11and 12, and I, you know, I
brought home a copy of thewitch's Bible, like this big,
thick, black book, right?
Like she flipped out.
She was really scared for awhile.
But yeah, right.
You know, I don't blame her.
Like, I I made these like newfriends, these new weird, kind
of sketchy friends that camefrom like broken homes.

(14:23):
So just like, oh god, what ismy kid getting into?
So I really don't blame her.
It was like a year of her likefighting me on, and that I just
like I'm like, no, this is myreligion.
And I kept at it, and it wasn'ta phase, and she just had to
accept it.
What did my dad do?
My dad, uh, my parents aredivorced at the time.
So, like, my dad, I think he hetold me he looked up like what

(14:45):
the US Army had to say on Wiccaor something.
Like he looked up, yeah, helooked up like the US military
guide to like Wicca, and that'show we learned about it.

Nicte-Ha (14:55):
That that was your father's authority.
He was like, Well, let's seewhat the army says about all
this.
I mean, yeah, exactly.
It's like, okay, well, it'smilitary.

Lannan (15:06):
No, I don't think he's ever even held a gun in his
life.

Nicte-Ha (15:09):
But he's you know, he's a card-carrying Republican,
so I guess that's that'shilarious.
I mean, they do have paganchaplains, or at least they did
until very recently.
Who knows what's happening now?
But I know they did have paganchaplains.

Lannan (15:23):
Yeah, they did.
And there were pagan servicemembers.
I mean, there's I'm sure thatthey're still pagan service
members.
I don't again, I don't yeah, Idon't know what their status is,
but um there's been paganservice members, openly pagan
service members for a long time.
Um, you know, and Wicca was bigin the 90s and early 2000s, and
that's kind of what I'm I'msure most of the openly pagan

(15:44):
people were back then, and nowwe have, you know, openly uh,
you know, Nordic polytheists andstuff like that, and Greek
polytheists and stuff there now.
But yeah, that was that was mydad who's like, oh well, you
know, sounds fine to me.

Nicte-Ha (15:58):
Sorry, that's really funny.

Lannan (16:00):
Yeah, my dad for you.

Nicte-Ha (16:02):
Yeah, so um, so that's interesting to be an atheist
republican.

Lannan (16:09):
That's an interesting combination given to actually
know what he believes, and Idon't know if he knows what he
believes either.
Right.
Like he's sort of open aboutthings.
Like when my parents divorced,like he went back to his
childhood um Christian ScienceChurch and revisited that, and
then he dragged me to a coupleother different kinds of
churches, and he was just kindof like, I don't know, figuring

(16:31):
stuff out.
But I don't, I don't know.
I I would say that he probablyis functionally atheist.

Nicte-Ha (16:38):
I think a lot of people are functionally
atheists, they're kind ofculturally Christian, right?
But they're not reallypracticing.
And if you pinned them down andsaid, Do you actually think
that there's a bearded man inthe sky who is the only being
who judged everything, I thinkmany people would say, Well, no.

(17:00):
I mean, that's borne out by allthe research done, Pew research
and all of that, over thedeclining religiosity of
Americans.
But but I think that that thatcultural that's part of why I
started the podcast was becauseto push back against that sort
of default cultural assumptionthat you're either a Christian
because you believe in God, oryou're an atheist because you

(17:21):
don't, and that there isn'tanything really in between that.
Because when you say I'm areligious person or I'm a people
have sort of gotten around thatby saying I'm a spiritual
person, but then I think thatthat's just squishy cop-out for
a lot of people.
I might get some hate for that.
I don't know.
All six of my listeners willget mad at me.

Lannan (17:39):
That's a whole conversation right there.
Like spiritual but notreligious.

Nicte-Ha (17:43):
Spiritual but not religious.
And I just think to myself,there's gotta be more to that
conversation.
Can't there, there's gotta bemore thought behind that if
you're going to do that.
Because yeah.
So, well, that that's veryinteresting.
So when you started, were youdrawn?
You were Wiccan initially,because I I feel very very
connected here because when Iwas in high school, this is the

(18:05):
mid-90s, so about 10 yearsearlier than you.
When I was in high school, itwas all Scott Cunningham, Silver
Raven Wolf, you know, the allof those.
And so it was all very mucheclectic, eclectic paganism.
I couldn't be Wiccan becausethere weren't any covens around
for me to join.

(18:25):
And I wasn't super sure aboutthe sky clad thing and all of
that.
I was also too young, honestly.
Oh.
Um, I think I used Wiccan aslike a shorthand, but I
definitely started with thosebooks, although it didn't really
continue in that vein.
And so did you did you startWiccan sort of Celtic paganism

(18:46):
as your default?
Was that where you began?
And did that how long were youon with that with that group of
deities?

Lannan (18:53):
I'll just say like everything that you just said
was like, oh man, that was yeah,no, that was it.
That was me for like threeyears.
It was like my first three veryintensive years, is going
through all of that.
Oh my god, I haven't heardSilver Raven Wolf's name in
years.
Oh, blast from the past.
Um, yeah, no, I I called myselfWiccan because that was like

(19:15):
the only word that I really knewhow to describe what this
secret third thing was thatwasn't Abrahamic and wasn't
atheist.
Um, yeah, so I called myselfWiccan, even though I didn't
really follow what the religionoutlined whatsoever.
Um, yeah, I read all those samebooks.
I was reading Cunningham andand Silver Raven Wolf and

(19:38):
basically whatever I can get myhands on by whatever fly by
night author was out there.
I didn't really do much ofanything with the the sort of
starter pack of Celtic deities,although that was sort of just
like the water that I wasswimming in either way.
My my first deities wereactually Egyptian, where they

(19:58):
were comedic.
Uh real, I had a real affinityfor the animal heads.
I I somebody gave me like astatue of like Fast, and just
like, yes, I love this.
And so I had Fast and Anubis asmy quote patrons for a couple
years.
Um I was doing I was doing allkinds of stuff.

(20:19):
I was more experimenting withlike land spirits and house
spirits and ecstatic practices,trance states, and I didn't know
that's what any of it was uh atthe time.
But um, yeah, yeah.
And then and then in highschool, I kind of like I moved
away from my friends that I wasdoing all this research and
practice with.

(20:39):
They've they moved out of town,so I and I went to a uh a
different high school from allof them.
So I'm like, I kind of lost myconnection.

Nicte-Ha (21:16):
Lan was explaining uh his, I'm sorry, I didn't even
ask.
Are your pronouns I keep askingpeople?
He, him.

Lannan (21:23):
He, him, yeah.

Nicte-Ha (21:24):
Yes.
So Lan was explaining hisstarter pack of deities, and I
got so excited about one of hisstarter pack of deities being
Bastet that I, because I alsowas a Bastet fan, still am.
She's wonderful.
And I have a statue that Iwanted to show Lan of Bast.
And then I lunged out of myseat while he was talking and I

(21:46):
tripped on microphone cord andeverything went boom.
So there's gonna be a littlebit of an introduction in our or
an interruption in ourrecording.
Okay, so you were drawn toBastet and the comedic deities.
All right, let's go.

Lannan (21:59):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (22:00):
Yeah.

Lannan (22:01):
Um, yeah, I don't remember.
I don't remember what it was.

Nicte-Ha (22:04):
It's okay.
So you you said you were drawnto Bastet.
It wasn't the Celtic starterpack.

Lannan (22:10):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (22:11):
You were initially drawn to the comedics.
So where did that, where didthat come out of?
And was it only Bastet or wasit like the full everybody toast
raw?
What was the draw?

Lannan (22:22):
I was super drawn to Bastet because I was given a
children's book when I wasyounger.
I must have been like seven oreight, and it was a children's
book, and all the illustrationswere painted on and it was super
cool.
It was about this temple girlwho served in the temple of
Bastet, and this you know, bigevil grumpy lord comes along and

(22:45):
he's grumpy about something,and he accidentally kills one of
the temple cats, and this girlis devastated, and so then she
goes on this adventure to theunderworld.
I don't remember exactly why,but both her and the grumpy lord
are going through theunderworld, and I think she's
trying to get the cat spiritback or something, and then they

(23:07):
have their hearts weighed andeverything, and then the grumpy
lord, his heart is eaten byAmut, and he's defeated in the
end.
But I just thought it was socool.
Like I had never, ever, everseen just an honest depiction of
somebody in a polytheistculture before and uh worshiping
a deity, and I thought that wasthe dopest shit.

(23:30):
And so I when I was like eightyears old, I actually started
worshiping Bastet for a littlewhile.
Like I had little shrine swordin the backyard and everything.
So that's kind of where thatstarted.
Like I didn't I didn't do itfor very long, but that's where
that started.
So it's like as soon as I hadmy more grown-up opportunity to
participate in paganism, I'mlike, I know who I'm going to.

Nicte-Ha (23:49):
Yes, I think, I mean, I was always fascinated.
I love now, my daughter isseven, and she went through this
period of just being obsessedwith mythology.
I'm sure she's gonna go in andout of that because who's not
obsessed with mythology and andand history of those kinds of
stories.
So, but she has the DK books onNorse mythology, Egyptian

(24:10):
mythology, and Greek mythology.
And we she we've read themmultiple times, cover to cover,
all the gods, their stories, andit also gave her this atlas of
world religions that's that'sreally fun.
So, but I love what I loveabout reading all three of them
is you can clearly see the kindof cultural and societal

(24:30):
differences in the way that thestories are structured and the
lessons they're teaching.
When you read them, it's reallyinteresting.
Like all of the Egyptianstories, well, not all of them,
but the Egyptian stories, likethe story about Ra and kingship.
It's this very complicated, butit's all a kind of a
justification for the divineright of kings, right?

(24:52):
So kingship is is a divine isfrom the gods.
Like the gods became were thekings and then they gave it to
the descendants, right?
And then the Norse mythologiesare these just like chaotic,
insane stories.
I'm sorry, I'm I don't want tooffend any Norse pagans.

Lannan (25:10):
I don't think you will.
I really don't think.

Nicte-Ha (25:12):
Oh my god.
These are definitely storiesthat somebody just was like, and
then the horse had eight legs,and people around the fire are
like, ooh, eight legs, you know.
Um that horse can run reallyfast.
Right.
And it was not, it turns outthat the thunder god disguised
himself as a woman and wed thegiant and then killed him.
You're like, what?
So, and then you have theGreeks who are all about like

(25:35):
cheating and backstabbing andsleeping around.
Like it's just really wild toread them all next to each other
and think about what storiesthat culture is telling
themselves about human behaviorthrough the lens of these of
these stories.
So did you also look atHellenic gods and do that detour
as well?

(25:55):
Um kind of on your on your pathof exploration?

Lannan (25:59):
Um, I didn't really.
I kind of I kind of just sortof went right around that one.
Which is funny because that waslike the only compendium of
myths that I actually had waslike Greek myths.
Um I thought they were cool.
Uh the myths were always reallyinteresting to me.
Um I mean, there's there'sthere's so much in the Western

(26:20):
art canon about them.
So many beautiful paintings andand you know, prints, woodcuts,
plays, you know, whatever,everything.
So it's like we're still kindof swimming in in Greek mythos.
Uh, and I think kind of maybeby that by that reasoning, it it
didn't stand out to me asanything especially especially

(26:42):
emotionally interesting becauseit was just sort of always
there.
So the deities themselves, theydidn't really grab me in any
special way.
I thought they were cool, butyeah, kind of kind of just
avoided that one altogether.

Nicte-Ha (26:53):
So you you mentioned that your family, sorry, I'm
gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna pivotkind of abruptly, but well not
really abruptly, but I'm justgonna pivot and just say, you
know, you mentioned that youryour father's white and uh
presumably your mother'smexicana.
Is she was she born in Mexicoor is her family from Mexico and
she was born in the UnitedStates, or what's the what's the

(27:16):
connection there?
And then how much of arelationship with Mexico did you
have when you were growing up?

Lannan (27:22):
That's a good question.
I didn't have a super strongconnection to Mexico.
My family that's why that'spart of the reason why I call
myself Chicanos, because like myfamily um has my family is in
like the Pasadena area for likegenerations since like you know
the turn of the century.

(27:42):
Like my my great grandmotherwas born there.
I probably would have had amuch stronger connection to the
country if my if if my mom and Ihad a better relationship with
her dad because you know he w hehis his family, they were a
family of braceros.
So uh he was born he was bornin Aguas Calientes, you know, he

(28:04):
still had a bunch of familythere, but uh my mom, just due
to some unfortunate familycircumstances, like my mom was
kind of estranged for most ofher life until um I was like
three teen.
It's kind of like when Istarted really getting
introduced, reintroduced to thatside of the family and getting
to know my grandfather.

(28:24):
But unfortunately thatconnection is is pretty weak.
Like my mom doesn't even knowreally any Spanish.
My grandmother doesn't knowvery much Spanish either,
because like mygreat-grandparents, they, you
know, being in the Pasadenaarea, they were redlined.
Um, this is back in the the 40sand 50s, right?
So they were redlined and Idon't know exactly what the

(28:45):
decision was.
Uh I don't know how much it wastalked about, but they decided
not to raise their kids withSpanish.
So they wanted them to theywanted them to assimilate
basically as much as possible.
Just because they yeah, I'mjust I'm assuming that they they
suffered.
They suffered a lot.
And you know, even my mygrandmother suffered a lot when
she was younger, um, you know,medically.
Like she almost she almost diedgiving birth to my mom due to

(29:07):
like medical negligence andstuff and and just casual
racism, right?
Back in the back in the 60s.
So I don't like I'm sad.
I'm sad that uh Spanish is justnot part of, you know, this
part of the family.
Like that there, I like I havea bunch of cousins that have,
you know, married other Latinosand other Chicanos and stuff,
and you know, their partnersknow Spanish and their families

(29:29):
know Spanish and stuff, but likemy part of the family, we just
don't, and it's sad.
But I I understand thehistorical reasons for why um
you know why that is, and it'syou know, comes down to racism,
certainly don't but I have avery strong connection to
California, basically.
Um very, very strong connectionto LA and the desert out there.

(29:51):
God, I miss the desert so much.
But like that's you know,California is is that's where
home will always be, even youknow, if my aunt's Ancestors
came from Mexico.
I don't know.
It's a it's a comp it's acomplicated thing, not being a
recent immigrant, being like afourth generation American,
right?

Nicte-Ha (30:08):
So Yeah, I mean, I think we're so used about we're
so used to thinking of theMexican experience.
At least I am through my ownfamily lens, because my family
are more recent Mexicanimmigrants.
My grandfather was born inMexico.
I actually was born in Mexico,but that's because my dad was in
Mexico for school, medicalschool.
So I was born in Mexico, I wasborn in Puebla.

(30:30):
But like my grandmother, hermother was from Guanajuato, but
she was born in San Bernardino.
But I think we're so used tothinking, and I'm so used to
thinking about the Mexicanexperience, especially in
California as a recent one, oneof immigration, right?
You're right.
It that thought and thatcultural narrative erases the

(30:53):
fact that California was Mexico.

Lannan (30:56):
Yeah, right.

Nicte-Ha (30:57):
It was part of Mexico for like a few hundred years.
And so even if your family camefrom Mexico, they could have
come, you know, in the 1700s orthe 1800s, or, you know, before
the before the turn of thecentury, before it was actually
California, even.

Lannan (31:13):
You know, the Tejanos, right?

Nicte-Ha (31:15):
Yeah, the Tejanos, right?
And and all of the big ranchesthat were owned by by Mexicans
before California was acquiredby the US.
So yeah, it uh you're right.
Thank you for pointing thatout.
I mean, I know you but it it'ssomething that I forget because
the cultural conversation is sofocused on erasing that part of

(31:35):
history, I think that's I mean,and I get it.

Lannan (31:38):
And there's there's obviously more, there's more
recent immigrants than not.
And and the conversation isabout them because they, you
know, they they suffer the bruntof the system because it's
like, you know, people like myfamily, you know, a lot of us
still look very brown and someof us don't.
Like I don't, like I'm stillI'm I'm extremely white passing,

(32:01):
and you know, I sound like awhite guy and I live like a
white guy for the most part,right?
But um so it's like when I whenI tell people, it's like I have
to like come out as Chicano.
And then there's that whole,it's God, it's the whole
bullshit thing of like, well, ifyou're gonna say that you're
Mexican American, we're gonnaput you to the test.

(32:22):
We're gonna test you.
Um, I'm like, I'm gonna failthat test.
I'm gonna fail that test.
I'm sorry.
I always have, you know, my momdid too.
But that's also kind of likethe white passing slash mixed
race experience of like, youknow, you're never gonna be
white enough to be white, andyou're never gonna be brown
enough to be brown.

Nicte-Ha (32:41):
Right.
Everybody's got a test for youto pick.
You gotta pick.

Lannan (32:45):
Yeah, exactly.

Nicte-Ha (32:46):
You gotta be this or that, or you have to be enough
of one or the other.
And we get it from, I think oneof the things that is
complicated about the multi-raceexperience is we get it, like
as you said, from inside of ourculture, from our own people.
And then also from, well, Iguess technically white people
are also my people, but we getit from from all sides of our
people.
They're like, hmm, show me,right?

(33:07):
I think that's partly why I'mI'm very grateful I speak
Spanish, but I'm not, I'm notteaching it to my kids.
Their dad's white.
And I think to myself, I'mlike, is this it?
Is this like where, you know, Ican show them, I can teach
them, I can tell them that youhave this connection to your
ancestors and that are not allyour ancestors came from Europe,

(33:28):
right?
But are they gonna feel thatbecause the cultural connection
is so much about family and somuch about land and so much
about just non things you can'tteach, right?
Non, non-teachable experienceslike dancing in the kitchen with
your cousins or your aunts,tacumbia, you know, backyard
barbecues, all that.

(33:48):
It's just it's part of the,like you said, the water that
you move in, right?
The air that you're that you'removing through that you absorb.
And I think, I don't know if mykids are gonna choose, right?
They're gonna be more whitepassing than me.
I think I'm mostly whitepassingif I'm in Iowa or Idaho.
But for sure, you know, I getthe question, oh, yeah, how's

(34:11):
your Spanish so good?
And I'm like, because I'mMexican.
Really?
Yeah, get the same thing.

Lannan (34:15):
Man, yeah, like I yeah, I've really uh I almost like got
like goosebumps when you'relike when you're when you kind
of were talking about like,well, like it's this is this the
end?
Is this how this ends?
Like like passing shit on toyour kids like that.
And it's you like you'retotally right.
Like the further and furtheryou get from it being part of
your daily life and your dailyexperience and your daily

(34:36):
interactions with people, likethe more you have to like make
the concerted effort and likeput elbow grease into it.
And you know, like when I wasgrowing up, my my my parents
moved out of Pasadena becausethey wanted me to go to a better
school district.
So we moved to La Racenta,which is uh Glendale school
district, great schools, or soI'm told.
And like uh yeah, we we hadsome cousins there, and you

(34:58):
know, I grew up with thosecousins, which was great.
I'm glad I had I'm glad I hadfamily in in town.
But I think we were like one ofjust like a very tiny handful
of like Latino families in thearea, but it was still like a
very multicultural experience.
It was like half white people,yeah, but then the other half
were like Armenians, Koreans,like other Middle Eastern folks.

(35:20):
And so I was still very much ina very, very multicultural
area, which I'm extremelygrateful for.
I am I am so happy that I wasexposed to Korean food as young
as I was.
So good.

Nicte-Ha (35:35):
Korean Mexican food is like one of the best things
that's ever come out of theUnited States.
I'm just saying Korean Mexican.

Lannan (35:42):
Yeah, like Mexican Asian fusion, the best peak, peak
cuisine, as far as I'mconcerned.
But it's but like so, but Ididn't, I I had sort of this
like unconscious sense that Iwasn't like all the white kids,
you know, because like I'd gohang out with my my family and
we'd be making Mexican food allthe time.
Or, you know, I'd be dragged tomy cousin's house for like the

(36:05):
big tamale making weekend everyDecember, or you know, this,
that, the other thing.
And even just like having thatCatholic experience in the
family also put me apart fromwhiteness.
But I didn't have a conscioussense of like my
Mexican-American identity untilI was like in high school.
And then I went to high schoolin LA.
I went to Laksa, I went to thearts high school downtown LA.

(36:28):
Tons of Latinos, tons ofChicanos going to that school.
And and I remember wanting tojoin Mecha, Mecha Club at
school.
And I brought it up to my dad.
My dad's like, oh no, you can'tdo that.
That's a that, you know, thatthat's a racist group.
They're racist against whitepeople.
And I'm like, oh I I mean,like, I I didn't know, I didn't
have any racial or ethnicconsciousness then.

(36:49):
So so I never joined Mecha.
And and sometimes I think aboutlike how things would have been
different if I did.
Like maybe I'd know moreSpanish, maybe I'd feel more
culturally connected and itwouldn't have taken me this this
long.

Nicte-Ha (37:00):
Well, it's also your dad labeling you as white,
right?
Like that sort of demonstratesthat your dad's understanding
was that you were white and youwould be the target of racism.

Lannan (37:11):
Yeah.
Yeah.
There's, you know, somethingabout like my family history
that he didn't, you know, hedidn't want me to discover or he
didn't feel it was worthdiscovering.
Um yeah.
Yeah, because his family, likewhen my mom and my dad were, you
know, together when they wereyounger, um, like his family was
like racist to my mom, which isreally ironic because my

(37:34):
grandmother being very new age,very kind of very in the woo-woo
sound healing, remote viewingkind of world, right?
Like that level of new age.
Like she's always like sheloves Mexico.
Like Mexico is like one of herfavorite places.
And she's always said, uh, youknow, oh, I feel like in a past

(37:56):
life I would have been likeliving in Teotihuacan.
And yet, like her son marries aLatina and fucking racist as
shit, right?

Nicte-Ha (38:06):
Like, right, right, right.
Like she gets to exoticize itif as long as it's like
something that's out there.

Lannan (38:12):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (38:13):
It's a very good idea.

(38:34):
That you're you're an artist.
So can you talk briefly aboutyour art and the medium that you
use and anything like that thatyou'd like to share?
I'm curious.

(38:55):
You know, it doesn't have to dowith the teteo or the or your
religion, but I'm just curiousabout your art and what kind of
artist you are.

Lannan (39:01):
I like to paint.
I'm kind of I've been I've beena painter for like my whole
life.
Not a very good one, but I lovepainting.
I've done I've done a lot of myown depictions of various
deities.
Like my primary, my primaryshrine has a big painting of
shock that I did.
Um, yeah, I made my own paintfor that one.

(39:22):
I made my own casing and andground up my own.
Yeah, I didn't grind thepigment, you know.
I I mix mixed my own paints andstuff for that one.
I have a watercolor of plazo.
So I have fun doing those.
Um I have fun painting.
Um, I've done some spirituallyum inspired painting work, but

(39:46):
my real love is comics.
My real artistic vice, I callit, is comics.
It's like doesn't like mycurrent project, my last project
was was me working through somespiritual ideas about myself
and spiritual theses that I wassort of arriving at and wanting
to convey thematically to otherpeople.

(40:06):
But my my current project is ispurely self-indulgent.
No.
Um, I wouldn't say, okay, so Iwouldn't say it's purely
self-indulgent, but it's alsoit's not directly spiritual.
It's a vehicle for me to talkabout, just talk about various
things that interest me and Ithink are important and things
that I you know I feel like Ihave an interesting perspective

(40:29):
on.
Um so it's it's a pokapost-apocalyptic romantic
comedy.

Nicte-Ha (40:36):
Do tell.
Tell more.
Are you in the middle ofwriting it and storyboarding it
and doing paint doing drawingsfor it?
Is this something you're gonnapublish?
Is it like on the web?
What's the medium?
Okay.

Lannan (40:47):
It's a webcomic.
I started writing it like ayear and a half ago, year ago.
Uh started drawing it about ayear ago.
I officially hit 150 pages thatI've completed as of yesterday,
which is holy crap.
Sort of my halfway mark.
Oh wow.
Yeah, I'm really excited.
So it's it's gonna be aboutlike a 320-page graphic novel

(41:09):
that I'll be posting in webcomicform.
So on a website.
And then after that, it's gonnaturn into like an episodic
series with like much shorterstories, like 50-page stories or
60-page stories.

Nicte-Ha (41:20):
Oh my god, you are like that, you're like serious,
you're professional.
You know what's interestingwhen I was talking about cards
that I pulled.

Lannan (41:27):
Uh-huh.

Nicte-Ha (41:28):
So this card is Shilonen.
I think I'm seeing that right.
Shilonen?
Yep.
That sounds about right.
Spirit of young corn.
And listen, when you said it'spurely self-indulgent, a deity
of sustenance, she was honoredat festivals that included
singing and dancing, and herpriestesses wore garlands of
miracles and scattered flowersof the tobacco plant.
Lonen can signify youth or ayouthful stage of a project, a

(41:51):
state of innocence.
She reminds you that if youwant to have strong stocks and
healthy crops, you need tocontinue nurturing the young
plant.
Consider making an offering tohonor all that nurtures the
young corn in yourself.
So it sounds to me like you arenurturing all parts of your
being and not just the likesuper serious spiritual ones,

(42:15):
right?

Lannan (42:16):
I okay.
Yeah, maybe I've been calledout, called out my kid on me.

Nicte-Ha (42:20):
Yeah.

Lannan (42:20):
It's so that's wonderful.
It's like I like to tell peoplelike I like I when I was like
in college, I went to art.
I went to art, art school incollege.
Bad choice.
I don't recommend it.
Don't, don't do it.
Anybody who's listening tothis, don't do it.
It's not worth it.
But I had this idea where it'slike, oh, well, if I want to be
like a super serious artist,then I need to make super

(42:41):
serious art.
And only until I hit like 30,I'm like, you know what?
I'm tired of making seriousstuff.
I want to make funny shit.
I love writing comedy.
I love writing funnyinteractions between funny
characters.
And I started watching likeSeinfeld more deliberately, like
paying attention to like whatthe writing is and like what

(43:01):
they're doing.
And I started watching MASH.
I love MASH.
I'm like, you know, funny islike really powerful.
Like, laughter is reallypowerful.
Comedy is amazing.
Comedy, there is so much youcan do with comedy, and um and
and and comedy's power is thatit's like it's like the the the

(43:26):
pill pocket.
Like, if you gotta give likeyour dog a pill, you wrap it up
in this delicious little thing,and then that's how you get the
pill in there.
So it's like you can you cantalk about stuff, like really
serious, really grim, reallydark things with comedy in a way
that you can't in any otherway.
And I've I'm reallyappreciating, I'm really

(43:47):
appreciating that now in my 30s.
And um, I've I reallyappreciate another deity that I
haven't really thought about atall, or a type of deity that I
haven't previously thought aboutat all, which is like Wei Wei
Coyot.

Nicte-Ha (44:01):
Um deity of just I was just gonna say trickster, your
trickster energy maybe is comingout.

Lannan (44:08):
So I feel like I feel like that's me growing up a
little bit, going, you know, youknow what?
Actually, laughing is good.

Nicte-Ha (44:14):
So Chicano is in Chicana as a very, I think like
pretty political way ofidentifying yourself.
I think there's been thiseffort to really embrace the
indigenous side of Chicanismoright.
And yeah, there's a big effortto connect deeply with the
indigenous side and exploringthe Mexica deities is a part of

(44:37):
that for a lot of chicanos.
And so I'm just wonderingwhat's your take on that term
and and how do you feel like itapplies to you?
Um, or is it something thatyou're just like, you know,
that's not because my sisterdoesn't identify as indigenous.
So she's a chicana, but shedoesn't identify as indigenous.
And I know that that can besort of a loaded conversational
term.
So I'm just wondering how youparse that for yourself.

Lannan (44:59):
Uh yeah, that wow, that's a really that's a really
big question.
You're asking all thehard-hitting questions.

Nicte-Ha (45:05):
Sorry, Lynn.
I gotta practice, they gottapractice.

Lannan (45:09):
Yeah, you gotta practice for the Tales of Aztlantis,
guys.
Um I yeah, I've thought I Ithink really, really, really
hard about the identities that Iclaim.
Um I would say that uh becauseof my re my engagement with this
side of my family history, myancestry, cultural heritage,

(45:33):
whatever you want to call it, itI didn't start thinking hard
about doing it until I moved toCanada.
That has kind of influenced theway that I negotiate uh any
potential indigenous identitybecause it's so present and it's
so raw and it's so recent uphere.
Uh whereas in California it'sit's really not very recent, but

(45:59):
it goes all the way back tolike the mission system in the
1700s, right?
So like negotiating indigenityin Southern California is very
different than negotiatingindigenity here in British
Columbia.
And so I'm just I'm verycognizant of what's going on up
here, and so it's a very, it's avery deliberate thing for me to

(46:22):
claim as opposed tochickenismo, which is what I see
a lot of people moving towardsnow, uh, which is good, which I
think is a very good thing.
But I think because of thedistance that I have based on
the circumstances of my mybirth, my family, uh how my

(46:44):
family has historicallynavigated their own relationship
to their indigenous Latinoidentity, my distance from
Mexico, my you know, my myfamilial distance as well as
just my sheer physical distance.
I'm not sure I am yetcomfortable with saying I am

(47:06):
indigenous.
Right now, um, I wouldabsolutely say that I am
indigenous descended, but beingisolated from others who are
re-indigenizing themselves whocome from the same kind of
history, like Chicanos who arere-indigenizing themselves.
Like if I had like a like alike a physical community where

(47:27):
I live of all people doing kindof the same thing.
Like if I had, you know, if Iwas in LA and I was around other
people from like the Discordserver who were all kind of
doing the same thing, I mightfeel differently.
But part of the part of theancestor work that I also do is
specifically about embracing uhthe discomfort and embracing the

(47:51):
ugliness and embracing all ofthe bad decisions that brought
me and my family to where theyare now.
Um, and so like I'm verycognizant of like even the term
mestizo, right?
And all the ugliness that thatconveys, you know, I am a
mestizo.
I am the result of baddecisions.

(48:13):
I am the result of trauma.
I am the result of rape andtheft and colonialism and racism
and all of that stuff.
And um part of me reconnectingis not just like celebrating the
good and celebrating what isbeautiful and poetic and

(48:34):
culturally significant, it isalso embracing um and accepting
all the horror that is, youknow, my bloodline stretching
back to the dawn of time, right?
And specifically stretchingback the past 500 years.
So I think for me, that is whatmy Chicanismo is rooted in, and

(48:57):
that's sort of uh it's it'sless maybe about you know, like
the brown power politics and thefarm workers movement and all
that stuff, and more about sortof a politics, like a more of a
a deeper time kind of politics.
That's yeah, that's I thinkthat's where I'm at on that for
now, and that may change in thefuture, but yeah, for now I

(49:17):
would say that I am Chicano, andyou know, I don't think anybody
else in my family wouldidentify as Chicano.
They're all pretty apolitical,you know, for better, for worse.
But yeah, I feel like I feellike I'm the only person in my
family that is looking backwardsat history, right?
Everyone else is very muchfocused on tomorrow, next year,

(49:38):
who's having babies next, who'sgetting married next, the next
job, the next house, as opposedto, you know, pausing and
looking back and recognizingwhere we came from.
And I think that's uh that's adeeply unpleasant experience for
people who have suffered racismand have suffered institutional
violence.
So I get it.

(49:58):
I get it.
I I understand why I'm the onlyone in the family doing this.

Nicte-Ha (50:38):
Because it is a complicated place to be and to
navigate.
And I think that your wordsreally speak to a lot of the
experiences of a lot of Chicanosand Latinos, first, second,
third, fifth generation who arenavigating that feeling of
in-betweenness and looking backand seeking connection.

(50:58):
So thank you.
That was pretty wise.
Thank you so much.

Lannan (51:02):
Oh, thanks for asking the question.

Nicte-Ha (51:04):
So you dropped the Discord server.
So I think I want to go.
So we we covered your thestarter pack of deities.
I love that.
I'm just gonna use thatforever.
And then, you know, EgyptEgypt, Egyptian deities and
chalk, and then what was thewhen would when did the
transition to the teteo come?

(51:24):
And maybe you can talk a littlebit about the terms we're
using, because I think sometimesin polytheistic spaces, people
say, I'm working with deities,which I always think is really
weird, versus worshiping themand who the teteo are, and if
there are particular aspects ofthe teteo that you that you
follow.
So how did they come to you orhow did you come to them?

(51:47):
And kind of is there aparticular couple of deities
that that you are particularlydrawn to?

Lannan (51:54):
How did I come to them?
Okay.
So in 2020, you know, obviouslyCOVID happened.
Um, and we were all, I feellike a lot of people were sort
of taking stock of their livesen masse at the time.
Um, my grandmother moved inwith my mom, and I that like I
don't know, that triggeredsomething.
And I I feel like the ancestorswere were pushing me towards

(52:19):
reckon reconciling with the pastthrough that because my mom and
my grandmother's relationshiphas always been really
difficult.
They never got along forvarious reasons.
My mom's upbringing was notrosy.
So that had me thinking about,you know, my mom's relationship
with my grandmother was bad, butmy mom's relationship with her

(52:41):
grandmother was good.
And then I found out that mygrandmother's relationship with
her mom was bad, but herrelationship with her
grandmother was good.
So I'm like, well, how far backdoes this go?
Like, how far back does thismother-daughter, these these
mother-daughter problems andabuse and trauma and and what
have you?
Like, how how deep does thatgo?

(53:01):
And so I just I started lookingback and going back and going
back as far as I can and tryingto like place like where my
ancestors were and sort of in inand around historical moments
and around when they might havebecause I don't actually know
exactly when my grandmother'sside of the family arrived in
California or when they crossedthe border.

(53:22):
I don't know, actually, knowwhen that happened because it
happens long ago.

Nicte-Ha (53:25):
Maybe before there was a border to cross.

Lannan (53:29):
Maybe.
So I went like pretty much asfar back as I could.
So um, and and because the theMaya deities also said, hey, you
know, you need to look closerto home.
So it's basically it was comingat me from all sides, and I was
like, okay, I can't, I can'tavoid this anymore.

(53:51):
Because I would that's kind ofwhat I was doing.
I was kind of avoiding thatthey for some reason.
I don't know.
It just it felt toouncomfortable for me until this
moment.
And then I started looking intothem, and it just had this like
feeling wash over me of likehomecoming, which I don't think
I would have been reallyprepared for before that.

(54:11):
So I guess it, you know, ithappened when it was time for it
to happen.
And I was like, oh my god, wow,like these gods, they feel like
family, and that seems to be areally common experience um for
a lot of us coming back to them.
Uh feels, yeah, feels like itfeels like one big extended

(54:34):
divine family.
And that's just kind of that'sjust kind of how that went for
me.
And then I was looking forother people um who were also
interested in the deities.
I remember I remember that theywere like a couple like Yahoo
groups.
It was like kind of a thing fora few years that like people

(54:55):
were blogging about and talkingabout and making groups about,
and then they all just kind ofdied.
Um, they all disappeared.
All the blogs are deleted.
Yeah, it's like an entireentire community just like
disappeared from the internet,like around 2010.
Yeah, really weird.
Weird.
And so the only group that Icould find, I did a lot of
digging.
The only group that I couldfind was on Reddit.

(55:15):
And so I joined the Redditgroup, and um it was kind of
active.
I don't actually know how manymembers there are now, um, but
it's been closed for a fewyears.
So I I became an active part ofthe the group, an active
community member.
Uh, there was somebody who hadownership of the group, and me
and a couple other people werelike, well, they're not actually

(55:37):
part of the community, they'rejust caretaking the subreddit.
So we got ownership from themand we ran it for a few years,
and then we made the server, andwe and the, you know, the
server was growing at theDiscord server for folks, and
then uh um membership of boththe subreddit and the server
were growing, and then we justkind of realized it's gonna be

(55:59):
better for us as a community ifwe stick to the Discord server.
And because we, you know,Reddit being Reddit, you know,
we started getting all kinds oflike goofy, goofy people coming
in, asking goofy questions andacting goofy.
Um, and we're like, no, I thinkas a community, it's just gonna
be better if we close this upReddit, make like a guide and

(56:21):
have like rules that people haveto read in order to participate
so they're not being stupid,asking stupid questions.
And then we could also like ageverify too, because um, we get
some young, young ass peopletrying to get in there.
And I'm like, no, you're 14.
You can't, no, you're no, youcome back in a few years.

Nicte-Ha (56:42):
Good for you.
I see some posts on some ofthose Reddit sub subreddits, and
people are like, I'm only 15.
I'm like, what the hell are youdoing on Reddit?
This is a bad place.
Although I did grow up in theera of just joining random chat
groups when I was like 16 on theinternet in like 1996-97.

Lannan (57:04):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (57:06):
I am so lucky that I never got sucked into anything.

Lannan (57:11):
Yeah, I think about how like I grew up on the internet
and compared to now, I'm like,okay, it's like way safer.
So I I get it.
I get it.
I totally accept that there'sgonna be like literal children
in a lot of these public placeson the internet, but my
boundaries are like, I don'twant to deal with you.

Nicte-Ha (57:28):
Good for you.
Okay, let me just clarify.
So for people who arelistening, there was uh on a
walk, which is spelledA-N-A-H-U-A-C.
So no new posts, you just gothere for, but then you can join
the Discord server.

Lannan (57:39):
So Yeah, we direct people from there to join the
Discord server, yeah.

Nicte-Ha (57:43):
Okay, that's what I figured.
So just to let everyone know,that's how that's how I joined
Ana Walk briefly when you couldjoin it and post, and then I I
joined the Discord server, andthat's where I discovered I was
the oldest person on the server,at least at that point.

Lannan (57:56):
So it's okay.
You might be up there withItzli with the Itzli now.

Nicte-Ha (58:00):
Yes, I think it was me and Itzli.
I think Itzli was like twoyears younger than me or three
years younger than me.
So, but I haven't, I I left thecommunity because I was not as
dedicated about pursuing theworship of the Teteo at that
time.
So I was kind of like, I'm justgonna dip out.
Plus, I had younger kids, but Iknow that you've been really
active in it.
So, what's it like running areligious Discord server?

(58:24):
I mean, what's the, you know,do you feel like people look at
that as their kind of primaryreligious community?
Or do you think it's like moreof a clearinghouse for people's
ideas around how to practice andwhere to find resources?
And then they practice in reallife, or is it kind of both?
Like what's the what is it likerunning that, you know, a

(58:44):
digital, a digital religiouscommunity, essentially?

Lannan (58:47):
I think it's I think for a lot of people it is their
primary religious community,which is really interesting.
We we do have other people inthere, we do have a lot of
people in there who are familiarwith other polytheist paths or
they follow other polytheistpaths in addition to uh teotica
uh uh uh teot sorry,teoticayotl.

(59:07):
Um so we have a mix of folks,but I do try so it being a
polytheist traditionspecifically, I do try and
emphasize learning more aboutpolytheism in general, because I
think that just makes folksmore just you know, a more
rounded sort of theologicalperspective, a a better

(59:29):
understanding that what you knowwhat was going on
religious-wise in throughoutMesoamerica before um before the
conquest was not unique becauseI think that there are a lot of
people who are reconnecting totheir ancestral culture who come
from a very Christian or veryCatholic background, and they

(59:52):
have this sense or they theyhave this thought in their head
that oh, what you know, what ourancestors were suing with very
Very special, very unique, veryuh, you know, it wasn't, it
wasn't anything like what those,you know, like what the
Europeans were doing.
Um, and it's like, no, no, it'spolytheism.
It's it's it's exactly thesame.

(01:00:13):
It is the you have these bigpolitical institutions that
revolve around ritual calendarand a ritual schedule of worship
and honoring various deities,various godhoods.
That's that's what they weredoing.
There's a lot of people thatdon't like that because that's
you know, you know, they theyhave this sort of very

(01:00:34):
Christianized and turnalizedidea of oh, well, that's you
know, that's barbarism, orthat's I call it Aztec
exceptionalism.
Um, and I I think it's justgood to approach it with the
understanding that polytheismhas existed everywhere
throughout the world.
It comes in many forms, manydifferent theologies, many, many

(01:00:54):
different kinds of metaphysics,many different kinds of
worldviews, but it's it'spolytheism.
You you you are acknowledgingthe multiplicity of the divine,
the existence of the divine.
Um and and acknowledging thatmultiplicity and plurality is a
big deal.
It's a much bigger deal thanpeople think when they first

(01:01:16):
come into it.
They, you know, think, oh,okay, you know, you got more you
you have more than one god.
You got a lot of gods to pickfrom.
I can worship whoever I want.
And it's like, yeah, okay,that's that's the very, very,
very basic idea of it.
But theologically, it is vastlydifferent from a monotheist
worldview, let alone atheists.

(01:01:36):
I would say the atheism andmonotheism have much more in
common with each other thanmonotheism and polytheism.
And a lot of people don't don'tunderstand that until they, you
know, really start doing theirhomework and they really start
reading and just thinking, justcontemplating about what it
means to live in a world withmultiple godheads.
So I I try and emphasize sortof sort of a more well-rounded

(01:01:57):
education.
I direct people to otherpolytheistic communities because
I think it's important to havemore more than one community
that you can rely on forinformation.
I just think it's that's justgood.
What's the word?
Stewardship?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And good, uh uh, just like goodum intellectual hygiene.
That's what I was gonna say.
Um, rather than just relying onone community and one one kind

(01:02:21):
of people for information.
Um I don't remember what else Iwas gonna say.
There was a whole other thingthat I was gonna say on this,
and I don't remember.

Nicte-Ha (01:02:29):
Well, it might, it might come back.
You know, we're talking you youuse the phrase Aztec
exceptionalism, and I think oneof the dangers, I think people
who are rediscovering theirindigeneity or reconnecting to
their ancestral practices inthis way, I think that there is
the danger of what we seehappening in Eastern Europe or

(01:02:51):
in Norwegian countries withnationalism and racism creeping
in to that, to thatexceptionalism, that idea that,
you know, we were way moreadvanced than so and so.
And the evidence has just beensuppressed.

(01:03:11):
It I will fully admit that, youknow, the Mexica have been
maligned pretty thoroughly byEuropean academics and by
historians.
However, you know, it's not,you know, there was human
sacrifice happening, right?
And we can have a wholeconversation around is

(01:03:32):
crucifixion and all of the warsof religion is that human
sacrifice that the Europeanswere doing and all of that,
which I think is a validconversation.
But, you know, you have peoplewho are very drawn into this
idea of making the Mexicaexceptional, which erases kind
of the cultural diversity of thearea, right?
And it really does.

(01:03:54):
I think that'll that's a dangerfor a lot of Chicanos and for
others who are kind of reachingback to that idea of Aslan or

(01:04:17):
that idea of the Mexica as likea an exceptional people.
You end up kind of recreatingthat pattern of nationalism and
and won't say racism becauseit's different, but like that
pattern of sort of like insularnationalism about your one
people.

Lannan (01:04:35):
I think too, it it lends itself to an
anti-intellectualism, right?
Because then it's like, oh,well, I've learned all I need to
learn about the ancestors.
They were awesome, they werecool.
Nezawal Coyot was, you know, hewas a he was a gentleman and a
scholar.
And look at all this poetry wehave, look at look at all this,
these, the, you know, thesephilosophical treaties, uh,

(01:04:57):
treatises and and metaphysicsthat we would still have if the
Spanish hadn't come anddestroyed everything.
You know, it's like people likevalorizing like the Library of
Alexandria, right?
And it's like, oh, look at allthis stuff.
We you know, civilization wouldbe so much more advanced if if
the Christians hadn't come alongand destroyed the Library of
Alexandria.
And like, no, like it was alibrary.

(01:05:19):
That's all it was.
It wasn't like it wasn't thesum total of all human
knowledge, and it really kind ofcovers up the fact that the
Machika were empire builders,you know, they they were the
Johnny come lately's to thearea, and they came in and they
bulldozed the local politics andthe local cultures, and they

(01:05:42):
they they wanted to rule as muchas they could and as many
people as they could, and theywanted efficiency, and they
wanted tribute, and they made alot of power plays, and they
made a lot of really brutal,nasty power plays, and that's
the way it was.
And it doesn't serve anybody tosweep all that under the rug.

(01:06:07):
They were just as much playingpolitical games as anybody now,
anybody in the US right now, butthat's everywhere, everywhere
there's politics, everywherethat there has ever been
politics.
So they they were working in awell trod human tradition.

Nicte-Ha (01:06:24):
Yeah, I was actually thinking about this last night,
kind of thinking about ourinterview and just reflecting on
you have the stories and thewarnings about um the Wendigo in
in the Great Lakes, like Ojibwecultures, and then you have the
story about skinwalkers amongthe Dine and the South uh

(01:06:49):
Southwest tribes, right?
The idea of people who who whoseek to have power over others,
right?
So I just was thinking aboutthis idea of all these cultural
stories we tell about rapacityand greed and generosity of
spirit and all of that, andthinking about how different our
culture would look if weadopted certain attitudes toward

(01:07:12):
generosity.
I was like, I was like, all ofthese things are just culturally
taught to us, right?
Philosophies about what ourrole is in the world, and
they're tied into our religiousbeliefs and religious duties as
people.

Lannan (01:07:25):
Yeah, no, a hundred percent.
That just yeah, that justreminds me of like some of the
stories that we still have fromthe Tenochtilan uh area, you
know, whatever the Empire.
Um yeah, I I I like thinkingback to the story about the guy
playing ball with Tlalok and umhe wins and Tlalok gives him

(01:07:50):
corn, gives him mace kernels,and the guy's like, what the
fuck?
Where's my jade?
And Tlalok is like his youknow, he smites the guy
basically.
He's like, What are you stupid?
This is you can't eat jade.
Um like I I love stories likethat that are just like you
didn't think greed is greed isstupid.

(01:08:11):
This is you know, greed doesn'tgreed upsets upsets the balance
of stuff.
But I think too that it'stough, it's tough to talk about
like virtue ethics in thesesocieties that didn't have like
school, like specific schools ofphilosophy in the way that like
some of um you know, like theGreeks did basically or if they

(01:08:33):
did if they did, we don't knowbecause they burned all of the
codices and executed all thepre.
Yeah, that's true.
And I think in a place, I thinkin a in a culture like you
know, pre-conquest Mexica hadthose philosophies were like
physically embodied.
Like I would be like I would besurprised if a lot if if there

(01:08:55):
were like uh you know formalphilosophical writings anywhere.
Like it it seems to me thatlike the the what was
philosophically important to theculture was you know what could
be done, right?
Like it's very very practicalpeople, right?
Very similar to like the let'sjust say like the Vikings, the
Norse, right?

(01:09:16):
What was philosophicallyimportant to them was what can
be embodied.
Like, why would you write thisdown?
Everybody's doing it already.
This is you know, we teachthrough, you know, uh like the
like with the Aztecs, it wouldhave been like we we teach
through dance, we teach throughtraining warriors, we teach this
in the home, we teach this itthrough these embodied practices
of participating in culturerather than standing around and

(01:09:39):
thinking about it, right?
Like who has time for that?

Nicte-Ha (01:09:41):
Yeah, I just I was thinking that actually they you
know developing these differentschools of philosophy and all of
these deep thoughts is really afunction of of having the
luxury of time, which requires acertain like level of economic

(01:10:02):
stratification, right?
That yeah, Mexica were justthey were starting on, right?
I think one of the things thatshocked me was that the Mexica
Empire was actually relativelyyoung.
Yeah, you know, it was only acouple hundred years old when
when the when the uh clunkysettlers arrived, right?
And yeah, there were older onesin the area, right?

(01:10:23):
And that, but them as a as theMexica as a people, like were
relatively young as an empire.
And so I think that you have tohave some level of uh like in
Greece you had like lots ofslaves work in the fields so
that you could sit around inyour togas and you know draw
triangles on the ground orwhatever, you know?

(01:10:43):
So I think, right?
You gotta gotta have a littlebit of like a little bit of
space to sit around and look atyour own navel.
Yeah, come up with this stuff.
Um, I one of the things thatI've struggled with is when you
have experiences of the divineand you go out, you look for

(01:11:06):
other people who've experiencedit as well, right?
And you're starting on thisjourney and you're stepping
outside of sort of thewell-accepted definitions of
prayer and hearing God's voice,right?
It can be very complicated toparse through some of the
overwhelming experiences you canhave, right?
And then keeping yourobjectivity when you meet other

(01:11:29):
people who are also under likeyou tell them how you're
feeling, and they're like, Iknow, that's amazing.
Yes, my spirit guide from theplanet Xanadu also speaks to me.
And I'm so excited that you,you know, so there's like you on
the one hand, when you havethese deep spiritual
experiences, because I've hadseveral that I can't explain any

(01:11:51):
other way, but I don't, I it'sdifficult for me to to talk
about it with other peoplebecause you feel very
self-conscious that people aregonna either gonna think you're
mentally ill, which I think is athing, you know, if you're
regularly hearing voices, youmay be communing with spirits,
but you should also maybe checkwith a mental health
professional.
Yeah, yeah, it's good to beproven.

(01:12:12):
Right.
It's good to be proven.
Nothing wrong with that.
Yeah.
Right.
So, like, how did you how doyou sort of navigate that in
talking with people?
Because I think people are finewhen you're like, oh, I went to
church and I prayed and likeGod made it so that I, you know,
won $500 at the lottery.
But like it's very different.
I know when Christians arelike, God spoke to me, I'm kind

(01:12:32):
of like, okay.
So how do you, how do youpersonally navigate that
feeling?
Do you just sort of you'relike, okay, your God spoke to
you.
Is that the beauty of being apolytheist?
You can be like, yeah, your Godspoke to you, and that's great.
There was a question in there.
I'm sure you can parsesomething out of that.

Lannan (01:12:47):
Oh man, there's so much in here.
I would say that I I just I Itend to avoid those kinds of
conversations with normies.
I'll say that, I'll say thatjust straight up.
Um, I will get into thetheological weeds with normies.
I'll get weird like thatbecause that's like a language
that they can understand.
Being able to talk about youryour religion or religion in
general from that sort ofimpartial distance is something

(01:13:10):
that they can understand becausethey're doing it themselves.
Most people are.
And yeah, so that's kind of myapproach.
And I it doesn't, it doesn't,it doesn't help me to talk about
it with people that don'tunderstand.
So I just don't.
It just makes things weird andcomplicated and it gives them
the wrong impression, usually,because they have no idea what
I'm saying.
I'm speaking, I'm speaking acompletely different language.

(01:13:32):
So I just it's that's why Ithink it's it's really important
to those connections, thosecommunity connections or
individual connections.
If you're a polytheist, if andyou're the kind of polytheist
that has those kinds of personalinteractions with deities, with
spirits, with what have you,you gotta be able to have people
to talk about it with, peoplethat you trust, to be impartial.

(01:13:54):
You basically you you you haveto kind of develop like your
discernment ability because somuch of polytheism is sort of
this wild west for most people,and they're going it alone, or
you know, like I yeah, I if if Ifind somebody that I connect
with and who experiences things,excuse me, in the same kind of

(01:14:14):
way that I do, whether or notit's with the same entities or
not, or in the same tradition ornot, I will, you know, I will
try and connect with that personbecause being able to share
those experiences is soimportant.
It's so important um for thehealth of your practice and just
like for your mental health.
And so you could do likecheck-ins with people, see like,

(01:14:35):
you know, am I crazy or is thisdoes this does this make any
sense to you?
Yeah.
So like regardless of Pantheon,regardless of culture,
tradition, just you know, havingsomebody connect to or a
mentor, having a mentor is likereally good.
And I think that's kind of likeI think that's kind of the role
that I serve for a lot ofpeople in the server, is just
sort of like, you know, I'm I'mserver dad.

(01:14:56):
I'm server dad.
So when people start going offoff the rails, you know, it's my
job to rein everybody back in,you know, or say, hey, you know,
that sounds kind of weird.
Are you sure that's what youthink it is?
Or is you know, are you surethat there's not something else
going on?
Um, have you had your hormoneschecked?
Have you had your thyroidchecked?
You know?

(01:15:16):
Are you depressed?
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:15:18):
Are you still have you been out lately to touch grass?

Lannan (01:15:21):
No, yes, grass lately.
It's so important.
Really, right?

Nicte-Ha (01:15:26):
Especially now.

Lannan (01:15:28):
Yeah, especially now.
And the thing, the thing that Iwould say frustrates me the
most with the variouspolytheisms is that uh we really
don't have a lot of elders whowe can call on for experience.
We have we're we are uh areligion or a category of
religion of converts, of firstgeneration converts.

(01:15:50):
That's 90% of us, 95% of us.
Practically nobody is raised inthese traditions.
Nobody's parents have passedthese down to them.
That's changing.
Obviously, you know, people myage that grew up with this
stuff, we're, you know, we'rehaving families and we're
raising kids.
I'm not, I'm childless.
But, you know, I lot I know alot of people that are, you
know, having children andthey're raising their children

(01:16:11):
in their traditions, and that'sgreat.
But we don't really really haveelders that we can call on.
We don't have uh a priesthoodin the same way that uh, you
know, other world religions doof people that are vetted,
trained by other elders.
We are a collection ofreligions where people, anybody
can just just randomly startcalling themselves a priest, and

(01:16:32):
and you know, there's nooverseeing body that you can
make a complaint to about that.
So you you gotta take them attheir word.
You have to vet them, you haveto make sure that they know what
they're doing, that they're notthere to manipulate people or
self-agrandize themselves.
So I don't uh I don't trust, Ihave a hard time trusting elders

(01:16:54):
in any capacity, just from mypersonal experience with older
people in my family and olderpeople in my my life really kind
of all dropping the ball onwhat being an elder and what
being a mentor actually means,not getting the memo there.
So yeah, I I have a really hardtime trusting people who claim
that they are in positions ofauthority and that they know

(01:17:15):
things and that I should go tothem for knowledge.
I have a really tough time atthat.
Um, but but it's alsounfortunate that we don't have
those people in our traditions.
So that's that's part of thereason I like Buddhism so much.
It's because you have peopleand the the priests, their job
isn't to commune with the deity.
The priest, the Buddhistpriest's job is to make sure

(01:17:38):
everybody's playing nice and uhmake sure people aren't having
uh uh you know breaks withreality when they're meditating,
and then also basically justlike giving advice on how to sit
for two hours at a time.
That's it.
That's all their job is is torun meditation centers for
people.
That's that's that's it.

(01:17:59):
So I really, I reallyappreciate Buddhism in that way.

Nicte-Ha (01:18:02):
I do also like that Buddhism's entire like one of
the core things that theBuddhist said is basically think
for yourself.

Lannan (01:18:13):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:18:14):
Like use my words as toilet paper, I believe, is the
phrase.
My mom is my mom is uh is aBuddhist.
She's been a Buddhist for thelast like 25 years.
Oh, that's still she's the SotoZen, Soto Zen person.
While she's also sort of amystic, it's like a whole thing.
But she and I have talked a lotabout Buddhism.
And I just love that likeBuddhist priests, like half of

(01:18:36):
the other thing is just callingyou out on bullshit.
That that is the fundamentalthing that they're that they're
trying to do is just pin youdown and make you stop
bullshitting.
Yeah.

Lannan (01:18:46):
So I think that's that.
I love that so much.
I yeah.
And there are a few people inthe community, a few older folks
in the community, you know,they're not old, but they I
would I would call them eldersjust because I have to, who do
that.
And I I they are nationaltreasures.
Um, but there's not many ofthem.
There's not many of them.

(01:19:07):
So I am, you know, I try, I tryto bring that energy to the to
the groom.
I try not to tell people whatto think.
I tell people how to behaveappropriately in a religious
community because a lot ofpeople don't know how to behave
in a religious community either,which is fine.
That's not something a lot ofpeople have experience with.

(01:19:28):
And then I, you know, I I tryand tell people, you know, to
experience stuff and to read andto expose themselves to ideas
and experiences and basicallyjust to like get out of their
heads and just practice.
So I try and bring a little bitof that that Buddhist uh
sensibility into the group and Ihope it's doing something.

Nicte-Ha (01:19:50):
Well, I also I just love that Buddhism, and I don't
want to kick us off becausewe've already been talking for
like an hour and a half, but Idon't I don't want to kick us
off in a whole nother direction,but I do love um the simplicity
of Buddhism and I think thefour noble truths.
I'm like, I don't really knowanybody who could argue those.
You know what I mean?

Lannan (01:20:09):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:20:09):
They're pretty, they're pretty good.
It's pretty good atencapsulating a lot of the human
experience.

Lannan (01:20:14):
And Buddhism to me is like extremely compatible with
the Mexika worldview.
They're both very practical,right?
They're both about avoidingextreme and just doing the right
thing and be there for yourcommunity.

Nicte-Ha (01:20:29):
Is that so I'm I'm kind of curious.
I I found that that brief AMAyou did, and you had a really
beautiful explanation of theMexica worldview.
And so if you want to justexplain to you what your
understanding of it is after allof your, you know, reading and
exploration, I know that's a bigquestion, but you had a very

(01:20:50):
succinct and elegant way ofexpressing it.
And I just would like to giveyou the opportunity to to share
your understanding of theMexican worldview that you've
come to through your study.

Lannan (01:21:00):
I don't remember what I said in an AMA at all.

Nicte-Ha (01:21:03):
Can I link it to uh do are you okay with it if I link
it in the show notes?
Yeah.
I'll link it.
Yeah, yeah.
Because I think it's a reallybeautiful explanation.
Um I'll link it in the shownotes.

Lannan (01:21:14):
I think what I'm going to say is probably going to be
vastly different because yeah, Idon't remember what I said at
all.
My memory's not so great.
And that's okay.

Nicte-Ha (01:21:21):
Well, and we also change over time and our
theology and our understandingof the world evolve.
So it's okay if it's different.

Lannan (01:21:29):
Yeah, I think I think if I were to turn it into a very
brief elevator pit, I think it'sabout fundamentally about
reciprocity.
About it's to me, it is verymuch a oneness, a oneness kind
of worldview where the duality,the duality is to me, the
duality of it is is secondary,it's a secondary manifestation

(01:21:52):
of what is fundamentally aoneness experience because
everything, everything dies,everything comes back, and
everything dies again.
Everything it's ever everythingis cyclical.
And I believe to avoid to avoidthat cyclical nature of life,
of existence, of materialreality, to avoid it, you know,

(01:22:16):
to compare it to a pendulum, tokeep the pendulum from swinging
too from one end to the othertoo much.
The whole idea is moderationand again avoiding extremes.
And that is what creates thebasis for uh functional family,
home, uh a functional civicsociety, a functional world, a

(01:22:42):
planet in which to live in, youknow, a creation, and that
willingness to be uh thatwillingness to be transformed
and willingness to change andwillingness to move through
those cycles in order to usherin what is uh good and what is

(01:23:04):
natural and what sustains themovement of the world, if that
makes any sense at all.

Nicte-Ha (01:23:11):
That does.
And actually, I will say,having just read your previous
explanation, you're still prettymuch holding on to the same
understanding.

Lannan (01:23:18):
Okay, cool.

Nicte-Ha (01:23:19):
That that no, that makes that's consistent and
that's beautiful.
I think that's a wonderfulsummation of it.
So I think that we're sort ofnaturally coming to the close.
I mean, I I think I could keeptalking to you for another
couple of hours, but I thinkthat we can we can move toward
the come some closing questions.
Um, I feel like a lot of thereconnection happens now, like

(01:23:43):
through through danza andthrough finding calpullis.
And so did you ever getinvolved in Danza Azteca?
And what are your feelings onthe close link between the
reconstructionism and danzaAzteca?

Lannan (01:24:00):
I have no personal connection to Danza.
I stumbled across it too late.
I was on I was already on myway to Canada, basically.
And then like the one that wasclosest to me when I was still
in LA before I moved was likelike an hour away, hour and a
half away.
It just wasn't gonna work out.

(01:24:22):
So it's it's never been part ofmy experience.
I've never enjoyed dancinganyways.
Never, never enjoyedperforming, never, never like
any of that stuff.
So that really would not havebeen my jam either.
Never played team sports, noneof it, none of it has been ever
been in my wheelhouse.
So but I think it's I thinkit's a great vector for people

(01:24:47):
to get into that reconnection.
I think it's great.
I think it's it's doing exactlyas intended for most of the
time for most people, whetherpeople come into the Kapoolis to
start learning Nahuatl or startlearning the calendars or just
just to learn anything becausethey don't know anything and
they're just hungry forknowledge, right?
Hungry for anything.

(01:25:07):
And they have that communityand and that structure.
And I think having havingcommunities that revolve around
joint organized action is reallygood for a lot of people,
especially a lot of people thatmaybe um are struggling to find
that kind of structure in otherareas of their life, especially

(01:25:28):
like young people, liketeenagers and stuff, right?
And that that that feeling ofempowerment is so important,
especially for young people.
So I think they're great.
I think they're fantastic.
Um and I love that they're allover the place now.
I do think that you run intoissues with some of the elders
in these communities.

(01:25:48):
Some of the, you know, some ofthese people are self-declared
elders because, you know, theyread a book once uh they read,
they read the material that isavailable uh uncritically.
And as we know, a lot of thematerial that's available is not
good.
And I think there's a lot ofthat looking to like sort of the
new age self-help world andthen repackaging that as

(01:26:09):
indigenous wisdom, and peopledon't dig any deeper, or they
don't know that they should bedigging deeper, or they don't
know that so-and-so author isunreliable, or you know, like
how many people think Mega LeonPortilla is reliable, like most
people do, so like to go intothis and have somebody tell you

(01:26:35):
um like you can't actually trusteven the academy, you can't
trust these people, you can'ttrust the archaeologists, you
can't trust the anthropologists,um, because most of their shit
stinks too.
Um and it see when you getpeople spouting wisdom and and

(01:26:55):
knowledge and so-called history,and it's just a bunch of
bullshit, um, you know, or moreof that like Aztec
exceptionalism stuff, or youknow, human sacrifice is just a
metaphor, it never happened.
Or my favorite that I'veactually seen a couple times is
oh, you know, the the Aztecs,they were actually vegan.
Yeah, yeah, the ancestors werevegan, so we should all be

(01:27:17):
vegan.

Nicte-Ha (01:27:17):
There's a lady here in Chicago, and there was a pagan
festival, and she was talkingabout the Aztec gods, and she
called herself a curandera, andshe was like, Yeah, they were
vegan.
And I was in the back, like,they absolutely were not.
Anyways, yes, I've heard thattoo.

Lannan (01:27:37):
Oh my gosh.
I can't believe how common thatis.
Like, yeah, yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:27:41):
It's like, no.
My dad tried that on me.
Well, my dad was going to DanzaGroup, and I I studied religion
at Princeton.
So I took a class on Aztecreligion with David Carrasco.
And at the time my dad wastrying to, he was kind of
getting more into danza, and hewas like, you know, it's just a

(01:28:01):
like a lie that the Europeanstold that we, you know, that
there was human sacrifice.
And I was like, Dad, I amtaking a class with like one of
the best known anthropologistsin the world on this topic.
And I can assure you that it isnot a lie.
It's just, it is, it is, ithappened.
And that was a bit that was abit of a struggle.

(01:28:23):
He now he's he's backed off ofthat.
But yeah, that was a bit of astruggle.

Lannan (01:28:27):
Oh man, it's so uncomfortable.
It's such an uncomfortableconversation.
Like it happened, you know,there weren't 84,000 in one day,
but it happened regularly everyyear.

Nicte-Ha (01:28:37):
Yeah.

unknown (01:28:37):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:28:38):
You know, it's funny, as you're talking, you know, I
think, I think, man, we'rereally holding ourselves to such
high critical standards becausewhen I think of the number of
Christian pastors and priestsout there, especially these
non-denominational, morecharismatic traditions, anybody
they can set themselves up as apastor with no divinity school

(01:29:02):
training.
You know, not if you're part ofthe major denominations, but if
you're one of theseevangelical, non-denominational
Christian churches.

Lannan (01:29:11):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:29:12):
You don't need an M-div.
You just need a storefront andpeople to listen to you.

Lannan (01:29:17):
Yeah, and a loud enough voice.

Nicte-Ha (01:29:18):
Yeah, and a loud enough voice and to be and and
for real, like how you know, weare sometimes cutting ourselves
off from exploring this becausewe're like, oh, well, they might
not be telling the truth.
And I'm like, that's a problemin Christianity too.
It's just, it's more aboutrecognizing that humans.
Humans are not completelyhonest, perfect human beings, no

(01:29:42):
matter who they are, whatreligious tradition they come
from.
And you always have to haveyour critical lens on what
they're trying to tell you.

Lannan (01:29:48):
Yeah.

Nicte-Ha (01:29:49):
So I just thought about that.
Yeah, we you should look at theKalpuli and the people and the
elders and what they're saying,you know, but that truth that
goes for Christian faith too.
And we shouldn't be selfconscious.
Conscious of it in ours anymore than not that we shouldn't
care about it, but we shouldn'tthink that we're exceptionally
less cr less credible becausethere are some of those people

(01:30:09):
in in our traditions.

Lannan (01:30:11):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean it's it's gonna be it'sa problem wherever there's an
opportunity for someone to exertpower over somebody else,
right?
Yeah.
And everybody's got biases.
I've I've never I've neverunderstood the impulse to be
like unquestionably loyal tosomebody or like the leader.

(01:30:31):
Like I know we had somebody inthe group that they would come
in and they would like be like,oh well, you know, the elder
of my calpulli says this.
The elder of my calpulli saysthat.
We should probably be doingthings this way because my elder
says blah, blah, blah, blah.
I'm like, but your elder is notour elder.
I don't know who this personis.
I don't know what they know.
How do I know that I can trustthem?

Nicte-Ha (01:30:53):
Well, it'll be interesting to see as the
reconstruction develops becauseI think this is relatively new,
right?
This started when I was in highschool, really.
I mean, like Danza Aztecastarted as a cultural kind of
movement, you know, and then itsort of evolved into this whole
spiritual religious practice,right?

(01:31:13):
I'm sure it started before themid-90s, but that's when it
reached, you know, myconsciousness and was sort of
more part of public events andstuff in California.
And so it'll be interesting tosee as this evolves because
clearly it's it's it's it's aspiritual movement.
So it'll be interesting to seehow that vetting process and

(01:31:33):
that if there is someinstitutionalization or schools
or certifications that end uparising, that's gonna be
interesting to watch.

Lannan (01:31:44):
Yeah, it will be.
Yeah, I wonder if we'll wind upwith like, you know, lineages
of of like the different coupleleaves, different school of
thought, different approaches,you know, like like yeah, to
bring it back to Buddhism, likethe different different Zen
schools, right?
Like you have you can traceyour lineages back to, you know,
all the way back to the Buddhahimself, or or at least, you

(01:32:05):
know, whoever well, all Soto Zenon on the West Coast can trace
it back to uh what was his name?
Suzuki Roshi.
It'll be yeah, it'll be reallyinteresting.
It's like you said, it's it'slike a new fledgling thing,
relatively.
Like it's been around for a fewdecades, but it's still
extremely, but it's a newpractice.
Yeah, yeah, and new peopledeciding what they want to do

(01:32:28):
with it and what they want it tolook like and what they want
their communities to be like andhow they want their communities
to be organized.
And that's all really excitingstuff.
But I think where it's gonnaget really weird and really
interesting is when when thatchangeover starts happening, if
it hasn't already between thatthose first generations of
elders passing that on to thenext generation, and like what

(01:32:51):
that passing on looks like andwhether that's going to be, you
know, are you gonna ritualizethat?
Like, what are you are yougoing to standardize that?
Are you gonna institutionalizethat?
So yeah, I don't know.
It'll be kind of cool.

Nicte-Ha (01:33:04):
Yeah, that'll be interesting.
And you're gonna have, youknow, third and fourth
generation, you're gonna havekids that grew up going to
calpullis and raised in, youknow, going to ceremonias and
stuff.
So uh I I have to bring thisconversation to a close.
Um, but it was it's such apleasure to have you.
I'm gonna finish with one lastopportunity.

(01:33:24):
I think I mentioned just askingif there is, you know, any
piece of advice, if you feellike you haven't already
expressed it, but if there'sanything you want to reiterate
about this journey, about beingon this journey, any piece of
advice or experience that youwant to pass on, think something
that you want somebody wholistens to this interview to

(01:33:46):
take with them beyond what wewhat we express today.
You know, I want to hear if youhave anything to share in that
vein.

Lannan (01:33:53):
When you when you first asked that, I'm like, oh man, I
got nothing.
I got nothing.
And then a thought came to mejust now, which is like, don't
be afraid of anything.
Don't be afraid, don't beafraid of the tail, don't be
afraid of history, don't beafraid of the ancestors and what
the ancestors have done.

(01:34:13):
Don't uh don't be afraid ofbeing wrong and don't be afraid
of don't be afraid of beingright either.
Don't be afraid of new things,new new discoveries, new finds
uh that may rewrite what weknow.
Don't just don't approachanything having to do with

(01:34:34):
religion and with reconnectionand finding community.
Just don't approach anythingwith fear.
Fear is the mind killer.
That's that's it.
That's what that's what I gotfor you today.

Nicte-Ha (01:34:43):
Fear is the little death that brings total
obliteration.
Yeah.
Well, thank you so much, Lan.
I'm gonna go ahead and end ourour recording.
And I just want to say what anabsolute pleasure it's been
talking with you.
And I hope that people find asmuch as much richness and
nourishment in your words as Ihave.

Lannan (01:35:03):
So I appreciate that.
It's been really good talkingwith you too.
I'm I'm really glad that wefinally got this going.
This has been awesome.
Thank you.

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