In plain words
when it functions, that same Brahman is called Para-Brahman. The root-truth within the world is the Ātma; the root-truth within man too is the Ātma alone. Everything that appears different from this Ātma is of the nature of mithyā. That is: whatever appears real as long as it is not inquired into, but is found, once inquiry is made, to be unreal — that is what is called mithyā. This illusory world is the life lived in Māyā. There is no place other than our own Ātma; and so Māyā is called the śakti of the Ātma. When the Ātma functions as related to that śakti, it is called Paramātma. The very nature of the Ātma is sat-cit-ānanda. Though spoken of as three, these are not different from one another; they are but the one single nature of that Ātma.
In the same way, Māyā, called the devātmaka-śakti, has three guṇas: sattva, rajas and tamas. These very guṇas transform into the powers of jñānecchā and kriyecchā. Sattva gives Jñāna; rajas gives [the power of action]. Tamas, being joined together with the power of action, appears manifold, as it were. This infinite power alone is the maker of the world. At first she is predominantly of pure sattva. Being spotless as a mirror, she has the power to reflect within herself whatever object stands before her. When she is reflected in the Ātma that is her own support, she attains the name Īśvara. That same Paramātma, by the glory of His own power, transforms into the form of the world. This transformation belongs to Māyā alone, and not to Īśvara, who is merely the reflection within it. Just as clear water, when disturbed, comes to be called impure foam or bubbles, so too, through the upsurge of Māyā, the Ātma alone shines forth in the form of the world, with names and forms. The state in which Māyā's rajas and tamas guṇas are unstirred is called avyakta. In this unmanifest state, the entire world lies dormant within Her, in seed-form.