A good way to understand the concept of Maya is to think about
seeing an oasis in a desert. You can see it! You know it's there... you can almost taste the water... but nope, it's not really there at all. This illusion,
this perception of what we think to be real but in essence is just in our minds, is a perfect example of Maya. It is pretty much an explanation (and exploration)
of things which we are taught but never questioned, things which use to identify ourselves blindly. For example, if you see a snake slithering up your window at night -
you see it moving, it just has to be real - so you quickly flip on the light and it is only the string to pull up your blinds. The second you realized it was that
string, it ceased to become the snake. Reality is in our minds, so ironically, does Maya even exist? Or is it just a perception of what we believe to be true?
In the Ramayana, one of the most prominent tales involving Maya is one in which Indra, jealous of
Gautama for his marriage to the beautiful Ahalya, takes the form of her husband and makes love to her. Ahalya was certainly unaware that this was not
her husband, and unfortunately she was tricked into committing adultery. Gautama discovered Indra leaving their home, and cursed him. Ahalya was turned to stone
and was to be set free only by Rama. This is almost like the old Irish stories my grandfather told me about chasing rainbows, and how blindly following things on this
earth that you can't truly see will cause you nothing but pain and trouble.
This trickery and deception is a perfect example of Maya.
In another traditional story, not told in the Ramayana or Mahabhrata but an old legend to protect her virtue, Sita (Rama's wife and an incarnation of Lakshmi) is "cloned" by Agni, god of fire, to protect her from the Demon King Ravana. This Phantom Sita (Maya-Sita)
is created during Rama's exile in the forest so that the beautiful and virtuous incarnation of Lakshmi would not be touched by a rakshasa,
while Agni kept the real Sita on Mount Kailasa, far away in the Himalaya Mountains. Is this real, or just another illusive deception on the part of Maya? Did
Sita really go off into the mountains with Agni, or were people just desperate to make it seem as though the real Sita would never have been touched by a
rakshasa? Read on, and you'll definitely discover a new world filled with illusions...