The worst demon you have to face what is lurking inside you. It’s not an empty slogan that you are your worst enemy. The demon represents the predator of your impulses such as greed, anger, sensuality, possession and power longing, and all that’s kind of stuff. We have a choice that we either face it, and voluntarily confront with it or we run away from. And asceticism beyond certain boundaries belongs the the latter category. By asceticism in this case I do not mean mastering complete self-control, but self-serving self-torture. Of course, asceticism is a broad category, but this topic is about asceticism beyond certain category which leads to the same obsession as what they strive to rid of. Which is nothing else than changing slave master. But it’s not a freedom and harmony by any means.
In perspective of modern materialistic mass-society even the mere concept of asceticism is bizarre and incomprehensible, both from hedonistic and conventional approaches. Why does anyone want to run away from pleasure? The answer might be as intimidating as even the ascetics are not aware of. Seeking meaning by running away from inner demon. The sad fact is, and this is the tragedy of asceticism, you can leave the temptation that the society offers by leaving society, but your inner demon will not leave you.
When, in ancient times, ascetic hermits withdrew from society to live at the top of a column or in the depths of a cave, they had two motivations. They wanted to live without sins, which they could not do in society. Because of temptations society triggered. Their other motivation was to starve their own demon with stimulus withdrawal. They starved themselves, they fled into insanity to not to think about sex until then.
In fact, however, the ancient ascetic hermitage, as the obsession of today’s Indian ascetics was based on a tragic misconception. Self-torturing does not work to oppress sensual desire. Even oppression does not work whatsoever. You waste your mental energy that you mobilize against temptations. The whole process is counterproductive altogether. Not to mention the self-hatred that’s all you achieve. No one can arbitrarily force a state of consciousness on subconscious.
For the sake of credibility I’m gonna demonstrate with a photo montage how my foolishness almost killed me in my twenties. I was too young, naive, and idealistic, though eventually I quitted the mad diet just in time, when I started to lose hair as warning sign:
And this is not my worst condition. Please do not try it. If you still want to start a drastic diet, I strongly recommend the supervision of physicians. Let my example be a deterrent for those who are thinking about a same experiment.
What is the solution for those who wish to live with no sensuality?
I know from my own and others ’experience that the solution are not an extremism and anorexia to fix this. The good news is there is a solution. Unlocking your true potential is the best way mastering self-control. Which is transforming sexual energy into creative energy. The strange irony of asceticism is that the word itself comes from the Greek athlete term. And athletes were the masters of self-control for purpose, and a purpose wasn’t escaping demon. The purpose was achieving something great, and tangible. This is the positive conception for asceticism.
If you occupy yourself with productive activity and discipline yourself to right direction the demon shall leave you alone. But the secret is that you ought to find life purpose that you actualize every single day in small portions. And You’ll enjoy the rewards that come with it. This alone makes you better than the 99% of people. And the best part is, you’ll soon realize, that your life goal is no longer escaping demon, but learning, creating, exploring something new.
Far from the original purpose of Greek athletes the asceticism evolved separately elsewhere. All religions have ascetic features. In Judaism, the sect of the Essenes was an ascetic. John the Baptist and Jesus himself practiced asceticism as a follower of this sect. Later, entire Christianity was built on this ascetic conception. Hinduism has many ascetic sects, and Gautama Buddha was an ascetic and spiritual teacher had been the founder of Buddhism. Even the Islam has an ascetic sect, the Sufism. In one thing, the ascetic aspirations of all religions are common, which is the spiritual goal. Today’s ascetics also practice asceticism for this purpose.
But what does it mean to be an ascetic today?
I need to stress, only reasonable asceticism alone is worth mentioning here.
What makes asceticism reasonable?
The asceticism what is beyond certain boundaries, which means it benefits us, and doesn’t harm us. Dying of starvation neither beneficial nor productive. It’s that simple.
So returning to our subject, what’s the point of asceticism nowadays?
The point of it is the same than was in ancient times. Finding the most valuable resource of life, the meaning with sacrifice and mastering self-control. Finding meaning means getting rid of meaningless and harmful activities. But it’s not sufficient alone. You should pursue meaningful activities, but only actualizing life purpose can make activity meaningful. I’ll give you some clues:
The ten commandments of asceticism
- Refrain from enjoying tobacco and alcohol
- Refrain from drugs and intoxicants
- Refrain from any form of gambling,
- Just spend as much time sleeping as is absolutely necessary
- Avoid all kinds of sensual pleasures which unproductive and do not let the purity of your mind be disturbed by barren fantasies, do not consume food for pleasure
- Avoid trouble and troublemakers, avoid uncertain and dangerous people, don’t seek their company even by accident, avoid them as much as possible
- Break up with toxic people and counterproductive relationships immediately, do not explain, do not confront, just break up
- Live only for intellectual pleasures, and those pleasures are connected to your purpose in life in some form
- Never stop learning and seeking opportunities to break out of comfort zone, don’t spend even a day useless
- Once you have done all this, help those who deserve it with your knowledge and experience, don’t just live for yourself
As you can see the asceticism can and must be virtuous. This is no longer a selfish and counterproductive asceticism. For modern society, this is still meaningless and incomprehensible self-torture, because those who devoted their lives for spiritual purposes are non-conformists in the sick materialistic society. And those all live spiritual life who are seeking meaning of life.
What about money and wealth? The ascetics keep themselves poor in order to get rid of addiction to materials. We all know this. Because they strive for total freedom without even being aware of. This is the reason of the Diogenesic purity. But again, it leads us to a counterproductive and harmful conception of asceticism. The money just like clothes only a means in our hands. The problem occurs if you do not treat it so, but as a life goal, which is pretty materialistic. Yet worse if you subordinate everything and everyone to materialistic purposes, such as money, status, property, possession. This is why so many people see their lives empty and meaningless. And they wonder on this, while they expect their happiness from materials. The life goal or the meaning of the life can be spiritual only, and materials can be only means to achieve it.
And the noblest goal of life is the love of learning, creating, exploring. The most successful people, the entrepreneurs, are all philosophers, artists, and scholars in one person. Finding meaning itself is spiritual procedure. All in all let materials serve you without becoming the slave of materials.
The modernism considers the asceticism as meaningless selfish self-torture, especially the materialistic approach. Which is partly true but only on the asceticism beyond common sense. However, the question arises. Not are an activities with no meaning or intellectual value considerable as meaningless selfish self-torture, such as hedonistic lifestyle? All in all you don’t need self-mortification and extremism to be a Bodhisattva or something like that.
If you like this topic please visit my previous post relating to life and meaning connection:
Thanks for reading me!