Swami Vivekananda's Quotes On Kama-Kanchana ~ Swami Vivekananda Quotes

The renunciation of Kama-Kanchana
is the most important.

—Swami Vivekananda

The word Kama (Devanagari: काम, Bengali: কাম) means "lust" or "sensual/sexual pleasure", and the the word Kanchana (Devanagari: कांचन, Bengali: কাঞ্চন) means "money/possession". In Ramakrishna Kathamrita, we find the mention of Kama-Kanchana many times. We know Ramakrishna disliked those people who were very much learned in the general senses, but at the same time were addicted to Kama-Kanchana.

In this article we are going to make a collection of Swami Vivekananda's quotes on Kama-Kanchana.

Blessed indeed are those who can renounce Kama-Kanchana, living in their homes with their family!^[Source]
How should a man immersed in Kâma-Kânchana (lust and greed) become a devotee of one whose central ideal is the renunciation of Kama-Kanchana? Shri Ramakrishna wept and prayed to the Divine Mother to send him such a one to talk with as would not have in him the slightest tinge of Kama-Kanchana; for he would say, "My lips burn when I talk with the worldly-minded." He also used to say that he could not even bear the touch of the worldly-minded and the impure.^[Source]
That realisation of love can never come so long as there is the least desire in the heart, or what Shri Ramakrishna used to say, attachment for Kâma-Kânchana (sense-pleasure and wealth).^[Source]
The renunciation of Kama-Kanchana is the most important.^[Source]
The voice of the ancient sages proclaim to us, "If you desire to attain God, you will have to renounce Kâma-Kânchana (lust and possession). The Samsâra is unreal, hollow, void of substance. Unless you give it up, you can never reach God, try however you may. If you cannot do that, own that you are weak, but by no means lower the Ideal. Do not cover the corrupting corpse with leaves of gold!" So according to them, if you want to gain spirituality, to attain God, the first thing that you have to do is to give up this playing "hide-and-seek with your ideas", this dishonesty, this "theft within the chamber of thought".^[Source]
To keep one's self steady in the midst of this whirl of Kâma-Kânchana (lust and gold) and hold on to one's own ideals, until disciples are moulded to conceive of the ideas of realisation and perfect renunciation, is indeed difficult work, my boy.^[Source]