K'ux
K'iche' heart-soul / centre of will and feeling
K'ux — the K'iche' Maya term for 'heart' as the inner centre of will, feeling, and identity. The Popol Vuh repeatedly invokes the deities as Heart-of-Sky (U-K'ux Kaj) and Heart-of-Earth (U-K'ux Ulew) — the same word that names the human heart names the cosmic creative principle, and the human k'ux is the locus where the divine heart is mirrored. Speech to another person is addressed to that person's k'ux; to act 'with one heart' (jun k'ux) is to act with full will and integrity. The k'ux is not a discrete soul-substance in the Aztec teyolia sense — it is the inner centre of the person, both organ and metaphor at once. In contemporary K'iche' communities the term continues to operate in both registers, and the heart-touch greeting in some highland villages is a public acknowledgement of k'ux to k'ux.
Point 1 of 3 in Maya Soul Centers — K'ux / Ch'ulel / Pixan
Cross-tradition overlaps
No overlapping points are registered for this point.
Sources
Popol Vuh, opening (preamble) (primary_canonical)
“U-K'ux Kaj, U-K'ux Ulew — Heart-of-Sky, Heart-of-Earth — the names of the maker and the modeller.”
Christenson, Popol Vuh: Literal Poetic Version (secondary_translation)