I've been sitting, working, watching as things fall away this season; relationships that were once important and had major effects on my mental state have run their course; activities that I once enjoyed now seem tedious and draining. Financial success and career development have, all at once, taken a back seat to having enough money to pay my bills and otherwise protecting my time and energy. Work when it's time to work, sleep when it's time to sleep, build a fire when it's cold. Simple. Just sitting and breathing.
With this generalized turning inward, things which didn't make much sense before are starting to fall into place; the little rituals throughout the day that ensure the important things get done regardless of the little distractions of daily existence. The talismans and incantations that I and those around me use to maintain the center--the backpack my coworker carries around even though she doesn't use it, the sheer number of times I say "Oh, we're doing this now" as a way to release and reset attention and intention for whatever new thing needs to be addressed. Perhaps there's more to it that will reveal itself in time, but for now that's where I am.
Things feel at rest, even when frenetic. In that context, I'm finding that it's easier to see the effect things have on my own state; meat, alcohol, and sexual desire seem to have a particular kind of turbidity where if I engage in one, it brings the other two. Nothing wrong with any of them, but it becomes easy to see that the enjoyment brought by those things is less important and less satisfying than maintaining the center and staying as unencumbered as the situation allows.
I don't think any of this is renunciation any more than the snow melting in the spring is renunciation; a new season brings a new context, and to try and hold on to old behaviors that worked in a different context is as unnatural as ice refusing to melt in warmer weather. The expression may change, but fundamentally it's still the same water.