To Renunciate

I was on the subway the other day and I was sitting between two women who were both reading books. I looked to my left and saw the chapter title of the woman’s book: “Yoga Freedom through Renunciation.” I looked to my right and saw the chapter title of the other woman’s book: “Renunciation and Rebirth.” I looked up the word renunciation when I got home to see why this would be such a hot topic on the train. Here are a few definitions:


1. An act or instance of relinquishing, abandoning, repudiating, or sacrificing something, as a right, title, person, or ambition.
2. The act or an instance of renouncing: the renunciation of all earthly pleasures.
3. A declaration in which something is renounced.

So both these women were learning how to eliminate something from their lives to reach some higher understanding. I like the idea of trying to rid yourself of whatever prevents you from happiness, but why are people so eager to renounce things? Can’t we reach enlightenment by embracing our faults and focusing on our goals? Instead of putting so much energy toward getting rid of a negative attribute, people should work hard to attaining whatever positive goals their trying to reach, and the thing they were trying to get rid of will fall by the wayside as a result.
For example, I had a bad habit of cracking my wrists all the time. I would crack them so often that it got to the point where it hurt not to crack them, but then it would also hurt to crack them. I would wear a rubber band on my wrist and snap my hand every time I thought about cracking my wrist, or tell a friend to slap my hand or do some other ridiculous techniques to stop the habit. But after a while I just stopped and I don’t remember when I stopped. At some point in time, my wrist popping wasn’t a priority anymore and so it was no longer a problem. I must have just shifted my focus to something else and my habit subsided because I had more important things to think about.
I’m not saying that loosing ourselves from our vices is just as easy as focusing on something else, but there’s no need to throw our troubles out the window and call it “renounced.” I think the best way to deal with our faults is to recognize them, embrace them, not be so hard on ourselves for having them (we’re human), and then move onto something else. As long as we’re aware that we have these problems, it’s easier to curb them whenever they surface.