THE OBSTACLE IS THE WAY– Book Summaries

In The Obstacle Is the Way Ryan says that there is always a way out or another route to get to where you need to go. What impedes us can empower us.

Learn to see obstacles as an opportunity to practice some virtue:

• Patience
• Courage
• Humility
• Resourcefulness
• Reason
• Justice, and
• Creativity

Whatever we face, we have a choice: Will we be blocked by obstacles, or will we advance through and over them?

Not everyone is paralyzed by obstacles. We watch in awe as some seem to turn those very obstacles, which stymie us, into launching pads for themselves.

Earlier generations faced worse problems with fewer safety nets and fewer tools.

 “Bad companies are destroyed by crisis. Good companies survive them. Great companies are improved by them.” Andy Grove

Great individuals, like great companies, find a way to transform weakness into strength. They use obstacles to move forward.

“The obstacle in the path becomes the path. Never forget, within every obstacle is an opportunity to improve our condition.” Obstacle Becomes the Way, Ryan Holiday

All great victories, be they in politics, business, art, or seduction, involved resolving vexing problems with a potent cocktail of creativity, focus, and daring.

When you have a goal, obstacles are actually teaching you how to get where you want to go—carving you a path.

Overcoming obstacles is a discipline of three critical steps. It’s three interdependent, interconnected, and fluidly contingent disciplines:

• Perception,
• Action
• Will

WHAT IS PERCEPTION?

It’s how we see and understand what occurs around us—and what we decide those events will mean. Our perceptions can be a source of strength or of great weakness.

You will come across obstacles in life—fair and unfair, but what matter is how you see them, react to them, and whether you keep your composure.

Desperation, despair, fear, powerlessness—these reactions are functions of our perceptions. You must realize: Nothing makes us feel this way; we choose to give in to such feelings.

Don’t be a slave to your impulse and instincts, you have to learn how question them.

You can see disaster rationally or opportunity in every disaster.

There are a few things to keep in mind when faced with a seemingly insurmountable obstacle. We must try to:

• Be objective
• Control emotions and keep an even keel
• Choose to see the good in a situation
• To steady our nerves
• Ignore what disturbs or limits others
• To place things in perspective
• Revert to the present moment
• To focus on what can be controlled

This is how you see the opportunity within the obstacle. This requires self-discipline and logic, you need to Logic need to deploy them.