Like all spiritual blessings, powers, and practices, bhava can be a blessing or an obstacle.

There are countless blessings given through bhava, but there are also many examples of people misusing it.  People act and they claim to be what they are not.  Even if the bhava is genuine, people can misunderstand the experience or use it selfishly.  Bhava, as awesome and humbling as it can be, can also inflate one’s ego.

Every spiritual tradition warns about the experiences, powers and ego that come with spiritual practices, whether meditation, visions, samadhi, trance, or spiritual teaching.  Spiritual trance gets singled out for more criticism, probably because it is so unusual and, when it is real, so threatening to religious leaders and institutions.

No one teaches that we should avoid meditation because some people have become proud or heartless from their meditation.

No one advocates eliminating religious or spiritual instruction because some false teachers make good money.

Many gurus have exploited their spiritual experiences and devotees for the sake of their own prestige and power, so many people want nothing to do with any guru.  But those seriously interested in the spiritual path should not stop taking blessings and seeking the true guru.

Shivabalayogi told devotees that even yogis who successfully complete tapas can have ego.  Those who complete tapas with a specific purpose in mind get only that.  Should we discourage people from meditating in samadhi?

“If you are doing tapas or meditation for a particular purpose then you will get that only.  God will give them the duty and the power according to their desire.”

One person was acting trance and asking for possessions, clothing, gifts of money or otherwise taking advantage of the devotees.  He did this to my father.  The man appeared to be in trance and told him that Swamiji wanted my father to give the man new clothes and money.  It didn’t seem right to my father, so he asked Swamiji about it.

Swamiji himself used this incident as an example of how some devotees misused bhava.

The more powerful the experience, the greater the danger from its misuse.

There is a corollary.  The more powerful the experience, the greater the opportunity for growth.