Then came the next turn on the spiral, and out of the shadows emerged what many experienced as the most luminous event of the millennium—the Harmonic Convergence of August 16 and 17, 1987. The significance of these dates was discovered by Jose Arguelles, a visionary investigator into the Mayan Calendar. In this system, each "age" consists of 13 Heavens and 9 Hells, followed by a final period of transition. The key dates in the Mayan calendar that Arguelles called Harmonic Convergence marked the end of a cycle of 13 Heavens and 9 Hells, and the beginning of a time of transition which ends on the winter solstice, December 21, 2012, coinciding with the end of the Mayan Calendar.

The nature and importance of Harmonic Convergence was described by Moira Timms in Beyond Prophecies and Predictions:

At Harmonic Convergence, then, humanity entrained to the evolutionary timing cycles in the center of the galaxy, which are, in turn, linked to the evolution of the universe. Suddenly, we were connected to galactic and universal evolutionary frequencies catalyzing the greatest evolutionary shift in the history of the species. It is interesting to note that the symbol for Hunab Ku, the being that embodies the galaxy, contains a g-shaped or phi ratio spiral at its center. Hunab Ku shows us that the geometry of "movement and measure" in galactic evolution is the phi ratio spiral, so clearly evident in the geometry of the galaxy itself.

As the light rays from the galactic core penetrated our sleepy minds, many us realized that the "New Age" wasn’t just about creating Ecotopia—we realized we were launching into an entirely new dimension of reality. No longer was the focus solely on the third-dimensional Earth. Suddenly, we found we could communicate with angelic realms, ascended masters and other higher dimensional beings, as the veils between 3-D and the higher realms thinned.

We entered a point of no return, analogous to the event horizon in a black hole. As astrophysicists understand, black holes function as doorways between dimensions. These revolving, imploding vortexes engulf all matter and energy that come within the sphere of their influence. When anything approaching a black hole gets close enough to reach the threshold called the event horizon, it cannot escape the accelerating, contracting spiral that will inexorably pull it into the vortex. This results in the complete dissolution of whatever enters the black hole. In a similar way, Harmonic Convergence marked the point of no return for third-dimensional, physically-identified consciousness. From this point on, the accelerating Time Spiral guaranteed that we would go through the necessary death and rebirth of the Omega-Alpha process. At the time of Harmonic Convergence, many intuited that the shift into the New Age was no longer a possibility—it had become a certainty. In fact, it was well underway, despite all outward appearances.

The journey through the imploding black hole of Omega is mirrored by the exploding and unfolding birth-spiral of light of the Alpha cycle. The title of Peter Russell’s book, A White Hole In Time, aptly describes the Alpha point through which we will travel. We might imagine our process as something like that of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly—a much-used analogy, but still the metaphor that most powerfully evokes the radical thoroughness of our transmutation. At Harmonic Convergence, we prepared to enter our personal and planetary chrysalis.

Within this evolutionary womb, we undergo the death of our third-dimensional human "caterpillar" identity, as the fourth- and fifth-dimensional "butterfly" prepares to emerge. The interval between the Harmonic Convergence of 1987 and the Zero Point of the Time Spiral comprises a bit less than 13 years. This is the time of dying to our caterpillar identity—to all small identities and self-conceptions, both personally and planetarily. Then, after we come out the other side of the "white hole in time" on July 26, 2000, 13 more years will pass until we emerge from the inter-dimensional chrysalis on July 6, 2013. At this point, our glistening new wings will be open, and we will know ourselves as trans-dimensional butterflies.