Working with Obstacles

Every practitioner meets obstacles. They are not failures, but the very ground on which the path unfolds.

When we begin practice, it is easy to imagine that progress means calm, clarity, and ease. But real practice often feels like the opposite: distraction, doubt, weariness, or even resistance to the teachings themselves.

In the Dzogchen and Mahamudra traditions, these are not signs of weakness. They are the natural surfacing of habits and karmic patterns. To meet them with awareness is to bring them onto the path.

Obstacles can be transformed: anger into clarity, attachment into compassion, doubt into openness. The key is not to push them away, but to recognize them as expressions of awareness itself.

Common Obstacles in Practice

The Obstacle Is the Path

Meeting the maras and turning obstacles into friends.

A Life's WorkGreg Patenaude

The problem of suffering.

In his first sermon, the Buddha taught that the entry-way to a spiritual practice started with the truth of suffering. The main problem that we are trying to resolve with our practice is the reality of suffering, dissatisfaction, and discontentment in our life. The Buddha taught that the first noble

A Life's WorkGreg Patenaude

Leap.

Leap over the unknown. Approach an unfamiliar pass, a seemingly treacherous waterway, a deep ravine, an unfamiliar opportunity, a chance to help or make a difference... Have you ever been hiking with a group of people and come across a place where you might need to leap to keep moving

A Life's WorkGreg Patenaude

Learning to dance.

Part of finding your way and traversing the path is learning to dance. Dancing is an essential wayfinder [https://www.lifes.work/wayfinding/] skill. In fifth grade I went to a family dance. These were the good ole days of MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice. I was young and innocent,

A Life's WorkGreg Patenaude

Read more blog posts about Obstacles and Problems.

Obstacles are not walls. They are doors. Each time we meet one with awareness, it opens into a deeper freedom.

“Whatever arises, joy or difficulty, can be the path if you recognize it as awareness itself.”

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