In this second half of a two-episode discussion, I briefly review the limitations of sensual or worldly pleasures. Then I explore how engagement with the world, contrary to simply being a compromise, can be its own path of practice. Finally, I talk about how the Buddha’s teachings on renunciation are not only relevant but deeply meaningful and useful for householders.
Quicklinks to Article Content:
The Drawbacks (Limitations) of Sensual or Worldly Pleasures
The (Positive) Case for Worldly Pleasures
Looking Further at Renunciation as Householders
In the last episode, I described the path of practice recommended by the Buddha: A path of strict renunciation of almost all the sensual and worldly pleasures that bring happiness and meaning to the lives of most of us. “Sensual” pleasures include pleasures of the heart and mind, so they include things like intimate relationships, the comfort and privacy of your own home, and the joy of travel.
It is apparent from the original Buddhist texts that lay people – also called “householders,” as they practiced Buddhism while living in a household – were capable of everything but the very highest level of spiritual attainment. While the renunciate path – the path of homeleaving, or homelessness – was considered preferable, it wasn’t exactly necessary. However, according to at least one story, once someone attained the highest level of liberation (that of an arhat), they lost all taste for worldly pleasures and concerns, and therefore would leave home even if they were a householder up until that moment.
At the end of the last episode, I explored some of the troubling questions this can present to householder practitioners (including me). Is the ultimate goal of Buddhist practice a state in which we stop caring about anyone or anything? Fortunately, the answer to this question is, “no!” I suggested that, instead, spiritual liberation in the Buddhist sense opens us up to an unconditional happiness and sense of meaning that transcends anything else we have known. This means we are no longer dependent on conditional things for happiness and peace of mind, so we can freely make the choice about our degree of engagement with the world.
The Drawbacks (Limitations) of Sensual or Worldly Pleasures
I will explore the positive aspects of liberation more in this episode, but first I want to review the drawbacks, or limitations, of sensual pleasures (again, our mind is considered a sense in Buddhism, so these pleasures are not limited to physical experiences). Sense pleasures are not considered inherently bad or sinful in Buddhism. Instead, the recommendation that you find something else to rely on for happiness and peace of mind is based on very pragmatic reasons.
Describing the drawbacks of sensual pleasure can end up sounding a bit preachy or negative, but bear with me, this will set up a more nuanced discussion of how to practice as a householder.
The first drawback of worldly pleasures is that we naturally want them to last even though they don’t. We want the good things in our life to last, but they do not – and our awareness of this can make us uneasy. Not only that, even if conditions remain more or less the same, our pleasurable experience of them does not. This is the nature of impermanence. The classic example of this is anticipating and enjoying a delicious meal. It is our appetite that helps make the meal enjoyable. If we kept eating past the point we were hungry, the meal would quickly become painful instead of enjoyable. By their very nature, sense pleasures are temporary and ephemeral – if children stopped growing, if sunsets got stuck, if the seasons never changed, if there were no more challenges to rise to, our enjoyment of these things would also fade, or at least change.
The second drawback of worldly pleasures is that the ephemeral nature of the satisfaction they provide means we’re constantly seeking more pleasure. Because of the transient nature of all sense pleasures, we have to keep seeking new pleasures all the time to keep us happy. In addition, sensual pleasures are conditional. They require certain circumstances, opportunities, or the proximity to certain things. It is perfectly natural to enjoy good health, family relationships, leisure time, hikes in nature, or a successful career, but things inevitably change, or we are deprived of the source of our happiness. We may become ill, or relationships may become difficult, or we lose people. We may be very busy and unable to spend enough time doing the things we enjoy. If we are dependent on conditional pleasures, we will need to grasp tightly to the ones we still have, or go looking for new pleasures to sustain us.
The third drawback of sense pleasures is the burden and stress of first obtaining them, and then maintaining them. In the Pali Canon, the Maha-dukkhakkhandha Sutta: The Great Mass of Stress, describes the many drawbacks of relying on sensuality for happiness. The sutta admits there is an allure to these things; they can be “agreeable, pleasing, charming, endearing, fostering desire, enticing.”[i] However, the sutta goes on to describe the drawbacks of these things, including the need to labor for them and endure whatever unpleasantness is involved in your job. If you are unable to obtain them you may feel distraught. Once you have obtained a source of sense pleasure, you need to protect it, and this can become a cause of conflict and animosity in your relationships.
The fourth drawback of worldly pleasures is the misery we experience when we’re separated from them, the fifth drawback is that they can distract us from practice. We spend time planning to obtain them, working to obtain them, and then maintaining them. We also spend time immersed in them. Sometimes, the more full and wonderful our life is, the harder it is to make practice a priority. (See also Episode 225 – How to Relate to Worldly Pleasure as a Buddhist.)
The (Positive) Case for Worldly Pleasures
Most Buddhists I know understand the drawbacks to sensual or worldly pleasures but feel strongly that their engagement with the world is more than worth it. Their sentiments, which I wholeheartedly agree with, are summed up well in the saying, “It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.” It may make us sad (or sometimes even anxious or depressed) to think that our children will grow up and move away, that our loved ones will eventually die, or that the house we have lovingly maintained will one day crumble into ruin, but we see this as the price of love and we do not hesitate to pay it.
For those of us who practice as householders (more or less), it is not simply a matter of being willing to compromise our practice in order to indulge in worldly pleasures and relationships. There may be a little of that, as we contemplate the life of a renunciate and think of all the things we’d be loathe to give up, but at a deeper level we recognize how at least some of our worldly engagements are opportunities for practice, not obstructions to practice, or distractions from it.
Through raising a child we may be mightily challenged to let go of self-concern, give up our efforts to control everything, and learn the profound truth of how our true self does not end at our skin, but manifests in part in beings and things beyond us. Learning a skill or an art may help us identify our karmic obstacles and open us up to new ways of being the world. Our work may demand we learn patience, forgiveness, and acceptance. Our intimate relationships may bring out our deepest fears and also our greatest strengths. Our material possessions give us an opportunity to practice gratitude and generosity.
There is a saying in Buddhism (one which may be shared by other traditions) which says, “It’s easy to be enlightened on a mountaintop.” Similarly, it may be relatively easy to feel like you’ve achieved some level of spiritual attainment when you’re in the protected environment of a monastery, or in the deep silence of retreat. It’s when you come back into the world and have to deal with people and situations that whatever insight or equanimity you have attained gets tested. Of course, monasteries aren’t always such easy places to be, either. There are people there too! But, whether it’s in a monastery or out in the rest of the world, we learn an immense amount from our personal interactions with people, the way we fill roles, the way we perform tasks and express ourselves, and the way our heart is touched by the things we encounter.
Even when it comes to those pleasures we simply enjoy, with no edifying practice lesson attached to them, we have a chance to face impermanence head-on. It is difficult but transformative practice to learn to wholeheartedly appreciate someone or something even though we are going to lose them/it, or to wholeheartedly make an effort even when we know complete satisfaction is elusive. Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield tells a story about his teacher, Ajahn Chah:
One day my teacher Ajahn Chah held up a beautiful tea cup, “To me this cup is already broken. Because I know its fate, I can enjoy it fully here and now. And when it’s gone, it’s gone.” [Kornfield continues] When we understand the truth of uncertainty, we become free.
The broken cup helps us see beyond our illusion of control. When we commit ourselves to raising a child, building a business, creating a work of art, or righting an injustice, some measure of failure as well as success will be ours. This is a fierce teaching.
We may lose our best piece of pottery in the firing, the charter school we work so hard to create may fold, our start up business may go under, our children may develop problems beyond our control. If we only focus on the results, we will be devastated. But if we know the cup is broken, we can give our best to the process, create what we can and trust the larger process of life itself. We can plan, we can care for, tend and respond. But we cannot control. Instead we take a breath, and open to what is unfolding, where we are. This is a profound shift, from holding on, to letting go. As Suzuki Roshi says, “When we understand the truth of impermanence and find our composure in it, there we find ourselves in Nirvana.” The impermanence of the glass is inherent in its existence, just as our own deaths are inherent in ours.[ii]
It’s possible to hide out in a monastery, or within the confines of monastic discipline, avoiding the pain of impermanence by minimizing your engagement with anything you might come to love or depend on. You may avoid engagement with the world out of fear, or self-doubt. This isn’t to say in any way that the practice of renunciation is bad (I recommend it!), just that the measure of real practice is something based on what is happening in your body, mind, and heart, not on whether you happen to live in a household or within the restraints of monastic discipline.
Looking Further at Renunciation as Householders
As householder practitioners, we usually love the story of Ajahn Chah’s teacup. We take it as affirmation that our life – full as it usually is of relationships, responsibilities, possessions, activities, entertainments, hobbies, travel, etc. – is nothing more than an incredibly rich and useful practice venue. As long as we don’t get attached to things, as long as we periodically contemplate impermanence and nonattachment, we can diligently practice no matter how much we have and do!
When it comes to the question of householder versus renunciate practice, one extreme – which we have rejected, I hope – is the belief that the renunciate path is the best or only path of practice. The other extreme is the belief that renunciation is completely irrelevant to Buddhism unless you’re one of those odd people who like the idea of living without possessions or pleasures.
On the Access to Insight website – a wonderful repository of Pali Canon texts and related articles – says this:
The Vinaya Pitaka, the first division of the Tipitaka, is the textual framework upon which the monastic community (Sangha) is built. It includes not only the rules governing the life of every Theravada bhikkhu (monk) and bhikkhuni (nun), but also a host of procedures and conventions of etiquette that support harmonious relations, both among the monastics themselves, and between the monastics and their lay supporters, upon whom they depend for all their material needs…
It helps to keep in mind that the name the Buddha gave to the spiritual path he taught was “Dhamma-vinaya” — the Doctrine (Dhamma) and Discipline (Vinaya) — suggesting an integrated body of wisdom and ethical training. The Vinaya is thus an indispensable facet and foundation of all the Buddha’s teachings, inseparable from the Dhamma, and worthy of study by all followers — lay and ordained, alike. Lay practitioners will find in the Vinaya Pitaka many valuable lessons concerning human nature, guidance on how to establish and maintain a harmonious community or organization, and many profound teachings of the Dhamma itself. But its greatest value, perhaps, lies in its power to inspire the layperson to consider the extraordinary possibilities presented by a life of true renunciation, a life lived fully in tune with the Dhamma.[iii]
What can we, as householders, learn from the Vinaya, or from the example of strict renunciation? It’s not a practice we’re ever going to literally do ourselves, so what is the point of contemplating it?
For me, spiritual renunciates – Buddhist or otherwise – have always been fascinating. When life is stripped down to its bare essentials for a prolonged period of time, how do you amuse yourself? How do you avoid getting profoundly bored, or depressed? Don’t you end up feeling trapped? No Netflix, no novels, no wine, no music, no cuddly dogs. No vacations to plan and anticipate. No diversions, no personal projects, no new possessions to acquire. No intimate relationship. Even those of us who lead relatively simple lives (it’s all relative) fill our days with choices aimed at our own comfort and pleasure, from our hot mug of coffee or tea in the morning to our afternoon run to our half hour spent perusing the news or social media. A renunciate has none of that.
And yet… there are many content renunciates. The path has its own challenges, of course, but there are plenty of people in the world who stick it out for many years, if not for their entire lives, and they often appear to be among the most contented people around. From Buddhist monks like the Dalai Lama to silent Christian monks and nuns in cloisters to Indian sadhus meditating in remote caves, they often seem unusually present, calm, and joyful. Such a life is definitely not for everyone, but as Access to Insight suggests, such examples can “inspire the layperson to consider the extraordinary possibilities presented by a life of true renunciation.” [iv]
It’s important to realize that Buddhist renunciation is not a penance (that is, “a punishment undergone in token of penitence for sin.”[v]) It’s not a prolonged struggle against the weaknesses of the flesh, or even an effort to avoid being defiled by the world. Instead, it is – potentially – a practice that leads to profound, simple, and unconditional joy and peace.
The Pali Canon’s Kāḷigodha Sutta (translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu) tells story that illustrates the joy of the renunciate path:
A large number of monks heard Ven. Bhaddiya, Kāḷigodhā’s son, on going to the wilderness, to the root of a tree, or to an empty dwelling, repeatedly exclaim, “What bliss! What bliss!” and on hearing him, the thought occurred to them, “There’s no doubt but that Ven. Bhaddiya, Kāḷigodhā’s son, doesn’t enjoy leading the holy life, for when he was a householder he knew the bliss of kingship, so that now, on recollecting that when going to the wilderness, to the root of a tree, or to an empty dwelling, he is repeatedly exclaiming, ‘What bliss! What bliss!’”[vi]
The monks then go tell the Buddha about this, and the Buddha asks Ven. Bhaddiya why he goes around saying “What bliss! What bliss!” Bhaddiya replies:
“Before, when I was a householder, maintaining the bliss of kingship, lord, I had guards posted within and without the royal apartments, within and without the city, within and without the countryside. But even though I was thus guarded, thus protected, I dwelled in fear — agitated, distrustful, & afraid. But now, on going alone to the wilderness, to the root of a tree, or to an empty dwelling, I dwell without fear, unagitated, confident, & unafraid — unconcerned, unruffled, my wants satisfied, with my mind like a wild deer. This is the compelling reason I have in mind that — when going to the wilderness, to the root of a tree, or to an empty dwelling — I repeatedly exclaim, ‘What bliss! What bliss!’” [vii]
I think every one of us can relate to Bhaddiya’s joy in simplicity, no matter how wealthy we are, no matter how many human relationships we maintain, no matter how full our lives are of enjoyable activities and meaningful engagements. Our engagements with the world may provide rich opportunities for practice, but they also come, inevitably, at a cost. The more possessions we have, the harder we have to work to pay for them, maintain them, and protect them. The more commitments we make, the busier we are. The more activities we are engaged in, the more likely we are to feel stressed or overwhelmed at times. The more exciting and enjoyable things we do, the more our minds will be full of anticipation instead of being able to calmly enjoy the present moment. The more relationships we maintain, the more complicated and demanding our lives get.
Each of us gets to decide for ourselves how much is too much. It’s impossible to achieve perfect, permanent balance. For most of us, engagement with the people and activities we care about is worth the occasional times when things get a little overwhelming.
However, we might take the message of Buddhist renunciation to heart by honestly reflecting on our choices and whether there’s anything we can do without to create more space in our lives for practice, whether that’s formal practice like sitting or time with Sangha, or the informal practice of trying to be as mindful, alert, and appreciative as we can be each moment. Sometimes I find myself stressed, listing to myself all the things I “have” to do. Then, upon some reflection, I recognize how half of the things on my list I have chosen to do because they are pleasurable, relaxing, healthy, sustaining, or educational. I could easily opt out of a few of these things, although I’m generally loathe to let any of them go.
Most people I know will readily admit that they have too much stuff, too many activities in their schedules, and sometimes emphasize materialistic pleasures (namely, things that cost money) to the extent that it compromises their ability to enjoy the simple things in life. It is not unusual to hear someone admit that they find themselves missing some of the stillness and simplicity of the COVID-19 lockdown. No one wants to be back in that situation, but some of us found the lack of options strangely liberating. You couldn’t go shopping as a pastime or go on trips. You couldn’t go out to dinner. Most projects were halted. As a consequence, we lived much simpler lives.
Naturally, I missed all kinds of things during lockdown, but I never once found myself rushing to get from one activity to another. I never found myself trying to cram on more thing into my schedule. I couldn’t just run to the store for anything that popped into my head (yeah, I could order it online, but at least I wasn’t driving around town in traffic). Oh yeah, and then there was hardly any traffic. Everything slowed down.
Perhaps it’s helpful to translate the Buddhist teachings on renunciation for a householder as “voluntary simplicity.” The teachings, and the examples of the monastic renunciates who embody them, remind us that happiness and peace of mind are not dependent on the stuff we have and do. We enjoy and learn from our engagement with the world, but it is easy to overdo it and neglect our practice. A given relationship, possession, or activity may bring us great joy, but if we are constantly focused on the next interaction, acquisition, or exciting or pleasurable experience, we will miss the only thing that is real: This very moment.
It’s possible to embrace voluntary simplicity in a positive way, without making a negative judgment about whatever it is we have decided to do without. Instead, we can think of Bhaddiya, sitting under a tree, exclaiming, “What bliss! What bliss!” The unconditional contentment we can experience through practice is something we can access at any time. It can remain with us even when – eventually and inevitably – we lose all the worldly things we currently enjoy.
There’s no prescription for how voluntary simplicity should look for a householder. You very well may choose to buy less, work less, plan fewer activities, or carefully prioritize your commitments and let go of some of them in order to create more space in your life. It’s also important to remember that our meditation practice is an act of renunciation. For a set period of time, you put absolutely everything down. Silent retreats are longer periods of renunciation lasting for a day to a week, and making time for them can be very transformative. We can also practice renunciation moment by moment when we realize we are preoccupied with anticipation and oblivious to what is going on around us. We can take a deep breath and turn toward the essential matter of our life.
Endnotes
[i] “Maha-dukkhakkhandha Sutta: The Great Mass of Stress” (MN 13), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight (BCBS Edition), 30 November 2013, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.013.than.html .
[ii] Kornfield, Jack. The Wisdom of Insecurity. https://jackkornfield.com/the-wisdom-of-insecurity/
[iii] “Vinaya Pitaka: The Basket of the Discipline”, edited by Access to Insight. Access to Insight (BCBS Edition), 17 December 2013, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/vin/index.html .
[iv] Ibid
[v] https://www.dictionary.com/browse/penance
[vi] “Kāḷigodha Sutta: Bhaddiya Kāḷigodha” (Ud 2.10), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight (BCBS Edition), 30 August 2012, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/ud/ud.2.10.than.html .
[vii] Ibid
