BURNING WITH LUST 

"BURNING WITH LUST " is one of the pieces in my RAGA (a Pāli* word meaning ‘lust’) series. I examine the years just before the menopause. It highlights the female midlife crisis in terms of thoughts of infidelity, something I had never heard of until recently (it seems only men have ever suffered midlife crises!). It is a fundamental stage in a woman’s life but rarely spoken about, a time when we can experience romantic illusions that can cause damage to families and their well-being.  I experienced my own crisis being tempted to try something that I have never dared to even think about before. Despite being a good Buddhist this romantic illusion had a powerful effect over me and inspired me to examine the nature of desire and its accompanying illusions.

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​• Pāli is the language of the scriptures of Theravada Buddhism, written in Sri Lanka during the 1st century BC. Today Pāli is studied mainly by those who wish to read the original Buddhist scriptures, and is frequently chanted in rituals.