Chapter 2 - Bases Of Sensual Pleasure

Then there are living and non living objects that form the sources of sensual pleasure. There are gold, silver, jewellery, rice, cattle, poultry, vehicles, houses, land, attendants. Men work daily to secure these sources of pleasure. They seek these things to have good food, good clothes and good houses, to see movies and so forth.

Sensual desire (tanha) usually leads to intense craving for sensual objects (kamapadana). When a man starts smoking, he delights in his new habit but as the habit grows upon him he becomes addicted to it. Thus, we become excessively fond of certain objects and we feel restless and discomfited if we do not get them. In this way tanha develops into upadana (clinging, grasping or infatuation).

Upadana cannot come into being without tanha. The music and songs of foreigners do not appeal to Burmese ears and so there is no craze for them among the people. Burmese people do not eat dogs. Dogs flesh is abhorrent to them and so there can be no upadana in regard to it.