If you are a dharma practitioner, the meaning of not being afflicted by the hindrances that arise from enemies, illness, malevolent spirits or anything thing else is not that you are actually going to be able to prevent the arising of such things in the future. In fact, killing one enemy will not guarantee you that a second one is not going to manifest. Or by freeing yourself from one illness, you cannot be guaranteed in cyclic existence that you are not going to acquire a new one. What this does mean, rather, is that hindrances are not able to arise as obstacles to the spiritual path. You do not and cannot avert them completely, but they do cease to hinder progress on the path because they become part of the path.

Gyatrul Rinpoche

from the book Meditation, Transformation, and Dream Yoga

translated by B. Alan Wallace


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