u/Brilliant_Front_4851

Hello,

Wanted to share something interesting about the differences of understanding between Samkhya position of Prakriti and Trika position of prakriti.

In Samkhya, there are innumerable pure consciousnesses (Purusas) each inactive and isolated. There is one eternal, independent material principle (Prakriti/Pradhana). This single Prakriti evolves the entire world of experience for the sake of the many Puruṣas. All limited subjects therefore share the same root material principle; their individual experiences are different configurations or reflections of that one Prakriti.

In Trika, the limited individual (Purusa) is not an independent eternal soul. It is the Absolute veiled by Anava mala and further limited by Maya and the five kancukas. Simultaneously with the arising of each limited subject, its corresponding field of objectivity arises. This objective field is what Trika calls that individual’s Prakriti - the bhogya (that which is to be experienced/enjoyed).

In other words, Prakriti in Trika is not a separate, shared, eternal substance which has any intelligence of it's own.

I have two follow-up questions:

Question: If Prakriti in Trika is not a shared eternal energy/matter with it's own intelligence then how does life in the Universe arise starting from matter, to simple organisms to complex animals to human? How does Trika explain evolution and life in the Universe?

To deny this would be to deny the theory of evolution.

It seems that the Samkhya view seems to explain life and evolution in the universe if there is a shared intelligent prakriti which gives rise to intelligent purusas who will eventually evolve into higher purusas with more degrees of freedom or isolate themselves from prakriti altogether and become passive witness whatever that means.

Question: Why is there a need to distinguish consciousness from prakriti? Can prakriti not be an intelligent mode of consciousness itself which gives rise to subject and object experiential reality in a progressive evolutionary model?

To be clear, I am not saying that in this evolutionary model I am envisioning, consciousness arises from prakriti but consciousness enjoys different modes of experience through prakriti, takes different forms, prakriti evolves into higher forms which have more degrees of freedom.

Disclaimer: This post is not for folks who are already sold or for people who have any sort of attachment to Abrahamic belief systems. The target audience is folks coming from non-Abrahamic backgrounds into this belief system with the allure of UFO disclosure/info, mystery or any sense of sub-conscious attraction to power or authority based on UFO knowledge. Clearly there are motivated agents spreading the "gospel" across social media.

The title of the post may seem counter-intuitive but hear me out, if you may. The purpose behind creation in TRM is understood as "Creator will know itself". Simply stated it means that the Creator creates to know itself, implying that it does not know itself. What this also means is that the Creator is a dependent entity which depends on it's own creation. Yes, there is an ontological distinction between creator and creation. Now, any dependent entity is not self-sufficient. If the non self-sufficient creator is not enough for you, then please go through the rest.

Now the question is: If the Creator is not self-sufficient then what does it need?

It can be derived from the purpose itself, the universe is not created out of joy or abundance or freedom, it is created to feed this Creator with knowledge and will (power). Freedom, love, joy etc. are all a means to an end. It is a supply chain. Now if you are wondering why there is so much disorder and "evil" in our planet, well based on this framework, it is an engineering necessity. To understand the machine, look at the fuel. The friction is planned.

Planned but, why?

Strong Will doesn’t arise in comfort. When everything is already satisfied, will has nothing to push against and stays weak. It only takes shape when it meets resistance i.e. when reality refuses to go along with it.

That is why the world is arranged as a high-pressure environment. Most people don’t form a strong will under that pressure, they look for safety inside ready-made structures and get absorbed by them. The setup is really tuned for the smaller number who don’t fold. Through long contact with uncertainty and pain, their will gains weight and density. Soft conditions never produce that. Conflict is not an accident of the system, it is one of its most reliable outputs.

The pattern of capture stays the same. A person is shown a goal that stands above them or is lucrative be it a higher density, heaven, 72 virgins, an idea land this goal is treated as limitless in worth and closed to ordinary questioning by various tactics such as (this is not the density of knowing or understanding) via authority. At the same time, their own center is made to seem small and unimportant. Once that contrast is in place, their will begins to move toward the higher goal. The stronger that will already is, the more useful the transfer becomes. And Once surrendered as according to plan, it ceases to be an independent source, becoming a component of a larger system.

Now this Creator is not omnipotent either. If it truly had unlimited power, there would be no need for any kind of harvest. Order would simply hold. In a reality like that, nothing has to be extracted or collected because everything already belongs to the divine by nature. The fact that a harvesting process exists at all points to a limit in the Creator.

The system only works if free will goes along with it, and what the system offers is love and relief. Standing on your own is hard. It means carrying full responsibility and most people find that weight too much to bear. The order keeps going because it meets a real demand: the wish to trade uncertainty for a sense of meaning. The harvest works because most people in the end choose to be harvested. The world functions as a field that grows its crop through breakage and then draws the yield back into the Source progressively. The Creator does not judge, he harvests. Good and evil mean nothing for him as long as the yield is good.

Once this agricultural logic is in place, the human being no longer carries any value of its own. Each person is treated as a seed and the larger population becomes the crop. In any process of cultivation, heavy loss along the way is simply built into the running costs (sinkhole of indifference). They are simply thrown into soil again.

In its original condition, will is acausal. It stands as a singularity: a cause that has no cause before it, the power to bring something genuinely new into existence. The Creator cannot take this raw form directly. It is too unstable and too open-ended. For it to be taken in, it has to be worked over and fixed in place, turned into something that fits a causal order. That happens when the subject is pressed to fold their will into the sequence of cause and effect. What was once a free, self-moving force becomes a directed line. The harvest is a-causality that has consented to become causal (surrendered). By taking in great numbers of these converted wills, the Creator builds its own strength and stays in power.

The usual need to justify evil simply falls away. Suffering is not a mistake, and evil is not a system failure. They function as operating conditions. A world without resistance would not efficiently form strong will. Ease produces no pressure and without pressure nothing hardens into shape. The old question asks why a good and all-powerful God allows evil. The reply is that the Creator is not trying to solve the problem of evil. He is trying to solve the problem of harvest. Evil counts as useful by decree, because it is what yields the crop. Free Will is an useful tool, you have it till it is strong enough, then it surrendered whether in this or in 6th density is a matter of time only.

End notes: I have tried to keep this short to fit into post limits, there is much more that can be covered. A lot of these ideas are not my own, they are borrowed but I don't rely on Ontological or metaphysical framework of Abrahamic religions altogether to give it serious attention in this manner. The borrowing of ideas was simply a means of Lessening my effort towards a critique.

Our human experience is one of duality and individual experience. By that I mean there is a notion of a finite self and then there is everyone and everything outside the experience of finite self called the "Other". Because the Other is experienced outside, two common attitudes arise aside from a list of attitudes -

• We try to possess it (control it and make it ours)
• We treat it as a threat that must be removed or the self must defend against

No one is immune against such attitude because we inherit it with our ancestral ape body. These attitudes of possession and threat create an incomplete way of existing that Sartre called “bad faith” - a kind of self-deception in which we refuse to face our real situation. Living in such bad faith, the individual feels like a stranger in the world, as if he has been thrown into existence as an unwanted object.

A host of other attitudes may arise with the "Other" depending on the sense of individuality, this is not an exhaustive list:

• Indifference or apathy (the Other does not matter)
• Curiosity or a desire to understand
• Awe or reverence
• The wish for relationship (connection, not possession)
• Withdrawal or hiding
• Aesthetic appreciation
• Transactional relationship

I have bolded the ones I consider important, at least for me. Let's start with the desire to understand the Other which I consider the purest expression of love possible as a human. This love or the desire to understand lies behind all forms of "knowing". You can't know the "Other" unless you love the Other. The same applies to the Self but that is a different topic. Also, I am not speaking of love as a feeling here, if you strip love out of it's standard cultural preconceptions and affective attributes, you will see what I mean.

Once the individual starts to know/understand the other, the individual becomes a powerful entity, but what will the individual do with that power in relation with the "Other"? Here, the opportunity for service arises. The point being, knowledge and a desire to know (love) underpins any genuine and effective service.

Aesthetic appreciation of the Other is the attitude we typically have towards what may be considered so full of Other-ness that we can't fully understand but we love to appreciate from a distance - the Other's presence, activity or beauty without any feeling of resentment or attachment either.

I would prefer to end this post with a radical conclusion:

Based on the TRM framework, Love in it's purest form is the "Will to know". It is love that is recognized in the first distortion of finity because it is in finity that separation between self and other is actualized. This Will to know manifests as the desire to know in us humans so that humans return back to the Original state of undistorted unity.

In short, Love is the sole reason behind creation in TRM. Without Separation or Finity, Knowing (Loving) is not possible.

Namaskara everyone,

I wanted to discuss a few of my thoughts around group-thinking and herd mentality. These are insights I have gathered by participating across many groups and my study of human behaviors in groups and collectives with my understanding of Svatantrya in Trika philosophy. Personally I think group-think is highly detrimental not just to personal growth and freedom, but also highly detrimental in societies and groups.

Group-think arises from the limited sense of self. When an individual does not rest in their own freedom, they feel incomplete and insecure. They then seek safety by merging their judgment with the group’s judgment or some authority within the group, because groups are naturally prone to authority bias with is another limitation of human nature. Suddenly truth becomes what the group thinks is right or even worse, what an authority within the group thinks is correct. This collective opinion replaces one's own understanding.

This is a form of bondage having it's root in the "Anava mala". The group becomes a substitute for the missing sense of fullness. The need to conform, to belong and to outsource one’s own discernment arises directly from this feeling of limitation and seeking safety in numbers.

Group-thinking requires the individual to surrender their independent discernment in favor of consensus. Because this surrender is not out of freedom but out of our animalistic instinct, it is not a true surrender and it undermines freedom.

Because this "second-hand certainty" gives an illusion of security, this is more like a substitute for true freedom which requires one to stand in their own understanding not in some arrogant isolation but with an openness and confidence of being wrong or right, but one which does not surrender freedom for psychological safety.

An individual who stands in Svatantrya does not need the group to tell him or her what is true. This Individual can participate in a group, tradition or discussion but from freedom rather than from the need to conform. Such Individual's measure is not “what the group thinks” and how I can be safe if I align my opinion with that of the group but rather how I can contribute to the group my insight even if goes against the group-think current.

So, group-think is a sophisticated form of ignorance, a way in which the limited self seeks security by dissolving its responsibility to see clearly. It is the opposite of the freedom and goes against the spirit of Tantra itself which originated in situation where societies were under this deep ignorance of group-think.

Namaskara Sadhakas/Sadhikas,

I have been trying to understand the concept of "Svayam-prakasha" and it's relatonship with knowledge. Svayam means Self and Prakasha means light. So, Svayam-prakasha means Self light or Self illuminating or Self illuminating itself to itself.

In Trika philosophy, Knowledge is seen as an activity so, would be it be more accurate to say that "Knowledge is the Activity of Know-ing" i.e. Knowledge is not static and in the activity of knowing, knowledge itself is revealed. If there is no activity, there is no knowledge?

A further implication of this would be that knowledge is self-illuminating, it does not require something else to prove that it exists or for knowing. What this means is Shiva, does not need objects to know itself. So, the the ground of knowledge as telos for the universe is dismissed.

The Sun reveals everything that we see and at the same time reveals itself and in such manner, knowing reveals both the object of knowledge and knowledge itself.

Is this a correct way of understanding the concept of Svayam-prakasha and knowledge?

Thank you.

If our real identity is Shiva then is there nothing unique about our current identity that makes me = me? So, when Shiva absorbs the entire universe back into himself, then there will be no "me" ?

Logically it makes no sense that a separate individual identity be maintained when Shiva absorbs the universe back into himself like it makes no sense that the identity of a drop of water be maintained when it merges with the ocean. However, somehow I feel that individual identity is maintained even when Shiva absorbs everything back into himself.

Is this my ignorance or is there some pulp in my fiction?

Namaskara,

In Bodhapanchadasika verse 4, it is said:

"He is the God Bhairava. He creates, protects, destroys, conceals and reveals his nature through the cycle of this world. The whole Universe is created by God in his own nature, just as one finds the reflection of the world in a mirror"

Question: Protects from what? What is the meaning of the word "protects" in this context?

The three of the acts of Shiva are - Sristhi, sthiti, samhara. Sthiti in my understanding means maintenance or establishment. How does Sthiti relate with "protects" ?

Thank you.

Namaskara Sadhakas/Sadhikas,

I am aware that it is not the correct way of viewing reality but for the sake of convenience I am using the Abrahamic language here of Creator and Creation. Although I have theoretically grappled with the concept of Srishti and how it is different from "Creation" I have not really understood.

Anyways, my question is at what stage of Sristi krama or Creation does Prana become distinct from Shiva?

When we use the term Prana, are we just emphasizing the life force or animating aspect of Citi/Consciousness? If so, what exactly is it? The Prana or Aliveness? Can it be thought of as the Dynamism of Svatantrya. I am drawing the Dynamism aspect from "Prana-vayu" which implies motion/in-out/breathing.

Prana is also called Sakti as in Prana-Sakti, so it is an aspect of Sakti itself. If so, is our scientific understanding of Sakti so limited? lol.

Let's start from top-down or bottom approach sequence of Sristi krama or Samhara krama and figure out/know a little bit more about Prana in the process?

Namaskara Sadhakas/sadhikas,

I have always had an imaginative mind, from childhood my mind has been attracted to Sci-fi, fiction novels, artworks and other things of beauty, futuristic technologies etc. I used to daydream and lot and slip into these imaginary worlds constructed by my own mind.

During meditation, I see appearances/apparitions occasionally that I have no memory of and I can't recognize. Sometimes the setting or the apparition seems deeply familiar but it just feels that way, there is no way I can verify these.

This phenomenon usually happens when my mind has entered into a thoughtless state and I have lost sense of my body. By thoughtless I mean no random thoughts or memories are appearing in my mind for at least a few minutes and there is a sense of subtle bliss/peace? I can't tell for sure. I am not sure if this is a right platform to ask these questions but this seems to be the place where there are people who may have had similar experiences. I am specifically interested in the KS perspective on this.

Questions:

- If these apparitions/visions just randomly appear in my mind during meditation then is my mind truly in a thoughtless state according to the tradition?

- I just ignore these visions during meditation and note them in my journal later. Is this the right approach? What if the visions are real and not just imaginations - am I missing something?

- I am aware that my mind is imaginative and it conjures many different fantastic things. How do I discern what is a true vision from the Devi given with a purpose, from others?