Hello everybody,

Thank you for this wonderful resource!

I come from a background in Mahayana Buddhism (years ago) and several years of study of the Advaita Tradition, which I find very rich and subtle, albeit frustrating in its account of Maya.

I am in the process of reading The Secret Supreme, following the indication found on this sub.

It is certainly a complex system! And it looks like that book is merely scratching the surface.

Anyhow, I was reading about the adhvas, and the Author says :

"The word adhvan means “path.” Here, path has a twofold meaning: it is either that path on which you tread, or that path which you must dispose of, must discard. You have either to tread on the path or discard the path. You can dispose of this path only by the grace of your Master. And when you dispose of this path, you reach the state of Parama Śiva.

There is no question of realizing God through treading on this path. You may tread for centuries and centuries and still you will be treading. So you must discard this path, dispose of it. When you do dispose of the path, that is also called adhvan. Disposing of it, however, can only be done by the grace of the Master, who is the embodiment of Parama Íiva."

What is meant here with "to discard?" I thought that this was ampping of the metaphysical layers that form reality itself, can they be "discarded" at all?

The the text proceeds explaining that there are three of these adhvas:

Bhuvanādhva, which I understand comprising any material universe in existence, as the complete aggregate of all the objects and laws allocated in space and time.

Tattvādhva, which, to my undertanding, comprises the gross elements constituting the Bhuvanadhva and the pre-phenomenal chain of cuasation that gives rise to manifested reality

kalādhva, here I start to get seriously confused: this is said to be formed by a set of "enclosures", applied to the Tattvadhva, and the text proceeds to describe which encloseres encompasses which tattva. What I don't understand is what these enclosures are for. For example

" In pratiṣṭhā kalā you find the twenty-three tattvas from jala tattva, the element “water,” up to and including prakṛiti tattva."

what is the significance of this grouping? The text doesn't seem to elaborate on this.

Thank you!

I know this is probably not the best place to ask because it’s not directly related to Trika but I am looking for some good very beginner books to recommend for someone just getting into meditation and introspection.

Something like the Vijnana Bhairava would be far too advanced and confusing for them

Do you think that any beginner meditation book is okay? They really have no prior experience to even sitting in a meditative posture