When we were young, our elderly used to say that “you need to be educated otherwise you will be living poorly with a lot of sufferings in your whole life”. At that time, I did not realize that what they meant by “to be educated” is referring to “to have the Technical Knowledge”.

It is true that “Technical Knowledge” (like Medical/Engineering/Business, etc.,) can help us to relieve from some suffering during struggling for survival. But it does not cure all kinds of suffering that we face in our lives.

When we were born, it comes with two kinds of sufferings together as a package.

One is the suffering because of our body and mind. These are the suffering of body pain, hungry, etc. The other kind of suffering is, “not meeting our desire”, “dissatisfactions on the outcomes”, “unhappiness based on the comparison with others”, etc. In other word, the suffering of anxiety, worry, depression, etc. That kind of suffering can be named the suffering because of “mental defilements”. The mental defilements are mainly “greed, anger and delusion”. In layman term, we can call it selfish desire, in general.

So, since we were born, we have the responsibility to tackle these two kinds of suffering.

When I asked “what is your feeling once you hear the sound “suffering” (or) see the word “suffering”?”, one of my students answered me “the first thing that I feel is “I don’t want it”’.

It is quite true that no one wants to suffer except for some exceptional cases. It is also our task that the nature of living gives us to work as a life time job. Its JD (job description) is sample; “to live with less or no suffering in life”.

If we have technical knowledge and material richness, we may be able to tackle to relieve the first kind of suffering to some extent. But, no matter how much we are educated or rich or famous or powerful, our lives will still have the second kind of suffering, like, unhappiness, anxiety, stress, dissatisfaction, anger, lack of purposeful feeling in life, etc.

Can we live without that second kind of suffering? The answer is “yes”.

But it is quite sure that we can’t eliminate that kind of suffering with technical knowledge alone. Addition to technical knowledge, we need the “Spiritual Knowledge”.

Technical knowledge is useful for survival, but spiritual knowledge is useful for peaceful and meaningful living.

Technical knowledge is based on the “Identity”. Spiritual knowledge is based on the “Reality”.

If there is an identity, there is a discrimination. If there is discrimination with judgements on “high or low”, there will be “likes and dislikes”. If there are “likes and dislikes”, there will be a conflict. If there is a conflict, how can we stay in peaceful lives? That’s why, even though the “technical knowledge” is useful for survival, it cannot remedy to have a peaceful life.

I agree that “identity” is essential in our daily communication, but we need to realise that these are just names to represents the combination and the process of materials. And it is a false “sense of self” and false “sense of belonging” from reality point of view. If we really believe and behave the identity as the reality, we will be having the second type of suffering.

Spiritual knowledge is based on the Reality. The reality means viewing the things as the way they are. And, it works according on the law of nature and not according on what we want.

If you don’t know the reality, you will think that you can own the things you want. If you can’t get it, you will be angry. Even if you can get it, you will be suffering of trying not to lose it. But eventually, your possession on it, is impermanent, anyway.

As I mentioned earlier, we are born together with two things as a package. One is “Body and Mind”, (in other words) “unknowing nature and knowing nature”. The other one is “mental defilements”, which are greed, anger and delusion, basically.

And, we are mingling with “the needs” and “the wants” in our lives.

“The needs” are the requirement of “Body and Mind”.

“The wants” are because of “mental defilements”.

We all know that “the wants” create a lot of problems and make us sufferings. So, we are trying to stop the wants. But normally, the way we stop “the wants” is wrong. We are just trying to force ourselves not to want this and that. It will not work in that way.

Since “the needs” and “the wants” are part of the nature, we need to solve according to the law of nature, not according to what we want to be.

We need to know how the nature works.

In nature, if there is “darkness” in the room and if we don’t want the darkness, what we just need to do is, just to light it up. No need to move “the darkness” out or push it out. Once the light is on, the darkness will go, by nature. You no need to do anything to the darkness, actually.

Some usually ask the question that if we are free from “the wants” or “desire” or “greed”, how to make money and be successful in life.

The answer is “you no need to do anything to “the wants”, you just need to know about “the needs”’. Once you realize about “the needs” of body and mind, “the wants” will be disappeared, by nature.

In other words, you do not need to stop your works which make money for your life. You just need to realise what are “the needs” and then, you will not waste your time and energy for the “the wants” anymore, by nature.

Likewise, if you do not want greed nor anger, you do not need to do anti-greed nor anti-anger. What you need to do is just to realize about the nature as the way it is. Once you realise about our “false sense of belonging”, you will be free from the suffering created by mental defilements, by nature.

This realization transforms your delusion to wisdom. With wisdom, you will no longer have greed. Without greed, you will not have anger anymore. If you don’t have greed, anger and delusion, you will be free from suffering created by the mental defilements.

Free from both type of suffering is called “Nibbana” in Buddhism.