By reflecting on the research journey in an ethno-case study, this study attempts to identify the potential and limitations of critical realist grounded theory (CRGT) that hitherto remain unsubstantiated. My research sought to uncover how a Cambodian NGO's rights-based approach fostered people's transformative learning (TL) towards claiming their rights to development and how various structures influenced the extent of their TL. CRGT enabled the elucidation of the stratified realities, particularly land grabbing that influenced people's TL, through the abduction and retroduction processes. However, using CRGT--which treats people's meaning-making as a point of departure--and progressively focusing on the structures through the same processes led to the lack of empirical data on the structures. Therefore, I suggest some measures to overcome this issue.