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The Vital Desire-Soul and the True Soul · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  We generally confuse the vital nature with the soul.
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  We look at the external life of the body and recognize that when
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  the life force departs, the body dies and the lifetime and
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  personality associated with that existence comes to an end.
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  Some scientists decided that they could identify the
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  existence of the soul by actually weighing the body just
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  before and just after the time of death with a highly sensitive
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  scale, and the difference in weight between the living and
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  the dead body would represent the presence and the departure
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  of the soul. This idea, however, is very much
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  a product of the confusion between the vital nature and its
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  external manifestation in what Sri Robindo calls the desire
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  soul and the actual soul, which is not actually part of the
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  mechanism of the external existence.
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  This confusion leads to some notable consequences.
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  An example not purely fictional is provided by John Steinbeck in
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  his novel The Grapes of Wrath. A very short section early in
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  the book provides insight to a man who had been a preacher of
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  the Christian gospel in the Oklahoma Territory.
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  He eventually discontinued his role as a preacher and described
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  for his listener exactly what caused him to give up this work.
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  He had a strong calling to rouse people to the faith, and he was
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  good at it. He motivated crowds and raised
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  the emotional, vital force of the people.
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  People would speak in tongues and roll on the ground, all
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  manifestations of the kind of extreme vital pitch to which
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  preachers of certain backgrounds could bring their flock.
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  He noted, however, that however strong his own spiritual calling
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  and the energy he was able to elicit in others, he found that
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  his own sexual drive was awakened strongly, and he
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  invariably had sexual relations with young women after the
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  sessions, as they were more or less intoxicated with the energy
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  that arose. This preacher, however, seemed
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  to have a true calling in his being and experienced tension
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  for the obvious misuse of the force of his spiritual calling.
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  So he gave up preaching to avoid the connection, which he found
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  he could not deny, between the emotional force and the sexual
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  energy. He then began a period of
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  serious introspection that moved him toward a much more grounded
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  and focused spiritual development.
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  This experience, while recounted as a fictional character,
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  actually mirrors that. Many have found that if they
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  mistake the desire soul of the vital for the true soul, they
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  wind up fulfilling the desires of the vital and losing touch
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  with the deeper spiritual calling within.
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  In his famous book Faust, Goethe recounts the story of a seeker
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  after truth and power who calls forth various powers and
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  eventually is entangled with mephistophiles who tempt him
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  with vital fulfillments, including power, wealth,
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  success, fame, sex, et cetera. In his deepest being, however,
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  he maintained some spark of a deeper dedication and continue
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  striving for evermore knowledge and fulfillment.
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  Eventually he is saved from eternal suffering by his
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  connection to the Divine through his true soul.
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  Hermann Hesse wrote extensively across a number of his books on
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  seekers who became entangled in the desire Soul as they sought
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  for some deeper meaning for their lives.
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  They eventually in many cases grew to recognize the soul and
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  were able to be liberated from the entrapping forces of the
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  external life as presented to them by the desire soul.
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  This was a theme worked out in detail in his book Sidarta, but
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  also in much more complex life context that encompassed also
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  intellectual focus and discipline.
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  In Magister Ludi or the Glass Bead Game, Sri Orbindo notes
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  quote the soul and the life are two quite different powers.
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  The soul is a spark of the Divine Spirit which supports the
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  individual nature. Mind, life, body are the
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  instruments for the manifestation of the nature.
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  In most men the soul is hidden and covered over by the action
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  of the external nature. They mistake the vital being for
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  the soul, because it is the vital which animates and moves
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  the body. But this vital being is a thing
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  made-up of desires and executive forces, good and bad.
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  It is the desire soul, not the true thing.
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  It is when the true soul psyche comes forward and begins first
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  to influence and then govern the actions of the instrumental
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  nature that man begins to overcome vital desire and grow
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  towards a divine nature. End Quote.
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  Reference Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, the psychic being soul,
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  its nature, mission and evolution.
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  Section 1. Meaning and Nature of the
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  Psychic Being, pages 25 to 26.