Mystic Powers – A real goal?

“To possess real knowledge means to understand matter, spirit, and the controller of
them both.”

To meditate on God is the ultimate goal.

“What is called renunciation is the same as yoga, meaning to unite with God; nobody
can become a yogi unless they renounce the desire to gratify the senses.”
Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 6, text 2.

Due to the amazing features of some of the mystic powers, it is very easy for them to be
confused with an elevated spiritual platform, although they are in reality just different
manifestations of the material energy that keeps us in this world of suffering.

“I am happier with my material comforts – a beautiful apartment, a wonderful family,

and a great sex life.” Such persons do not appropriately realise that at any moment they
can be kicked out of their material situation. Due to ignoring this, they have no idea of
the true eternal existence. All their comforts are purely temporal in nature.

“Desires multiply one’s misery. Try to be happy and give thanks for what one has.”
Srila Guru Maharaj

Dear friend, many people talk about yoga these days. Yoga means union, union with
God, with the truth, with perfection. Yoga means to enter in contact with Him, to purify
oneself by getting out of ignorance, such is the goal in life.
But also, there are people who have heard that there are yogis who have developed
mystic powers. Such people have an attraction to these powers because they want to
dominate the world to some extent. They want to have curative powers, the power to see
the future or to manifest objects.
Eight mystic powers are mentioned that powerful yogis can attain too:

1. Anima-siddhi refers to the power by which one can become so small as to be

able to enter into a stone.
2. Laghima is the mystic power to travel to the sun using solar rays.
3. Prapti is the power to extend one’s hand wherever one wants and to hold
anything you want. For example, to touch the moon with your finger. One can
be sat thousands of kilometres from somewhere, and if you want you could pick
fruit from a garden there and bring it back.
4. Isita is the power to create or destroy a planet, just by desiring it.
5. Vasita is the power by which one can bring anyone under your control. This is a
kind of hypnotism that is almost irresistible.
6. Prekamya (magic): With this power one can acquire whatever one wants. For
example, by one’s will power one can make water enter into one’s eye ball, and
then make it come out again.
7. Kamavasayita one can break the laws of nature, thereby achieving the
seemingly impossible.
8. The power to become so light that one can float in the air or on the water.
Included in these powers exist telepathy, telekinesis, etc, that some people try very hard
to attain. With these powers such yogis elevate their ego, one that is puffed up due
having something others do not have, believing that they have been given the powers of
God for them to use. All this is in reality a major deviation from the transcendental path.
It is very dangerous, and our spiritual masters concentrate on the real duty in life, of
finding the mystic love that we have in our hearts. Thus, the ultimate goal in life is to
understand and follow the will of God’s love.

If someone is interested in becoming God, in that they believe there is no one above
him, that he is the supreme authority of himself in all he does, then in reality he must
have an enormous false ego. Because, if we are going to talk about God, we must talk
about He who maintains everyone. He who can’t maintain everyone can no be God; if
not, the word God loses all significance. Be honest friend, you do not even maintain
yourself, much less maintain everyone else. Mother Nature and her Supreme Director
maintain everyone. They are the ones who really deserve adoration and glorification.

As human beings we are experts in creating problems; we must therefore give thanks to
the Supreme Person, because He maintains us, protects us, and guides us to perfection.
In the path of Bhakti Yoga we do not want mystic powers. We know that the greatest
mystic power is everything that surrounds us, including our capacity to appreciate it and
talk about it. God’s mystic powers are infinite; and it is true that with His grace we can
become great scientists or musicians, etc. Likewise, all yogis on their path can develop,
to a point, some mystic powers. But if the yogi becomes distracted by such powers and
loses the vision of the ultimate goal, then he loses all the greatness that he had gained.

The reality is that this is an alarm bell our spiritual masters have given us, so that we do
not forget that the power to cure or assess the life of another should only be done as an
offering to the Lord, giving all the glories to Him. Of course, all people have curative
powers in their hands to give affection and consideration to people who are ill. Those
who claim credit for their successes and do not recognise the position of the Supreme
Lord, waste this precious human form with the opportunity to represent the Love
Supreme. They find themselves locked up in themselves in the multiple distractions that
exist in this world. First, it is money that distracts people, then it is the attraction for the
opposite sex, and later it is the attraction for fame. It is fame that is found for those who
have attained mystic powers.

There are people who after having acquired some powers perform cheap shows for
financial gain, or to gain followers; burying themselves under the earth, or such like.
But if we are really interested in achieving perfection in life, we should not deviate or
enjoy such cheap tricks, which even materialistic science has achieved with its love of
technology. We have heard of yogis who are teaching people to levitate and fly, but this
can easily be compared with aeroplanes that transport people from continent to
continent. There are yogis who have dominated the limitations imposed by water, or
who can enter into the earth, or move things from distant places; but, in comparison,
modern technology has created tunnels through mountains, submarines in the oceans,
and many other marvellous things. Both technology and yogic powers are both entirely
material in their activities, though different in form.
Therefore, instead of being exploiters of indifferent to the situation, it is far better to put
our attention the highest gift that the living entity has: the gift of love. This divine gift
can only be developed when one is touched by the loving power of a saint, a pure
devotee of the Lord.

Srila Guru Maharaj

Translation and interpretation by Gopananda dasa