Kali the Cosmic Life Force

In the Cosmic Hierarchy, KALI, the Power of Time (KALA SHAKTI) is the  highest and the most abstract manifestation.  In a world in which  happiness is closely related to attachment, KALI represents a stage of beatitude (ANANDA) that is beyond any egotistical attachment.  This is why She is apparently terrifying.  For attaining the Supreme Happiness, the  human being has to give up through detachment (VAIRAGYA) all that brings  incomplete or transitory happiness.  

KALI is the Cosmic Life Force (PRANA) of the Universe.  Besides absorption (LAYA) into Her Subtle sound (MANTRA), a very efficient  procedure of communion with Her is the  breathing awareness i.e.,  continuously focusing the attention upon the breathing process without  influencing it, like a non-intruding witness.  Merging his attention  continuously, even during daily activities, with the inhalation and  exhalation (and especially with that which is beyond inhalation and  exhalation), the practitioner will discover in a very short time the  miracle of mindfulness and the power of introspection.   In this way,  he becomes ever more aware of the Life Force (PRANA) that sustains his  life, starts to control it and can even expand his consciousness toward  the Great Cosmic Force that is KALI.

     At the beginning, this appears as a Dreadful Gloomy night, the sum of  all fears and the exact opposite of what all of us want from life.  But in  and beyond this state of supreme crisis, the biggest opportunity is found:  The Pure Immortal Existence.

Death, dissolution, lack of freedom, compulsion, fighting, suffering, submission to something that appears to be "Not-I" -- all these are the  most frightening, terrible and undesirable things to our ephemeral and  limited power of understanding. The feeling of being devoured,  humiliated, broken into pieces, destroyed, annihilated is the very  pricking of death -- the power that pushes us toward evolution.  In the  TANTRIC tradition, this Supreme Power of Time (KALA SHAKTI), the totality  of the present Moments of Time, which form together the Eternity going  back toward the beginningless Past and going forward toward the endless  Future, is called KALI. 

     In the TANTRIC vision, the material world in which we live is not an illusion (as it is stated by other spiritual paths) but a magical reality.   For the TANTRIC adept, spiritual attainment and total freedom are to be  attained here and now i.e., in this material world and during this life.   To realize this task, each individual who follows this extremely efficient  path has to get a plenary experience, because life is devoured by time and  death is the final point of life. The paralyzing and uncontrollable fear  of death is the attitude that make us mortal beings.  In this respect, no  spiritual path will be efficient until the individual has understood the  meaning of death and has surpassed, even to a small extent, his illogical  fear of it.  Death has to be faced permanently with courage.  Only in this  way can the meaning of time be lived and understood.Maha Kali is sometimes considered as a greater form of Shakthi, identified with the Ultimate reality of Brahman. It can also simply be used as an honorific of the Goddess Kali,signifying her greatness by the prefix "Mahā-".  Mahakali is the presiding Goddess of the first episode of the Devi Mahatmya. Here she is depicted as Devi in her universal form as Shakti. Here Devi serves as the agent who allows the cosmic order to be restored.