At first, there are only mental objects. Sensations, feelings, emotions, thoughts. There is no self at that level. Things are just as they are; they may be distinct, but there is no categorization into “self” and “other”. However, when craving comes along (or aversion, which is simply the other side of the coin), there must by necessity be something to be craved, and something to do the craving. This subject/object distinction is picked up and reified by the narrating mind; because to the narrating mind we are the subject rather than the object, we become the thing doing the craving, the “I”. Now there is a self and an other, when none existed before the craving arose.
