Oops, bit of a rambling post, was just trying to unpack my questions:

As all of life is perhaps illusory and/or temporary and/or suffering, and when one understands this in relation to objects of desire they somewhat lose their shiny attractive quality, does not with this recognition come something more profound than a statement of renunciation? Does ascetic intent signal a craving for rapid wisdom and/or a distracting/regulated simple pain in place of complex variable suffering inherent to being? This desire to 'go hard' almost feels ideologically at home with hyper consumption even though it involves self denial. And with asceticism being a possible shortcut practice, is it somehow a balm for the protracted suffering inflicted by time? I love sleeping surrounded by incredibly itchy wool, swimming in icy rivers in the middle of winter, fasting etc. just wondering is anyone can compare middle path/learning as ya go vs hard af asceticism? Respect to the forest monkes

Had another hard day. 02 AM until 11.45 jogging with weights 50 laps around my neighbourhood. A pause for sweets and salted snacks, as a reward. Yoga for 2 and a half hours. I napped 2 hours until then. I did listen to Vaporwave and 2000’s hits on Spotify while doing my asanas and proceeded 3 hours with leg bone and muscle hitting condition with a wooden cooking implement. It was followed by a 9 PM until 2.55 AM 30 lap running ended with 20 minute Karate punches when I have arrived home. Today I hope to read on the history of psychology and do another yoga, karate and 50 lap jogging routine.

   Did 5 hours of weight jogging. Have 3 hours of yoga and one hour of karate. Then it it 7 hours of course running. Hopefully I will read up on Aikido techniques while at work. I hope I will get 3 hours of sleep. Calf bone hitting and thousands of abs if I plan to work the night.

Hi, i am a teenager who wants to learn more about asceticism and eventually apply the wisdom in my life.

I think it aligns with my "natural" behavior. I never really liked romantic realtionships, video games, music, or anything fictional. For last 3-4 years I have never intentionally consumed fiction though I still do some "hedonistic" things like researching on internet about non fictional topics that will never help me in real life. Like for example, a programming language that I will never use, a curious question which won't help me irl in anyway etc.

I also spend way too much time chatting with internet people about non fictional topics like philosophy, programming etc. I justify my behavior by saying it to myself, "at least it's non fictional".

Any resources, guidance, or tips on how can i achieve my goals? BTW I don't like self help stuff, so maybe if someone can suggest anything other than that that would be awesome. Also I'm not spiritual or religious but I'm open to anything.

The dampening of desires, the letting go of desires, not being led or overcome by desires, however you want to put it, comes up frequently in different philosophies and religions. This notion is perfectly summed up in the quote used in the sidebar of this community

"Renounce all things, and thou shalt find all things; give up thy lust, and thou shalt find rest." - Thomas A. Kempis

You see this idea in Christianity, Buddhism, Stoicism and probably other religions and philosophies I'm not yet familiar with. Maybe this idea is even covered in psychology -- I'd really like to read more from this perspective.

I want to ask if anyone knows about any literature that specifically addresses this issue. Thank you in advance.

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https://open.spotify.com/show/5TmX9EiWZEyAA9CzzDyvxR

The dimensions of someone's home or the balance in their bank account don't determine their capacity to enjoy life to the utmost.

In the grand tapestry of life, the true measure of one's fulfillment extends far beyond the mere dimensions of their residence or the numerical values in their bank account.

It delves into the depth of experiences, the warmth of genuine connections, and the continuous journey of personal growth.

Living life to the fullest is an intricate dance of moments—those that bring joy, create lasting memories, and contribute to an overarching sense of purpose.

While material comforts can certainly enhance our lives, their size or monetary value is not the ultimate yardstick for a life well-lived.

If outside of the USA

https://play.google.com/store/audiobooks/details/Vines_Graener_The_Sage_Who_Sold_His_Ferrari?id=AQAAAECSrHHs8M

https://www.chirpbooks.com/audiobooks/the-sage-who-sold-his-ferrari-by-vines-graener

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/audiobook/sage-who-sold-his-ferrari-the

https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9798868696992

https://www.storytel.com/se/sv/books/4795923

I found this heremit through an article on The Guardian British newspaper. She has a website where she publishes thoughts, articles and her rules.

I love the conceptual simplicity of it, and thought about sharing them - it’s a great rule-making case study!

How to be an heremit: http://www.stcuthbertshouse.co.uk/howtobeahermit.html

Rules: http://www.stcuthbertshouse.co.uk/ruleoflife.html

https://youtu.be/Pe4OtnPJGpo?feature=shared

So I always loved the idea of ascetism, maybe I suffer from self harm tendencies because of my abuse as a kid but let's not get into that, but I am addicted to living in pain and sabotaging myself. BUT, I also live around some pretty shitty people who love giving me a hard time. Say, if one's goal is to live in as much discomfort as possible, wouldn't that imply not fighting back your enemies and suffering the reprecussions? At first it was only verbal, now that these people saw I am not fighting back they became physical, I started to get punched in the nuts, getting random chokeholds, having water thrown in my face, I can only imagine how far they'll go. I consider myself an ascetic but I feel the pain of humiliation might be too much. Does ascetism ever adress humiliation? I almost feel like giving up on ascetism completely I never felt so weak.

I am struggling. I am impulsive. I break my truces with myself. I give into societal comforts. I know right from wrong, yet I still do wrong. Certainly, none of us can live perfectly in adherence to the most righteous choices on account of our own lives, or can we? I keep breaking down, and one day of weakness leads right to the next, until I have spent more days reckoning and distracting myself than I have spent living in harmony with the difficult, delayed gratification tenants that we all know we should adhere to. Discuss, and feel free to ask questions.

Hey all - new to the community and very much interested in collecting a few good tomes to use as references for ascetic practices. I saw a lot of book recommendations browsing through old posts, so I wanted to share my top picks - would love it if you could add books on the topic which you go back to from time to time as source of inspiration, guidance and reflection.

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A Simpler Life: a guide to greater serenity, ease, and clarity from the School of Life: its a manual for simpler living, quasi-ascetism that rather focussing on rules, it provides starting points for your practice. Well structured and documented with examples from real world ascetics from the ancient roman empire to the 20th century. Highly recommended!

Walden, by Henry David Thoreau: this is a classic. I really enjoy reading it and the section about 'economy' really resonates with me and my views.

Goodbye Things, by Fumio Sasaki, I very much enjoyed his framing of minimalism, which is certainly ascetic from my point of view, especially when compared to similar authors/bloggers or YouTubers.

Vairagya Shatakam, a Sanskrit poem by Bhartrihari: 113 verses on renunciation that again, very much resonates with me. Plus its poetic and rich of stimulating imagery. If you like poetry, this is very nice.

I'm interested in esoteric and especially astrology. Giovanni Battista della Porta was a great Italian expert in this field, and I want to absorb his knowledge, but I also have to earn my money for living and I also think that his knowledge can help modern people, and I would really appreciate helping humanity using almost lost ancient knowledge. I understand that putting such a question on a group dedicated to giving up on all possessions in not very appropriate.. ok..no excuses.

I've discovered Asceticism very recently and I've been very intrigued by it but I've been thinking so what counts as pleasure

For example does meeting your family in reunion count as pleasure since you're technically not benefiting and it's just a way to fulfill the social interaction required by our psyche although it can be argued that conversations help us know x person and thus not meaningless.However conversations such as "look at how this person behaves, have you seen this person and their attitude etc" are in my opinion meaningless as it's just pointless nitpicking

Another example I'm a fan of the NBA but I will admit that watching it doesn't benefit me anything(while playing Basketball can be argued since it improves your physical conditioning and thus has a purpose) but on the other hand it can be argued that while I'm watching an analysis/match or historical run down I'm learning about this medium

What's your opinion?

Hello, as soon as this winter is over, I’m going in to hermitage in northern New Mexico for about a year. I could use some advice for traditional vegan foods that can be stored dry for long periods and will give me all the nutrients I need. I have a support group who will be able to leave me a box of rations every month or two. I will have a white gas stove and a limitless seater supply.

I don’t need diverse, fancy, instagram worthy meals. I would happily eat rice and beans every day, but I need complete nutrition in order to maintain my health and avoid scurvy.

Currently my idea is to find a good staple meal, and possibly supplement with a good multivitamin to make up for the gaps in nutrition.

I have access to an industrial size food dehydrator, so I’m exploring the possibility of using dehydrated pre-cooked rice and bean dishes. Apparently this can negatively impact the nutritional quality of the food, so I’m thinking it might be better to just have a sack of dry beans and soaking them overnight and cooking them normally.

I’m currently thinking of; rice and beans, quinoa, lentils, emergen-c drink powder mix

Any advice, anecdotes, or direction to books / meal plans from remote monasteries would be greatly appreciated.

TLDR: What is the simplest way to feed my body for a year without harming it?

I love art, am in love with a partner and my family and love my identity as equally as I love the rest of humanity (reaffirmed on shrooms). I am on a mystical path, and in a way, school is already a form of forced asceticism. But how can I impose a physical scenario on myself where time, art, love, bodily reliance (food, water) are all absent, without killing myself? I am not a masochist btw, I just need to know for myself that suffering and pain is only within the human mind, and ultimately I have control over it.

In criticisms of living a very simple life, I've heard the critics on videos or podcasts use the term "Tolstoyan renunciation". That has always made me curious about which writing by Tolstoy talks about living so simply that certain people use it as an extreme example.

I've wondered if it's just an overarching theme from Tolstoy's writings, if it's not a specific book.

Just wondering if anyone on here just wanders the USA by foot or in the past on a ascetic path

I liked this one Voluntary Simplicity: https://duaneelgin.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/voluntary_simplicity.pdf U guys have any recs?

What if a ascetic likes pain what would he/she do?

Hello everybody !

Second week of my asceticism journey is now complete, and things are going pretty smoothly.

First of all there has been a lot of moving in and out so I was fearing that some of my new habits would suffer from it. But not really, I am still consistent with progress on my five little goals I set for myself.

Chocolate : I am not even thinking about it anymore, my craving for sugary things has been replaced with hunger. Instead of yearning for cakes or chocolate at 4pm, I have become used to preparing sandwiches or eating a banana or kiwi (kiwi is the best fruit)

Video games : Still on my one hour a day limitation. My gaming sessions have been a lot more enjoyable because I would ask myself beforehand on what game I would spend my hour on instead of scrolling endlessly through my steam library.

Writing in my journal : Forgot to do it on two days but still consistently writing in it. It has been a great tool of self reflection and I am happy that in a few years I will be able to get back to these thoughts and see them through a new light brighten by life experiences.

Phone and scrolling : Still didn’t have time to buy a dumbphone, but I already got used to just not use my smartphone that often any more. I uninstalled every social media except the messenger apps that I use to communicate with family and friends. I also put my screen in black and white, don’t know if that will help much but I like the style. In terms of usage I generally abandon it in a drawer before going to the toilets or going to eat (in the past it would follow me everywhere so not having it on me 24/7 is a win). I still have the problem with going on websites and scrolling when on my computer so I will consider the option of webpages blocking PlugIns to target this particular issue.

Sleep schedule : Has been a bit shaken up by the whole « moving from one place to another » part, but it’s still not as bad as my previous « go to sleep at 3am and wake up at 12pm » routine.

An issue is that now I have a lot of free time. Exams period has ended (for now) and I’ll be taking real vacations until the end of the week because I cannot bring myself to look again at my lessons. So that leaves me a ton of time, which made me bored. So I tried out new things, one of which meditation. I did not understand until now what the deal was with meditation. I saw it as a « think of nothing for 30 minutes » but stumbling upon a guided meditation session on the TIDE app made me realise that meditation is not just « think nothing ». There never was an obligation to be able to think of nothing, but on the contrary, one can lean into the fact that thoughts are inevitable and just observe them. See them as what they are without judgments.

I cannot emphasize enough how much of a revelation this was to me. I have now done it several times during the past few days and I can safely say that I enjoy it. I’ll make it my sixth new habit: « meditate every day for at least 10 minutes ».

Also trying right now cold showers and going back to doing sports now that I have plenty of time to do so.

I'll report my progress in a week or in a month, depending on how eventfull things get. I feel like an upcoming challenge will be my exams results next week so yeah I might report on this.

Thanks a lot for reading!

Hello All!

One week ago I wrote a post about wanting to start my own little ascetic journey. I wanted first to tackle five things in my life: Playing less video games, eating less chocolate, buying a dumb phone to partially replace my smartphone, sleep at consistent times and write often in my journal.Some of the responds I got warned me about the fact that trying to take care of many things at ones might set me up for failure, and you were partially right. The first three days were rough and my lifestyle didn't improve much. So I started with a basic thing: clean my room. And I cleaned. Threw away the trash piling up for days, cleaned my desk, made my bed, cleaned the bathroom. And suddenly I was in a clear space. Not only in my room, but also in my mind. And so I started making the improvements that I was longing for:

- I almost completely stopped playing video games. Uninstalled steam was a great start, and the games I have on my switch are enjoyable for 30mins -1 hour sessions at most. So I let myself play for up an hour per day but usually I stop before hitting that mark. I don't even miss it that much.

- I swapped chocolate with dark chocolate (90%) which I physically cannot eat in large quantities. And for the moment I am not craving any sugary things. Weirdly, that gave me the motivation to cook myself (for once). I wouldn't say my diet is great now but sometimes I have the energy to make myself a salad or vegetables with eggs which makes me oddly proud considering I ate almost only processed food the last few weeks.

- Scrolling is still a tough one for me, even though I reduced it a little. I didn't have the time to buy a 30-50 euro clap phone (exam period yeah) but I will do it when I have time and continue reducing my time on the phone and building the habit to put it in a drawer or something.

- My sleep has become more regular and of better quality. For the past 4 days I would sleep at 9pm and wake up around 6pm. I already feel in a better mood, and more energized.

- Writing every evening in my journal was not as difficult to set up as I thought. Just having the journal laying where my computer is the rest of the day did the job for me. Even if it's one sentence that's enough.

I do realise that the first few days might be the easiest - everything is fresh, everything is new so motivation is high. But today I got results for some of my past exams - bad, not a failure but bad scores. These are the results of my past life in which I would dump hours and hours into games, binging and social media instead of learning my courses. I do not wish to go back to this life.

These past days were really enjoyable. Letting go of unnecessary pleasures was gratifying and gave me time to walk and just appreciated the view. It also gave me time to think about how far I wish to go in this journey and how to make things last after the "high motivation phase" is over. Like some of you said below my previous post, building systems is more efficient than relying on motivation alone to build habits. So this will surely be my next goal to keep the little improvements I made.

I would like to thank everyone who commented and brought constructive criticisms or encouragments, that helped at lot.

Thanks for reading!

Hello everyone, I am new to asceticism and looking for very practical ways of implementing it in my own life. What are some steps we can take to implement it in our own lives? Where to begin is my question I guess.

Thank you.

Hello!

So i wanted to make such a thing a long time ago, a challenge that I would give myself and post somewhere on the internet to have some level of accountability.
Nihilism and absurdism has thrown me into pursuing pleasures in unhealthy amounts, and I see in asceticism a path to get rid of what messed with my life for so long without me even realizing it.

So, inspired by u/BranJorgenson , I'll start too my little ascetic journey, cutting off bit by bit unnecessary pleasures and coming back to things I loved doing before overstimulating myself with various distractions.

Video games: Used to play it for hours on end, I think around 6-8 hours per day. My goal is to start reducing it to 1 hour

Chocolate: At my worst I could consume a few hundred grams a day. But it's inconsistent, so I feel pretty confident in just cutting it out completely.

Scrolling: My plan for this are to buy a "dumb phone" and keeping my smartphone as "tablet" in my home.

Sleep at consistent times: Sometimes I would try to sleep at 8pm and sometimes not giving a flying fuck I would stay awake until 2am.

Write in my journal consistently: That is something I enjoy but can't bring myself to do when overstimulated with screens and video games.

There are a lot more point that I wish to address, but for the moment I will be focusing on these 5. This will give me a lot of free time (especially the scrolling and video games part) that I will be able to dedicate to philosophy and meditation, and just more generally taking care for myself (my hygiene and room are in a deplorable state right now).

I still fail to find my values, even if (optimistic) nihilism has brought me a sense of peace knowing that everything has an end. Even though the search of purpose is a big goal and will take time, treating myself right is a first necessary step.
I plan on making an update in a week and telling my progress and how it's going.

Thank you for reading!