Читать книгу A Woman's Guide to Tantra Yoga - Vimala McClure - Страница 23

Imagine Shiva, or pure consciousness, to be like the ocean, and Shakti, or creative energy, like the climate. When the climate is stable, or congruent with the ocean, the water flows freely, uninhibited. This is the state before the beginning — the state of absolute peace. The transforming principles of Shakti flow in Shiva without obstruction. But at some point the climatic conditions change and freeze a part of this ocean. The transforming factors gradually form a matrix, and the forces begin to play. The sentient tendency converts to mutative, the mutative to static, the static to mutative and, eventually, back to sentient again, thus creating a whirlpool of balanced but interacting forces. This interaction becomes a struggle for dominance, and, because it is the most powerful of the three, the sentient force prevails.

At this subtle point, Shakti begins to transform Shiva with its forces, and pure consciousness manifests in its first stage: cosmic mind. There begins to emerge in this ocean of consciousness the feeling of existence: “I am.” It is only after this self-awareness occurs that creation can begin; the sense of existence is necessary for action. This sense of “I am” has come about as a result of the subtlest transforming factor, the sentient tendency, exerting the first influence upon consciousness.

Now that the “I am” exists, Shakti’s energy continues to transform even further with the mutative tendency. The water of our imaginary ocean has gone from free-flowing to dense, and now it is… slush! The influence of the mutative tendency enables cosmic mind to act. “I am” becomes “I do.” Now the mutative tendency has full sway over consciousness; the final transforming force takes over. The pressure of the static tendency objectifies a portion of cosmic mind in order to act. This objectified portion is mind-stuff (ectoplasm). Cosmic mind-stuff is the iceberg in the ocean. The subtlest consciousness is now ready to be transformed into dense material forms.

The combination of the sense of “I am,” the sense of “I do,” and the cosmic ectoplasm is called cosmic mind, and it is through the thought waves of the cosmic mind that the innumerable forms of the created universe come into existence. But the entire creation doesn’t just burst forth from the “imagination” of Brahma. It is a natural, creative process, and like all creative endeavors, the stage must be set; the requisite conditions must be created first.

Before a baby is born, all of the right conditions must exist in its mother’s womb: the right temperature, the right time in the mother’s cycle, even the pull of the moon can affect the conception, growth, and birth of a child. If conditions are favorable, microscopic cells divide and become an embryo, which in turn unfolds, in a perfectly designed sequence, all of the elements necessary for the development of a human being. So, too, in the creation of the universe, the subtlest factors must first exist before the denser forms, which we can perceive, can come into being. These are the five fundamental factors, the basic building-blocks of the manifest universe.