Shiva as the Supreme Reality

Shiva as the Supreme Reality 

As the primal reality, Shiva is looked upon in four main ways. 

Shiva is first the original light of reality, Prakasha. 

Second, he is the immortal life force, Prana.

Third, he is primal sound, OM or Pranava.

Fourth he is the primal being or pure consciousness, Atman or Purusha, our own inner Self and true nature.

Shiva as the primal power of light and awareness represents our own higher search for Self-realization, and is not simply an external deity. That inner light is the real basis of life and is beyond all birth and death. It is ever resounding as the cosmic vibration that is both the manifest and unmanifest reality. It is our true being beyond the limitations of body and mind, which are but its instruments.Shiva is the embodiment of mystery. His true nature cannot be known and does not dwell in the domain of speech or mind, word or thought. We contact Shiva when we realize the limited nature of all that we can know or think. This makes Shiva something of a terrible deity, the power of the great unknown that renders our lives but a grain of dust in the cosmic dance. Shiva is the deity of paradox. He stands above all dualities. He is beyond good and evil. He is the being of cosmic consciousness far beyond the constraints of any creaturely mind and its compulsions.Shiva is also the great deity of nature, the lord of animals or Pashupati. He is the lord of the wild. He really has no human form. We find his face and form hidden in nature, whether in the mountain, tree, the cloud, the animal or the rock. 

source : FB