In the interest of starting to post here a bit more regularly, I figured I would share, in installments, a rough translation of an interesting Tibetan text I came across recently. The text is by Dza Patrül Rinpoche (1808 – 1887 – Patrül has become the quasi-standard English phoneticization, but it could just as well be Peltrül), a prominent scholar-practitioner of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism, who is perhaps best known today for his extensive commentary on the ngöndro, i.e. the foundational, preliminary practices of the Longchen Nyingthig system, called ཀུན་བཟང་བླ་མའི་ཞལ་ལུང་ Künzang Lamé Zhelung, ‘The Direct Oral Instructions of the Guru who is one and the same as Samantabhadra’, better-known as ‘Words of My Perfect Teacher’. The text I’d like to share here is, also included in Patrül Rinpoche’s collected works and is titled བདུད་ཀྱི་རྒྱུ་བརྟགས་ཏེ་སྤོང་ཚུལ་གྱི་མན་ངག་བདུད་ལས་རྣམ་རྒྱལ་ ‘Complete Victory over Mara: Pith Instructions on how to Diagnose the Causes of Mara or Obstructing Demons and the Methods for Avoiding Them’. I cited the final paragraph from this ‘Complete Victory over Mara’ text in a recent interview I did with Steve James on the Guru Viking podcast on the Tibetan concept of gek or obstacles which arise in the course of meditation and spiritual practice. As it happens, the text is not an original composition, but as Patrül explains in the colophon, is his reworking of a chapter by the same name found in ‘The Heap of Precious Pith Oral Instructions’ མན་ངག་རིན་ཆེན་སྤུངས་པ་ Mengngak Rinchen Pungpa, a treatise by the influential Tibetan Kadampa master Chegompa, who was born in 1130. Patrül Rinpoche notes that he has summarized the original chapter, has edited its wording slightly, in order to rework it into ‘notes’ or a more bulleted form (ཟིན་ཐུན་དུ་སྤེལ་བ་). This is very kind of him, since it makes the key points of Chegompa’s chapter easier for students like us to access, study, and memorize. Since there’s so much of interest in the text, I’d like to share it in its entirety here, with a few personal reflections along the way.