Śivasaṃhitā 1.46

The image of the ocean and its bubbles is powerful in its precision: water does not become something different when it forms a bubble—the bubble is water. Likewise, the universe is not something different from Spirit: it is Spirit appearing in form. The wind (vāta) that agitates the ocean is māyā, the energy that dynamizes manifestation without altering the substance.

Phena (foam) and budbuda (bubble) are classical metaphors for the ephemeral in Sanskrit literature. The term sindhu (ocean, great river) evokes the vastness that remains while its surface forms dissolve. Vātavaśāt (under the power of wind) introduces causality: the world does not arise without cause, but through the action of the dynamic power of the Real.

The image of the ocean as consciousness and waves as individual beings is a constant in Advaita Vedānta, appearing in the Māṇḍūkya Kārikā, the Aṣṭāvakra Gītā, and in the Yoga Vāsiṣṭha. The Śivasaṃhitā adopts it for a Tantric purpose: understanding this non-difference founds yoga practice as recognition of the oceanic nature of being.