Before anything existed — no sky, no earth, no air — non-being formed a single thought: "may I be." Then it did tapas: it heated itself. From the heating came smoke; heated more, fire; more, light; flame; rays; embers; until it clotted like a cloud and burst — becoming the ocean. Creation isn't spoken or built here; it's sweated out. Friction on nothing until nothing gives off something. The text then turns the cosmology into a practice: "whoever, knowing the power of tapas, heats himself — he comes into being." (TB 2.2.9)

— In our words · Source: The Taittiriya Brahmana (Vedic tradition)