Cetana means living.
So as we have several times explained that we are all Brahman, but we are part and parcel of the Brahman. Now here it is said that paramaṁ brahma, the Supreme Brahman. The Supreme Brahman means one who does not come into this material contamination. He is called Supreme Brahman. The impersonalist school, they do not distinguish between these two Brahmans. They say, "Brahman is one. This individual Brahman, this conception of individual Brahman, is māyā, illusion." That is their doctrine. But according to Vaiṣṇava doctrine, they do not accept this. Their question is, "If Brahman is Supreme, then how He comes in contact with the māyā?" A Supreme cannot be under the subordinate, subordination of anything else. If something is under subordination, he cannot be Supreme. He cannot be Supreme. That is their argument.
Therefore the Brahman who comes under the clutches of this material māyā, er, energy, that Brahman is not the Supreme Brahman, and that is accepted in the Vedic literature, nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām: (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 2.2.13) "There are eternal, but out of the eternals, there is one supreme eternal." Nityaḥ. Nityaḥ means singular number, and nityānām means plural number. So plural number, we are plural number. Nityo nityānām, cetana. Cetana means living. I am also living. God is also living. He is also a living being like us, but He, His distinction is like this: eko bahūnāṁ vidadhāti kāmān: "That eka, that singular number Brahman, He maintains all these plural number Brahmans." Therefore, this plural number Brahman, this jīvātmā, these living entities, they are supported by the Supreme Brahman, Bhagavān.