Mystical systems
Shakti
Direct answer
Shakti is Sanskrit for power or capacity. In Hindu thought it is the active, creative force of the divine, personified as the Goddess and spoken of in yoga as awakening energy.
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At a glance
- Also called
- sakti, divine feminine energy
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Kundalini Awakening, Tantra, Chakra, Prana
Shakti is Sanskrit for power or capacity. In Hindu thought it is the active, creative force of the divine, personified as the Goddess and spoken of in yoga as awakening energy.
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What does shakti mean?
The word comes from a root meaning to be able. In its plain sense any power is a shakti: the power of fire to burn, of a word to mean. Theology raised it to a principle. The god is pictured as still awareness and his shakti as the energy by which anything happens at all, so that the two are no more separable than fire and its heat. A well-known verse says that Shiva without Shakti cannot so much as stir.
The tradition called Shaktism worships this power as the supreme deity under names such as Durga, Kali and Lalita. In tantra and hatha yoga the same power is said to dwell in the body as kundalini, and the whole map of channels and centres describes her ascent.
On the tree of the hidden arts: Chakras and the breath.
What sets Shakti apart
Shakti differs from prana and qi in being a theological term before it is a bodily one. Prana is breath and vital force; shakti is the power of a deity, grammatically feminine and worshipped as a person with names, stories and festivals. The energy vocabulary of yoga borrows from that theology, which is why the rising force in the spine is called a goddess. In Shakta teaching she is not an attribute of a male god but the supreme reality itself.
- Root: Sanskrit shak, to be able
- Plain sense: power, capacity, the force by which anything acts
- Tradition: Shaktism, one of the major branches of Hindu worship
- Key text: Devi Mahatmya, about the 6th century
- Famous verse: Saundarya Lahari 1: Shiva cannot stir without Shakti
- In the body: kundalini shakti, the power coiled at the base of the spine
Often mistaken for something else: Prana is the vital breath that keeps a body alive and can be worked with in breathing; shakti is divine power as such, of which prana and kundalini are counted as particular forms.
The story behind Shakti
Goddess worship in India is very old, and the theology of the Goddess as supreme power is set out in the Devi Mahatmya, a Sanskrit poem of about the sixth century that forms part of the Markandeya Purana. The tantric schools of the following centuries, among them the Shaiva traditions of Kashmir and the Shri Vidya school, developed the pairing of Shiva and Shakti in detail. The verse on Shiva's helplessness without her opens the Saundarya Lahari, a hymn traditionally ascribed to Shankara.
Why Shakti matters
The word is the hinge between Hindu theology and the yogic map of energy: the force described in the body is the one worshipped in the temple.
How to read Shakti
Writers on yoga use it for the energy felt in practice; devotees use it as a name of the Goddess; in grammar and philosophy it still simply means power.
Shakti in practice: an example
A devotee at the autumn festival of Navaratri honours Shakti over nine nights in the forms of Durga.
Where readings of Shakti go wrong
Modern talk of feminine energy often turns it into a trait of women; in the sources it is a cosmic principle present in everything and everyone.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- shakti meaning, what is shakti, shakti energy, sakti, divine feminine energy
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
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Common questions
What does shakti mean?
It means power, ability or energy. In religion it is the dynamic power of the divine, usually personified as the Goddess, the consort and active aspect of a god.
What is the relation between Shiva and Shakti?
In tantric theology Shiva is pure awareness and Shakti is its power to act and create. They are described as two aspects of one reality, often shown as a couple or as a single figure that is half male and half female.
Is kundalini the same as shakti?
Kundalini is one form of it. The texts speak of kundalini shakti: the divine power as it lies coiled in the individual body. Shakti is the wider term, covering that power in every form.
