Renunciation Reconsidered: Enjoyment Without Attachment

Across many religious and spiritual traditions, the idea of renunciation appears again and again. It is often framed as giving things up: wealth, pleasure, desire, comfort, even joy itself. Over time, this has led many people to believe that spirituality requires a kind of withdrawal from life — a rejection of its pleasures in order to be “pure” or “free.”

This is a misunderstanding.

True renunciation is not about giving up the things of life.
It is about giving up attachment to them.

Once this distinction is understood, spirituality stops being restrictive and becomes deeply liberating.

The Misunderstanding of Pleasure

Pleasure itself is not the problem.

We are allowed to enjoy life. We are allowed to take pleasure in beauty, comfort, intimacy, creativity, success, and even luxury. There is nothing inherently unspiritual about enjoying good food, meaningful relationships, exciting experiences, or material comfort.

The issue arises only when our sense of wellbeing becomes dependent on those things remaining.

Attachment is what turns enjoyment into vulnerability.

When we cling to outcomes, identities, or external conditions, we place our inner stability in something that is, by its nature, impermanent. And when that thing changes — as everything eventually does — the loss is not merely felt, it is devastating.

How Attachment Lowers Our Happiness

One of the most damaging effects of attachment is that it shifts our baseline.

A person may live a simple, contented life. Not ecstatic, but stable. Life feels manageable, even good. Then something extraordinary happens: sudden wealth, status, romance, or success.

For a while, life feels amplified. The pleasures are real. The experiences are intense.

But when those conditions change — when the money runs out, the relationship ends, the status fades — the person does not return to their previous contentment.

They fall far below it.

This is the hidden harm of attachment:
not that pleasure ends, but that the mind refuses to release comparison.

Before the gain, life was enough.
After the loss, life feels unbearable — even though the person is, materially, no worse off than they once were.

The Lottery as a Mirror

The lottery is an easy and powerful example.

Someone lives a reasonably happy, grounded life. Then they win millions. Luxury follows: fast cars, travel, admiration, attention, indulgence. Their nervous system adapts. Their expectations change. Their identity subtly reorganises around what they have.

When the money disappears — as it often does — the loss is not just financial.

It is psychological and existential.

They have not lost happiness.
They have lost what happiness was being measured against.

The devastation comes not from poverty, but from attachment.

What Renunciation Really Means

True renunciation is not rejection.

It is non-clinging.

It means:

• Enjoy fully

• Participate wholeheartedly

• Appreciate deeply

• But do not anchor your identity, safety, or worth to outcomes

You can pursue success without being defined by it.
You can love deeply without trying to possess.
You can enjoy pleasure without fearing its absence.

This is not indifference.
It is emotional maturity.

When attachment is relinquished, life does not become dull — it becomes lighter.

Why Life Becomes More Pleasurable Without Attachment

Here is the paradox that many traditions hinted at but failed to express clearly:

Once attachment is released, pleasure increases.

Why?

Because enjoyment is no longer accompanied by fear.

• No fear of loss

• No anxiety about maintenance

• No desperation to hold on

• No collapse when things change

Moments are enjoyed as moments, not as guarantees.

When something beautiful ends, there is sadness — but not devastation. Grief becomes natural rather than catastrophic. Change becomes movement rather than threat.

Nothing has been taken from you — because nothing was owned in the first place.

The Quiet Freedom of Non-Attachment

Non-attachment does not remove ambition.
It refines it.

You still build. You still strive. You still create and love and dream. But your inner stability remains intact regardless of outcomes.

This is what it means to win at life:

To have pleasure without chains.
To succeed without intoxication.
To lose without destruction.

To live fully — while remaining free.