Devī, Śakti and Śākta Traditions

Lessons 23 and 25 took the two great male-form streams. This one takes the third, and it is not smaller.

Śakti is, first, an ordinary noun. The lexicon gives it as power, ability, strength, might, effort, energy, capability, and then faculty, skill, capacity — with the everyday idioms attached: śaktyā, according to one's ability; paraṃ śaktyā, with all one's might.

Start there, because it prevents a common misreading. Śakti is not primarily a goddess's name that later got used for power. It is the word for power, applied to the divine.