Even though the universe is merged in the Self, there is no universe nor is there merging. There exists a single principle of the Supreme Self, that which remains immutable.

The negation of līnatā—fusion—is of crucial significance: there exists no process of absorption precisely because separation never occurred. The metaphor of a river flowing into the ocean finds no application here, for the river was never distinct from the ocean; it was merely the appearance of a current that suggested as much. The paramātmatattva—the principle of the supreme Self—is not an entity but rather the principle of principles, the condition of possibility for all possibility. The avikārin—the immutable—is not static, but rather the very capacity to serve as the ground of all change without participating in it.