When you renounce something, you’re tied to it. The only way to get out of this is to see through it. Don’t renounce it, see through it. Understand its true value and you won’t
need to renounce it; it will just drop from your hands. But of course, if you don’t see that, if you’re hypnotized into thinking that you won’t be happy without this, that, or the other thing, you’re stuck. What we need to do for you is not what so-called spirituality attempts to do — namely, to get you to make sacrifices, to renounce things. That’s useless. You’re still asleep. What we need to do is to help you understand, understand, understand. If you understood, you’d simply drop the desire for it. This is another way of saying: If you woke up, you’d simply drop the desire for it.

Renouncing things is less difficult than people believe: it's all a matter of getting started. Once you've succeeded in dispensing with something you thought essential, you realize you can also do without something else, then without many other things.

Renunciation is not about pushing something away, it is about letting go. It's facing the fact that certain things cause us pain, and they cause other people pain. Renunciation is a commitment to let go of things that create suffering. It is the intention to stop hurting ourselves and others.

"You might think of renunciation in terms of some external act like a New Year's resolution, or leaving family and friends to go off to a cave. But renunciation is much more subtle than that — and much harder — and much much more continuing. On the spiritual journey, renunciation means non-attachment.

To become free of attachment means to break the link identifying you with your desires. The desires continue; they are part of the dance of nature. But a renunciate no longer thinks that he is his desires.

"What is the necessity of giving up the world altogether. It is enough to give up the attachment to it." — Ramakrishna"

The reward of renunciation is some good greater than the thing renounced. To renounce with no vision of such a good, from fear or in automatic obedience to a formula, is to weaken the springs of life, and to diminish the soul's resistance to this world.

in this way, seek wrongly, and the further they range, the less they find what they are looking for. They proceed like someone who has lost their way: the further they go, the more lost they become.

But what then should they do? First of all, they should renounce themselves, and then they will have renounced all things. Truly, if someone were to renounce a kingdom or the whole world while still holding onto themselves, then they would have renounced nothing at all. And indeed, if someone renounces themselves, then whatever they might keep, whether the kingdom or honour or whatever it may be, they will still have renounced all things.

If one is able to become deeply aware of the negative consequences of desires, one will not become involved in them. This is what is meant by renouncing desire.

Renunciation is not getting rid of the things of this world, but accepting that they pass away.

Just as the serpent does not hesitate to fulfill the biological "law of its kind" in shedding its old skin, so right renunciation will not waver or shrink from those acts of giving up which right understanding of reality demands. Just as the serpent does not mourn over the loss of its worn-out slough, so right renunciation has no regrets when it discards what has been seen as void of value and substance and replaces it by something new and more beautiful: the happiness of letting go, the exhilaration of the freedom won, the serenity of insight and the radiance of a mind purified and calmed. It is the growing strength of this new experience which will gradually clear the road to final emancipation.

On the value of the renunciation that we should practise inwardly and outwardly. You should know that no one has ever renounced themselves so much in this life that there was nothing left of themselves to renounce. But there are few people who are properly aware of this and who remain constant in their efforts. It is a fair trade and an equal exchange: to the extent that you depart from things, thus far, no more and no less, God enters into you with all that is his, as far as you have stripped yourself of yourself in all things. It is here that you should begin, whatever the cost, for it is here that you will find true peace, and nowhere else. People should not worry so much about what they do but rather about what they are. If they and their ways are good, then their deeds are radiant. If you are righteous, then what you do will also be righteous. We should not think that holiness is based on what we do but rather on what we are, for it is not our works which sanctify us but we who sanctify our works. However holy our works may be, they do not in any way make us holy in so far as they are works, but it is we, in so far as we are holy and possess fulness of being, who sanctify all our works, whether these be eating, sleeping, waking, or anything at all. Little comes from the works of those whose being is slight. This teaches us then that we should make every effort to be good, and should worry not so much about what we do or the character of our actions, but we should be concerned rather about their ground.

You must not give way to desires which you don't believe in. I know what you desire. You should, however, either be capable of renouncing these desires or feel wholly justified in having them. Once you are able to make your request in such a way that you will be quite certain of its fulfillment, then the fulfillment will come. But at present you alternate between desire and renunciation and are afraid all the time. All that must be overcome.

To renounce one’s own will is a sacrifice of blood. It means that one has reached the point of laboring to death and of ignoring one’s own will. The statement ‘Behold, we have left everything and have followed you’ is about perfection; it is not about property and small amounts of money, but about thoughts and desires. You, however, have not yet come to this perfection; when you approach there, you will hear what you have to do. For the time being, simply remain carefree in all matters and concerns. As for your property, keep it for now for your nurture. The Lord Jesus Christ will bring you to that ineffable joy; for he is eternal light. Amen.

To renounce liberty is to renounce being a man, to surrender the rights of humanity and even its duties. For him who renounces everything no indemnity is possible. Such a renunciation is incompatible with man's nature; to remove all liberty from his will is to remove all morality from his acts.

Many people renounce the world because they can’t find a satisfactory place in it, and almost any spiritual teaching can be used to justify a pathological lack of ambition. For someone who has not yet succeeded at anything and who probably fears failure, a doctrine that criticizes the search for worldly success can be very appealing. And devotion to a guru — a combination of love, gratitude, awe, and obedience — can facilitate an unhealthy return to childhood.