There comes a moment—often in midlife—when the life we carefully constructed no longer holds. A career unravels. A relationship shifts. A sense of identity dissolves. What once felt stable becomes uncertain, even unrecognizable.
At MEA, this moment is not treated as a crisis to fix, but as an invitation to reexamine, to mine for wisdom, and to shape what comes next with intention. My forthcoming book, Nepantlán: Rituals for Becoming Your Own Curander@, begins precisely in that space.
In Nahuatl, the language of the Mexica, Nepantla names the in-between—neither here nor there, but somewhere in the middle. I extend this into Nepantlán: the place where transformation happens. Not the beginning or the end, but the threshold.
Midlife, I have come to believe, is one of the most profound Nepantláns we encounter.
When Life Breaks Open
A few years ago, my own life fractured in ways I could not have anticipated. After leaving a secure academic position to help build something new, I found myself in a system that eroded my sense of self. What followed was not just professional disappointment, but a psychological rupture that led me into depression.
In that space, I did not feel wise. I felt lost.
And yet, it was precisely there—in that disorientation—that something else began to emerge.
One afternoon, sitting outside in despair, a hummingbird appeared and hovered before me. In Mexica cosmology, it is associated with Huitzilopochtli—a force of struggle, will, and becoming. Whether symbolic or spiritual, the effect was the same: it interrupted my despair.
I began, almost instinctively, to create.
With scraps of cardboard, I assembled a small accordion-like book and began mapping what I now call Pivotal Moments—experiences that shape us, often without our full awareness. I wasn’t trying to write a book. I was trying to find my way back to myself.
That act of making became a ritual. And that ritual became a method.
Becoming Your Own Curander@
In many Indigenous traditions of the Americas, a curander@ is a healer—someone who tends to body, mind, and spirit through ritual and relational awareness. But what happens when the healer you need is within?
I use Curander@ rather than curandero or curandera intentionally. The “@” gestures toward inclusivity—holding masculine and feminine while making space beyond the binary. Naming matters. It shapes who feels called in—and who feels left out.
One of the central ideas of my work is this: we must learn to become our own curander@s.
This does not mean abandoning community. It means recognizing that healing is participatory—it requires our presence, attention, and willingness to engage the deeper layers of our lives.
Midlife often strips away the illusion that someone else will do this work for us. Nepantlán offers a framework for stepping into that role with intention.
Three Guides for the Threshold
Through my study of Mexica codices and lived experience, three glyphs emerged as guides through transformation.
Co—“here”—calls us into the present moment. What is actually happening in my life right now?
Tecciztli, the spiral, reminds us that growth is not linear. We return to the same questions—but with greater awareness.
Xinachtli, the seed, asks what remains dormant within us. What has been waiting to emerge?
Together, these symbols offer a practice of wayfinding—navigating life through attentive engagement with our unfolding.
Midlife as Initiation
We often speak of midlife as reinvention. But it is more precise to call it an initiation—a crossing.
The Latin root of “transition,” transire, means “to go across,” and implies a threshold. Nepantlán names that place and invites us not to rush through it, but to inhabit it.
This is where the work is.
Not in avoiding uncertainty, but in dwelling within it long enough for something new to take shape.
The Courage to Stay
The greatest challenge of Nepantlán is not entering it—life will take us there whether we choose it or not. The challenge is staying.
Staying long enough to listen.
Staying long enough to reflect.
Staying long enough to allow the old self to loosen its grip.
In a culture that prizes speed and certainty, this pause—between what was and what will be—holds the power of transformation.
An Invitation
The work I offer in Nepantlán is not a set of answers, but a set of practices:
To write, reflect, observe, and create.
To see your life not as a line, but as a spiral.
To step into the role of your own healer.
Midlife is not the closing chapter.
It is the threshold.The question is not whether you will cross it—
but how you will meet yourself when you do.
-Rafael
Rafael Adón Córdova, PhD, is a teacher, scholar, and cultural practitioner exploring the intersection of Indigenous wisdom, social theory, and personal transformation. A fifth-generation Mexican Californian, he was deeply influenced by his grandmother, Doña Enriqueta Delgado Reyna, a curandera and espiritista whose teachings on spirit and healing continue to shape his work. He is a 2018 Modern Elder Academy (MEA) alumnus of the InfinitUs cohort and the creator of Nepantlán: Rituals for Becoming Your Own Curander@, a practice that guides others through thresholds of identity, meaning, and becoming.