At the time of creation, Purushottam Bhagwan, who transcends even Akshar, inspires Akshar, and as a result, Purush manifests from Akshar. Purushottam Bhagwan through Purush inspires Prakruti. In this way, as Purushottam successively enters the various entities, the activities of creation take place. Thereafter, Pradhan-Purush pairs are produced from Prakruti-Purush. From Pradhan-Purush, mahattattva (cosmic intelligence) is produced. From mahattattva, the three types of ahamkar (that which produces the sense of ‘I,’ ‘mine,’ and ego) are produced. From ahamkar, the bhuts (five fundamental elements: earth, water, fire, air, and ether), the vishays, the indriyas (the sense-organs), the antahkarans (the inner instrument – the mind), and their presiding deities are produced; from those, Virat-Purush is produced. From the lotus extending from Virat-Purush’s naval, Brahma is produced. From that Brahma, Marichi (mind-born son of Brahma) and the other prajapatis (progenitors of mankind) are produced. From them, Kashyap, the son of Marichi, is produced. He is the creator of the gods, demigods, demons, animals, and the whole of creation. Purushottam Bhagwan enters and dwells in all of the above entities as their cause and antaryami.
Pralaya refers to the dissolution of the world which occurs at the end of Brahma’s life. Brahma has a life span of 100 years on the divine scale, which is equal to 3.1104 x 1014 human years. At the end of this period, everything up to, but not including, Akshar gets destroyed, after which the process of creation starts again.