Question: Are our desires under the control of the soul?

Sri Chinmoy: Right now our desires are not under the control of the soul. Right now only our aspiration is under the control of the soul. When we are aspiring and the soul says to do something, we do it. But when we are victims to teeming desires and the soul says to do something, we do not listen. The soul, however, will ultimately gain its supremacy.

When a new department head comes into an office, the office workers mock him. They won’t listen to him or do the things he asks of them. But gradually, gradually, he understands the situation in the office and he begins to exercise his authority. Then the clerks are afraid they will be fired, so they give him due respect. In the spiritual life also, the soul tolerates everything in the beginning. The physical, the vital and the mind are all unruly members of the family and they mock, they disobey, they do everything wrong. The physical being is like a naughty child who does not want to take a bath in the pool. He thinks that the water in the pool is very cold and he does not want to enter. But there is another child beside him, that is to say, the heart, who enters the swimming pool on his own, and gets properly bathed and is happy. The mother, who is in this case the soul, observes the situation and sees that the naughty one is not going to jump into the swimming pool. Finally after half an hour she just pushes him into the water and compels him to bathe.

Similarly, the soul waits for its own time. The world is full of ignorance, but inside the soul is God’s infinite Light and adamantine Will. There does come a time when the divine Will is exercised through the soul, although in the beginning the soul remains a witness, like the Purusha. The soul just observes what parts of the person are good and what parts are bad. When the good parts want to listen to the soul, the soul welcomes them. It says, “Now, let us run to the Goal.” The parts of the being that are still sleeping in ignorance and creating problems will be referred by the soul to the Supreme. Finally, one day the Supreme will use His omnipotent Power and say that the time has come to show them divine Light through divine Authority. At this time, God’s choice Hour, when the soul wants to liberate someone from the meshes of ignorance, the darkness of millennia will be expelled.