All beings are motivated by the desire for happiness or contentment throughout their lives.  However much we might differ in our views about which pursuits or activities might actually bring about happiness, we can still say that we are all drawn toward whatever we imagine will bring us this contentment.  Spiritual practice, then, like all endeavors, is first of all an activity taken up to achieve deeper personal happiness, joy, or satisfaction in life.

Those of us who are drawn to spiritual practice as our main path for achieving happiness are generally people with a strong intuition or conviction that the goals of life presented by conventional society – satisfying physical cravings, increasing one’s wealth, and increasing one’s social status – are mistaken or inadequate means of realizing happiness.  Why they’re mistaken, and what is offered by spiritual practice that’s fundamentally different, are important questions to examine.  Understanding the radically alternative vision that spiritual practice offers is the first step in coming to see how such a practice can bring about the deep and lasting contentment we all seek, both for ourselves and for the greater society.

When I use the term “spiritual practice” I do not mean religious practices done in the hope of some material benefit, or in order to identify oneself with a particular sect or group, as opposed to some other group.  By spiritual practice I am referring here to those practices and ways of life that aim to uncover more profound levels of awareness of oneself and our world than are conventionally available or habitually assumed.  These practices can be found most easily in the “contemplative” or “mystical” branches of many world religions.  Such traditions emphasize the development of insight based on direct personal experience that transcends the limits of conceptual or intellectual description, and they de-emphasize the simple adoption of beliefs or dogma.  Some examples include the Christian mystical movements in Europe, the Sufi schools of Islam, the Yogic movements in India (including Buddhism), and the “philosophical” Taoist heritage of China.

All of these contemplative spiritual traditions, despite their differences, share the view that our dissatisfaction in life is largely, or wholly, due to a fundamental misperception of who we are and how we relate to the world around us.  Seeing beyond this mistaken or limited view, then, is the central direction of these traditions.

This fundamental mistaken perception is generally described as an illusory sense of separation between ourselves and the world around us.  This sense of separation manifests in innumerable ways – divisions between ourselves and other beings, between ourselves and the physical world, and between ourselves and the divine (or however we label the ultimate nature or source of the universe).  This basic sense of separation produces a pervasive and underlying feeling of alienation and loneliness infusing much of our lives – sometimes dramatic and apparent, more often suppressed and covered over by the business of daily activities.  Our anxiety is revealed, however,  in our stressful encounters with the seemingly endless conflicts of daily life that emerge in a world of isolated, competing individuals.

To see beyond this limited perception of separation, then, is to be liberated from the primary source of our anxiety and dissatisfaction.  And with our central burden removed we are free to discover a new appreciation for the beauty of life.  This is the prescription for happiness given by the contemplative religious traditions.  The very root of the word “religion” – meaning to re-connect – reflects this aim of restoring wholeness to a fragmented consciousness.

The actual methods recommended by these diverse traditions to help relieve us of our delusions of separation also have many commonalities.  At first we are usually advised to reduce our habitual distractions, often by reducing our activities and separating ourselves from our usual environment, such as on a retreat.  Then we are taught various psycho-physical exercises that enable us to more easily focus on the immediate, direct experience of our consciousness in the present moment.  A common technique is to focus on physical bodily sensations, most often the breath, to root our awareness in something clearly palpable.  (The origin of the word “spirit” – from “spiritus”, the breath – might indicate this method).  In the undivided attention on present awareness, the many competing and conflicting mental phenomena – hopes and fears, likes and dislikes, memories and future plans – melt away, and a sense of peaceful relief can begin to emerge.  As the experience of present awareness is more deeply and consistently inhabited, we begin to let go of the fixation on past and future, and on our various desires and aversions that make up the character of our self-identity.  Eventually our core assumption about the existence of a fixed and solid individual self separate from the rest of existence becomes less convincing and more porous and transparent.  We see more clearly the burden of maintaining a worldview that separates our experience into so many discreet, competing boxes, based on the original separation of our self from our environment.  With courage (and hopefully the encouragement of a teacher and community) we can begin to let go of our rigid belief in our inherited conceptual worldview.  As we become free of the central burden of the separate self – with all its attachments and aversions with which it relates to its surroundings, we can more fully appreciate the beauty of the flow of consciousness itself – the seamless, undivided world of experience beyond the frustrations of conflict.

This is a summary of the path of present awareness meditation, a practice most prominently found in Buddhist and other Indian yogic systems, but also found in similar forms in many other contemplative traditions.  Some techniques of meditation use additional supports for focusing the mind on the present such as a repeated prayer, mantra, or profound question, or sometimes a sound or a religious image, either visible or internally visualized.  These more elaborate techniques might function to emotionally prepare the practitioner to more easily let go of unwholesome self-images and expand a sense of confidence, as well as focus the mind on the present.  The ultimate aim of freedom from a divided and conflicted mind, and from the isolation of the separated self, is the same as in the more simple present awareness practice.

So far this presentation of meditation is fairly conventional and wouldn’t arouse much controversy.  It paints a general picture of how this kind of practice might lead to some personal, psychological relief, at least temporarily.  But it remains open to the accusation that such a practice is essentially selfish – a “navel-gazing” indulgence of the privileged with lots of leisure time and a willingness to ignore the suffering of the wider world.  Some in the meditation community might counter that if we each improve our own mental disposition, a healthier society is an inevitable result.  Although undoubtedly a legitimate point, as far as it goes, we need to seriously consider whether meditation exercises alone really develop a person’s character to the extent that they begin to live a life that really undermines and dismantles the systems of exploitation and suffering in the world.  Or does it just lead to a little bit more calmness, relaxation, or a more harmonious conversation style with one’s friends?  Listening to the voice of our heart – our inherent capacity for empathy – many of us can intuit that deep and lasting personal happiness cannot really come about if we are ignoring the suffering of others (human or otherwise) or not doing what we can to alleviate it.  If a religious path is to be considered complete, and thus worthy of being the primary focus of one’s life – then it must include an effective way that we can help all beings overcome suffering in all it’s forms.  For many practitioners it is already a thorny issue to figure out how our meditational exercises and experiences can be effectively integrated into our daily life, with all our relationship problems, work and financial issues  – how our practice can most beneficially apply to the larger issue of healing society is an even more controversial question.  But it is a crucial question if we wish to create a healthier world.

A useful way to begin addressing this question is to look at the recommendations and models that our various traditions provide for how a practitioner should lead one’s life – particularly the ethical guidelines and questions of appropriate livelihood.  Remarkably, virtually all contemplative traditions advocate, to some degree or other, living a life of voluntary poverty – whether that means simply keeping possessions and material ambitions to a minimum, or living more completely outside the bounds of conventional society as a wandering mendicant, hermit, or monastic.

In the Buddhist tradition, the monk has been generally upheld as the preferred way of life for those with deep aspirations for spiritual growth.  In the earliest traditions the monastic life is practically the only option for those serious about practice, but even in the later Mahayana movement, which began to explore a wider range of models, the monk or nun was still the widely accepted ideal way of life.  To become a monastic meant primarily to accept and uphold the precepts – regulations for one’s daily life that ensured a high degree of simplicity, humility, and poverty.  These precepts were, and are, the formal gate for entering the monastic order – more prominent and universally followed than the practice of meditation or the studying of any particular philosophy.  Even lay people who wish to formally declare their intention to follow the Buddhist path do so to this day by accepting basic ethical precepts advocating simplicity, renunciation of greed, and advocacy of non-harming toward all beings, whether or not they take up meditation practice or other study.

Even in today’s world a connection between spiritual practice and material renunciation is still widely assumed.  In our contemporary consumerist cultures the visibility of spiritual practices, and certainly the visibility of religious monastic orders, have been greatly reduced compared to previous ages, and yet there is still a culturally-shared understanding that those choosing a simpler, less money-oriented life are closer to our perceptions about what characterizes a spiritual or “holy” person.  What is at the root of this connection between simplicity or poverty, and the spiritual cultivator?

One obvious reason that a materially humble life is linked to spiritual practice is simply that when one is freed from the time and energy demands (both physical and mental) usually spent on acquiring wealth, or just fulfilling one’s conventional economic role, one has a lot more time and energy to spend on spiritual cultivation.  But there is a more deeply ethical and profoundly psychological reason as well.

Despite the conditioning of our present consumerist society, I feel that most of us still have a deep intuition that a life based on sharing all we need with each other, of creating communities of mutual care and support, would be a more joyful way of life than the competition and striving that typifies the buying-and-selling, credit-and-debt society we find ourselves immersed in.  The religious figure that willingly abandons interest in wealth or conventional status represents a link with that possibility.

From the earliest times that the first hierarchical civilizations arose out of the smaller, more egalitarian tribal societies before them, there assuredly was some awareness by many that those who had acquired great wealth and power had done so by dominating others around them, whether through military force or cunning.  The result for the common person was that to stay afloat with adequate food and shelter for oneself and one’s family became much more precarious, more competitive, and more filled with the anxiety of possible failure.  Is it a coincidence that in the same historical eras where we see significant transitions from locally-based tribal societies (small scale horticultural, as well as some gatherer-hunters) to larger-scale, urban-based monarchies, we also see the rise of the first contemplative meditative traditions that suggested another way of life?  (The major organized example is the Indian “shramana” renunciant movement, including the authors of the early Upanishads, and the Buddhist and Jaina movements, but a similar intention can be seen in the Greek Cynics, or the movement that created the early Taoist writings in China).

The rise of these movements can be seen, at least in part, as responses to the alienation and suffering brought about by the destruction of small-scale, relatively egalitarian communities, and their forced replacement by large-scale hierarchical political states.  Many at the time must have resisted this change – those who choose physical resistance most probably met either quick or eventual defeat, as many in similar situations still do today.  Some, however, were led by these transitions to deeply question what motives lead to such upheavals, and to investigate what kind of societies, and ways of life, are truly best for the creation of human happiness.  Their investigations led to the creation of alternative sub-cultures within the dominant societies, and the legacies of these cultures have survived throughout the centuries in various orders of spiritual renunciants down to the present day.  

When a tribally-based culture is replaced by, or assimilated into, a larger hierarchical state, we can discern at least two basic forms of loss that the former tribal members might experience – one is the loss of autonomy to use the land as one would like (as an open public source of collecting and growing food and other necessities) as the state’s elites assume ownership and control of land and resources.  The second is a kind of spiritual impoverishment: religious authority changes from one centered in local and intimate relationships between an individual and their immediate community members and natural surroundings, to one based on more abstract and distant centers of power – whether intimidating and unapproachable deities, or intimidating and unapproachable priestly castes who keep a mysterious and elaborate ritual methodology to themselves.  The intimacy and familiarity of the former tribal religious culture had functioned most essentially as a way to clarify an individual’s belonging to their surrounding world, both social and ecological: how they formed an essential part of their community and landscape, and how they were, ultimately, in union with it.  In the religious culture of the larger state, the individual was also shown their relationship to their surroundings, but it was a relationship based more on subservience: the dutiful obligation to other powers, and the assurances of reward or punishment according to how well they carried out this duty.

In actual historical and present social realities, of course, religious expression is not so black and white.  A mix of locally-based, tribally-derived spiritual practices usually co-exist and creatively entangle with state-approved religious prescriptions.  But, in general, we can observe that in the transition from autonomous tribal-based societies to hierarchical states, there is some loss of the sense of intimacy, belonging, and equality that is nurtured by tribal religious traditions, and which goes along with the loss of autonomous use of the land and natural resources. 

These two aspects of our welfare – the spiritual and the material – are so deeply entwined that we might best understand them as reflections of each other:  the spiritual view allows us to comprehend and assimilate the apparent physical environment in which we find ourselves, and our material surroundings can be seen as the sensual manifestation and evidence of our spiritual perspective.  Thus, to restore the sense of belonging and purpose that are fractured when one’s material/spiritual world is radically changed, such as in the destruction of small-scale, tribally-based life by an urban-based state, both the spiritual and material dimensions of our life must be returned to wholeness.  The pioneers of early contemplative, renunciate spiritual movements, having sprung from just such a social upheaval, had the task of creating both a new spiritual vision and a new corresponding practical way of life to manifest that vision, in order to fully respond to the challenges of the new social and physical environment.

The emergence of the first renunciate movements was a truly revolutionary development that went far in achieving just such a holistic cultural and spiritual re-creation.   The original founders of these early subcultures had surely already lost much of the previous tribally-based belief systems, which likely had been eroding for generations, and the intentional reconstruction of an earlier pantheon of deities and rituals would be artificial, unconvincing (especially in the cosmopolitan context of an urban state society) and ultimately inadequate to deal with the changed social realities of life.  Rather than turning back to a tribal religion that had proved vulnerable to domination and no longer relevant, they had to create (or rediscover, or re-formulate) a new spiritual approach.  But the deep human need for dignity, purpose and belonging which tribal religion served in an older context, would have to be addressed for this new social reality.  Our universal desire for a harmonious relationship with a community, as well as with the larger natural world would need to be honored.  At the same time the core problems that hierarchical state and urban civilizations bring to the individual – such as alienation, loss of purpose and belonging, and fear of failure in a quickly changing, unreliable and competitive environment – would have to be investigated, clarified, and a solution offered.  

What was discovered was that through the voluntary embrace of renunciation people could opt out of an economic, political, and religious system that wasn’t working for them, and instead begin life anew in an alternative community outside the bounds of the dominant culture.  By turning away from the values of a hierarchical and violent power structure, and actually leaving such a system by ending one’s conventionally expected economic roles (which often meant physically leaving their homes and moving to the outskirts of settled land) bands of renunciants created new mini-societies with new values and aspirations.  Instead of working to support the wealth of distant elites, and the spiritual authority of priestly castes, these communities sought meaning in egalitarian mutual support, and a spiritual awakening that was directly relevant to each individual and (at least theoretically) available to all.  Thus, much of the wholesome attributes of smaller tribal societies was replicated, although the spiritual approach was more universal and could thrive on the questioning, re-evaluating, and creative flexibility that arises in the cosmopolitan realities of a world with urban centers and trading across vast regions. That approach entailed uprooting all previous assumptions about one’s identity, and, through careful observation of one’s mind and thoughts (meditation), arrive at the most essential and enduring requirements, both physical and psychological, of a joyful and content human life.   Through material renunciation, freedom from an oppressive economic system could be found, and through a corresponding inner renunciation – the discipline of contemplative practices – we can transcend the limits, and the burden, of our small, lonely, and fearful self-image, and thus cultivate and strengthen the experience of mutual compassion and belonging, of harmony and unity, that is naturally called for in the life of small, autonomous communities.

These spiritual discoveries were not thought up as hypothetical ideals in a classroom or think-tank – they evolved and came to fruition in the context of actual, living alternative communities.  Bands of outcasts, voluntary or otherwise, getting together and sharing their experiences and visions for a better way of life, after having abandoned, to greater or lesser extents, the economic and social roles and activities expected of them by conventional society, and “retreating” to a new realm.  They were likely centered on communities of renunciates in the forest, but also included networks of sympathisers in urban and village environments.  Life in such communities demands, in daily physical activity, the practice of sharing, of mutual work and support, and of reciprocal respect in decision making.  These qualities naturally became central to the spiritual vision of early contemplative movements.  Those practitioners in the community who were respected for their insight and became elders and teachers would spread the vision of simplicity and sharing in their teaching, and further advocate for the proliferation of alternative communal ways of life. Thus, spiritual wisdom and practical way of life emerged as one seamless movement.

It is no surprise, then, that in many traditional contemplative paths we find that a life guided by the ethical principles of humility, of deferring to the other, of sharing and altruism, is so deeply advocated – often more than, or primary to, the disciplines of meditation practice.  As we realize that a life focused on accumulating material wealth causes inevitable competition and struggle, creating winners and losers (and leaving the losers without basic needs), we can come to understand that such a life is not in line with our heart’s compassionate nature.  And as we see the isolation and alienation that such a life brings, those of us with courage naturally seek a different way.  That different way is to cultivate contentment with “just enough” – just the material elements we actually need for a simple, healthy life, and then to happily pass along whatever abundance we discover to all others, so that all beings can have enough as well.  This practice is sometimes called voluntary poverty, or radical simplicity, or renunciation.  This renunciation has nothing to do  with attaining spiritual “merit” (whatever that might be), or trying to gain a reputation for saintliness, or hoping to cultivate special powers through asceticism (although renunciation has been practiced for all those reasons throughout history).  The renunciation that arises naturally from clear observation of our human situation, that leads to the release of our deep, habitual anxiety, and that has been advocated by the greatest of our spiritual teachers, is simply a way of life of sharing that brings the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people – a way of life that has always been fundamental to all healthy egalitarian communities.  As the spiritual practitioner contemplates how our own life is not separate from all other life around us, that practitioner can be expected to naturally champion the path of simplicity, non-harming, and universal compassion.

At some point in the course of spiritual development a sincere practitioner is able to see beyond the habitual conception of a separate, isolated self-identity, and instead realize the self as a momentary manifestation of limitless, universal life.  With this perception comes the clear and full understanding of humanity’s most fundamental ethical principle – that what is harmful for other beings is harmful for myself; what is good for all beings is good for myself.  Many, perhaps most or all of us, can intuit to some degree the beauty of this principle.  But few have the clarity and courage to really digest it and live by it:  that if it’s not beneficial for other people, for other beings, and for the earth – then it’s not beneficial for me!  (even when it appears to be).  It is the essential responsibility of the spiritual practitioner to model a life led by this awareness.  This principle of universal responsibility is the core reason for authentic renunciation.  Demonstrating this way of life – and particularly helping to create the egalitarian, sharing communities that are it’s natural expression and foundational support – is the essential way that spiritual practitioners can contribute practically and effectively towards the creation of a more peaceful, sustainable, and joyful world.

Looking at the present state of spiritual practice culture in the contemporary world – particularly in the wealthier countries – it seems this great potential for spiritual cultivators to help heal our troubled planetary civilization is not being realized.   The core reason is not hard to understand.  Although much sophisticated philosophy from many traditions has been translated and studied, and many techniques of meditation have been transmitted and practiced, the renunciate way of life that was the context and basis from which those traditions grew have not, for the most part, been appreciated and embraced.  Instead meditation and philosophy have been separated out from the life of simplicity that was their nurturing source and natural expression, and inserted neatly into the midst of our unbalanced and dangerously unsustainable modern culture.  Little potential for challenging this dominant culture has been left in this stripped down version of spiritual practice, once the alternative vision of renunciate community has been given up.  And not much inspiring vision remains for the creation of the healthier society that we so desperately need. 

Why has this happened?  Many cultural and sociological factors may be discussed, but, essentially, we must recognize that significantly changing one’s day-to-day habitual routines and chosen way of life is much more challenging than talking philosophy, or even adding a therapeutic period of meditation to one’s morning routine.  The majority of the contemporary audience for meditation practices have generally been from the more “comfortable” middle classes, and in that milieu the benign nature of the modern consumerist lifestyle has mostly been assumed, or at least that lifestyle has been simply accepted in the absence of a visible alternative.   With sincere observation, however, it seems clear that a way of life based on the continuing pursuit of wealth (and fear of debt), and on a foundation of competition, is not truly in line with the mind of equanimity and non-attachment that we cultivate in meditation practice.  Even more crucially, the dire ecological and social consequences of our endlessly growing consumerist behavior (a growth that is a requirement of our current economic system) is completely at odds with any kind of vision of the healthy, just, and compassionate society that is implied in our spiritual aspirations.   We live in a society today that is dominated by the capitalist ethos of self-interest, and that is bound to a wilful ignoring of the enormous suffering that our way of life causes to all kinds of beings, and to the fact that it’s even destroying the life-supporting ecological balance of our planet.  Modern consumerism is a cultural obsession completely antithetical to the practice of mutual sharing and universal support that are the hallmarks of spiritual community and the foundation for a culture that recognizes and celebrates interdependence.  If we wish to truly explore the beneficial potential of spiritual practice on society and discover it’s relevancy for the modern world, we must directly confront the challenging reality that we live in, and have been conditioned by, a culture whose central assumptions are contradictory to the direction of our spiritual path.

A practice based on genuinely seeing through the illusion of a separate self, and filled by the resultant blossoming of universal compassion, will inevitably be expressed by a daily life guided by that awakening.  All the decisions of such a life are ultimately motivated by the intention to cause the least harm, and bring the most benefit to all beings.  Acquiescence to the normative behaviors of our contemporary culture – behaviors that cause such serious harm to poorer people, other animals, and to the earth’s ecological balance – can hardly be accepted as an appropriate way of life for an aspiring practitioner (or really for anyone who wishes to live ethically).  And yet these behaviors are ubiquitous in our culture to the point of hardly being considered – they include frequent car use, air travel, controlling temperature to maintain perfect comfort (and other similar extravagant uses of energy), the consumption of animals and their products, the use of disposable plastic (in both products and packaging), the incredibly resource-intensive consumption of short-lived electronic devices, and the consumption of all kinds of the most everyday products that travel all over the globe to reach us.   And, of course, there is the financial support, through taxes, of an aggressive and murderous military system that secures a constant flow of resources from all ends of the earth to maintain these consuming behaviors.

There are, of course, many compelling psychological influences found throughout our society that pressure us to continue participating in these behaviors.  (There has to be to ensure widespread compliance).  But if anyone might be expected to be able to pull away from the habitual allure of these pressures, and instead exemplify an alternative way of living, the spiritual practitioner should be prominently among them.   What else is the contemplative’s practice for if not to help see through the entrenched habits and assumptions of our conditioning, and to discover a new landscape, a new field of potential, for how we might live our lives with less suffering and deeper joy.

Creating such a new way of life is what the early forest renunciants of India were exploring, and the project was carried forward by the Buddha and his sangha.  When we examine the history of Jesus and his original disciples, it seems their mission was very similar.  Through the centuries Taoist and Buddhist contemplatives in China, Sufis in the Islamic world, and Christian mystics in Europe kept this core vision alive.  All of these often marginalised revolutionaries embraced a life of simplicity, and ceased to support the trajectory of greed and violence that so often characterises hierarchical civilization.  Instead they turned to the peace of present awareness that is our naturally inherent treasure, let go of personal acquisitiveness, and helped create open, sharing community.

Creating communities of simple living is perhaps the most essential way to spread this alternative life path throughout society.   As sociology has clarified, the most dominant motivation for most of our behaviors is to normalize with those around us – so we can say that the most prominent psychological force that keeps so many entrenched in unfulfilling patterns of consumption and competition is simply that everyone around them is also doing it.  Even if one is lucky enough to be introduced to an alternative vision, to break away on one’s own is scary – it threatens isolation, or even ostracization and ridicule.  To invite someone to simplify their life in the midst of a supportive community, however, is much more attractive and sustainable.   It’s not surprising, then, that the traditions of renunciation that have lasted, and that have had the greatest influence on their surrounding societies, were those with strong community as an essential ingredient.

In contemporary Western meditation groups, however, when the issue of re-thinking our practical, daily way of life is brought up as a core consideration of spiritual practice, there is often strong discomfort and resistance.  (It is clear at these times how our attachment to daily life habits form the strongest core of a perceived self-image – more so, I think, than ideology or belief systems).  Some in these groups insist that before attempting changes to one’s “outer” life, we should first perfect our “inner” spiritual realization.  The implication is that we can change our inner psychological experience somehow independently of the influence of our daily behaviors, and without much influence on them.  Later, perhaps, our “outer” life will change automatically, or perhaps it’s not really important that it changes at all.  But when we understand that our daily choices flow naturally from our mental landscape, and that our psychological outlook is constantly shaped by our environment and our chosen daily activities, then the dichotomy between “inner” and “outer” can’t be upheld.  Our way of day-to-day life, including any unquestioning adherence we might exhibit to common behavior that nonetheless causes serious harm to other beings, have an undeniable impact on our psychological landscape (an impact much greater, I would say, than can somehow be compensated for by a period or two of meditation or similar practice).  When we give up these behaviors in the practice of renunciation, we find ourselves in new territory – and our minds begin to open up to new possibilities and realizations.  As our minds become more open and unbounded, our new-found freedom expresses itself in a fresh and deeper observation of how we lead our lives, and how we might further change our lives for the benefit of all beings.

In other words, our chosen way of life is both the most crucial creating factor for, and the most fruitful expression of, our spiritual realization.  Meditational practices can be seen as a kind of prism that directs and perhaps magnifies the light of our myriad daily influences.  Or perhaps we can see them as a kind of enzyme – a catalyst that brings our daily influences to a heightened or clarified level.  But if those influences consist of the more unwholesome habits and assumptions of our culture, our practices might simply be deepening those traits, and they can really become the self-indulgent navel-gazing that some critics claim.  If instead we choose to engage with ethical renunciation, and immerse ourselves in the practice of simplicity (especially with the support of sharing community), our meditation practices can deepen and clarify our understanding of what we each need to do to create a more wholesome society.

If we were to wait until some imagined level of perfect enlightenment before bringing our daily lives into alignment with our deepest values, we will be waiting a very long time.  And all the while living in contradiction and compromised integrity, as we are forced to turn away from the suffering that our habitual daily choices are helping to cause.  How can that kind of training cultivate the compassionate, selfless consciousness that we aspire to?

Undoubtedly, some people occasionally have powerful awakening experiences that abruptly bring a new found clarity and transformed perspective, and which may lead to spontaneous behavioral changes toward a more ethical way of life.  But waiting for such an experience to come along and fix our lives is a dangerous proposition.  Many sincere practitioners don’t tend to have dramatic spiritual experiences that reveal revolutionary insight all at once; it depends on one’s personality.  And for those who do, the highs might quickly fade, and exciting temporary insights don’t often translate into reliable ethical maturation.  If we honestly observe our spiritual development, we know that our levels of inspiration fluctuate – we don’t always behave in line with the clear vision of our deepest experience.  But by aligning our daily actions with the vows or intentions of ethical simplicity and non-harming towards all beings,  we can be continually guided by the wisdom and compassion of awakened life, even during our less inspired intervals when clouds seem to fill the sky.  With the guidance of ethical renunciation, the pathway out of the clouds remains clear.

Some might claim that contemporary spiritual groups, particularly Buddhist ones, have their “precepts” as adequate guides for ethical behavior.  But it seems clear to me that it is not enough to uphold a generalized, broad, and vague set of precepts that simply reflect the accepted ethical norms of our current culture.  With these norms our society is rapidly descending into both ecological and psychological crises.  We must be brave enough to substantially update these precepts, and specify them so as to create a new vision for right livelihood, one that embraces a significant enough level of simplicity that our lives can serve as a model of genuine and joyful sustainability.  This kind of simplicity was traditionally practiced by orders of renunciants all over the world, but today they have all but vanished, at least in their full revolutionary impact.  Another important step forward, then, might be to revive or recreate such orders, though not necessarily in their traditional orthodox garb.  At the same time, though, we need to ensure that such pioneering communities are fundamentally dedicated to being examples for the wider culture – to influencing and educating all people towards a less harming way of life (as was assuredly their original intention) instead of letting them become islands of novelty, or of only ritual significance to the wider society (as has often happened historically).

With a dedication to renunciation, the support of community life, and with the clarifying and strengthening power of meditational practices, spiritual contemplatives could once again become the true pioneers of a more healthy society.  But this potential can only be realized if we are willing to meet the challenge of simplicity long celebrated in so many spiritual traditions.  

If we can glimpse the reality that this very moment is inherently sacred and complete, then we can understand that there is nothing more to strive for.  If we are inspired by the view of an all-inclusive, undivided world of experience, then we can understand that our own joy is intimately bound to the joy of all other beings.  With these understandings we can naturally embody a life of non-harm, non-acquisitiveness, and the celebration of the gift already here – a life of joyful simplicity.  In this life we can fulfill the true purpose of spiritual practice – expressed in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition as “freeing all beings from suffering.”