True Renunciation Is Not a Depressive View

When renunciation, emphasizing abandoning the happiness of this life, is taught, it remains questionable how valuable this notion is if it leads to an avoidance of life. Among my peers in India, there were some for whom the idea of renunciation seemed to confirm a depressive view that life is always disappointing, bad, or wrong. Yet we are alive and must engage with our life as best we can. Life may be suffering, on one level, but there is also great richness, joy, and value. The danger of this kind of renunciation is that it actually conveys the view that life itself is the problem. This doesn’t sit well with many Westerners, and perhaps with good reason. Why should we see something that has such potential and such value as something to be abandoned? This attitude of life rejection can so often be an attempt to justify a negative, depressive pathology. It seems to lack the love, compassion, and courage to engage in life fully, despite its problems. This interpretation of renunciation runs counter to the bodhisattva’s willingness to take up the challenge of life and live it fully for the welfare of others.

Rob Preece
from The Wisdom of Imperfection; the Challenge of Individuation in Buddhist Life