The Garuda Trap: Why Your Enlightenment Fails the Moment You Leave Retreat | Shōyōroku 44
Here we are turning the corner on our November retreat. Crisp autumn day. It’s nice to be in front of the fire. Although we did have a good bonfire set last night. It was getting a little frosty toward the end, but still very enjoyable. We’ll smell like bonfire for some time. I always make a joke that I wake up in the middle of the night and think there’s a forest fire—then realize it’s just my shirt.
We all come to retreat for clarity. We come here to open up, and somewhere along the way, without forcing anything, we begin to suspend our disbelief just a little. We loosen the grip on the story of who we think we are and let ourselves open to the truth—the truth that has always been right here. In that small opening, something very simple becomes visible: the spaciousness of our life, the wonder, the ease that’s been underneath everything from the beginning. When we don’t force it, when we just show up and the noise quiets down, we actually become a little more nimble, a little more playful, a little more responsive. We don’t have to strain anything and there’s nothing to manage. We can return to our natural domain.
Now, as we turn the corner on this last day of retreat, it’s helpful to ask ourselves, or a master within, for a little guidance. What do we do next? How do we step back into the world without immediately being swept into the old currents of habit energy? For that, we can ask the advice of the old master Hō-Ōshō of Kōyō, who appears in Case 44 of the Shōyōroku: “Kōyō’s Garuda Bird.”
Attention! A monk said to Hō-Ōshō of Kōyō: “A dragon king leaves the ocean and heaven and earth are calm. Meet him face to face—and then what?” The master replied: “The Garuda attains the universe. At such a time, who would dare stick his head out?” The monk countered: “When the head sticks out—then what?” Kōyō answered: “It’s like a falcon seizing a dove.” And then he added, “If you don’t understand, check in front of the balcony and know the truth.” The monk said, “Well then, I clasp my hands on my chest and retreat three steps.” Kōyō responded, “Blind turtle pinned under Sumeru, Mount Sumeru. Don’t get hit on the forehead and scarred again.”
I always tell you, we think when we wake up it’s going to be lollipops and rainbows. Sometimes it is. But here we have Garudas and dragons—maybe even more wonderful. In the old lore, the dragon is the ruler of the oceans, invincible in its natural element. But even the dragon has a predator: the Garuda. You don’t hear about it often; the dragons don’t want you to know. When the Garuda spreads its wings, the waters part and the dragon, the sovereign of the depths, is suddenly exposed. Even the dragon is vulnerable when it leaves its domain.
When we sit deeply for a few days, something in us remembers our own ocean—the calm, steady depth of our true nature, our original mind. Nothing special, nothing dramatic, just the simple fact of being here. But the moment we step out of this container, the moment we leave our natural element, something else appears. The texts say the Garuda is the dragon’s only predator, but it does not stalk the dragon in the ocean. It only sweeps in when the dragon lifts its head into the air, leaving home. And suddenly the mythology becomes perfectly clear. This isn’t some far-off story. It’s our life. The Garuda is that instantaneous surge of karmic consciousness that seizes us the moment we drift from direct experience into the world of thought forms. Leave your ocean, and the Garuda knows exactly how to find you.
Hō-Ōshō answers the monk’s question: “The Garuda attains the universe; at such a time, who would dare stick his head out?” When karmic momentum is awake and moving, there is no room for pretending, no room for spiritual posturing, no room even for subtle self-absorption. Stick your head out—introduce a single thread of conceptual thought—and everything ignites. This is not punishment; it is simply how karmic consciousness functions: immediate and inevitable.
The monk presses on and asks, “When the head sticks out, then what?” He’s earnest, but thinking in the wrong direction. Maybe he believes he can operate from within the old habits and find safety that way. We think we can think our way through it: “If I just get that last piece of information, if I just figure it out, then I’ll be okay.” Hō-Ōshō replies, “It’s like a falcon seizing a dove.” Instant. No deliberation. The moment the head appears outside cover, the falcon is already there. That’s the precision of karmic momentum when we leave original mind. Leave presence, wonder, inclusivity, and wander into judgment, thought, old stories—the falcon is already moving. Old patterns don’t slowly build; they happen in a single motion. It’s the train of thought: someone says something, you hear the conductor calling “all aboard!”, and suddenly the whole story is rolling. You know the soundtrack—it gets more elaborate every time.
Hō-Ōshō then says, “If you don’t understand, check in front of the balcony and know the truth.” The balcony is that edge where the two worlds meet—where we can’t hide from our own functioning. It’s not a place of punishment; it’s a place where things reveal themselves exactly. You see all the remnants of old battles: the half-told stories, the discarded facts, the identities you used to build yourself. They lie all over the ground from your last encounters. It never ends well. But we keep charging out there thinking maybe this new armor will work.
The monk tries something: “Well then, I clasp my hands on my chest and retreat three steps.” That’s how you leave the dokusan room—symbolic humility, a gesture of withdrawal. But it’s still conceptual. Still trying to figure it out. It’s not about advancing or retreating. You’re already standing. Notice how desperately the karmic mind clings: “Just one more thought, one more fix, one more idea, one more supplement, one more strategy—and then everything will be okay.”
Hō-Ōshō cuts through: “Blind turtle pinned under Mount Sumeru. Don’t get hit on the forehead and scarred again.” This is compassion in the only form that can help in that moment. You’ve already been crushed by these patterns. You’ve already lived inside them. You have the bruises and blisters to prove it. Don’t walk back into them thinking this time will be different. You already know what happens when the dragon leaves the ocean. You already know the Garuda comes. You already know the falcon seizes the dove. Many of you know the full weight of Sumeru. Fall back into that groove and you’re pinned under the mountain again.
This whole kōan is spoken with love. It’s less a warning than a finger pointing. And it’s not a master outside—Hō-Ōshō lives within, constantly saying, “That’s not going to go well.” But we say, “Hold my beer,” and run in anyway.
You’ve tasted the ocean this week. Don’t abandon your natural domain. Don’t drift into thought forms as you leave this retreat. Don’t surrender your life to karmic momentum the moment you reenter the world. You’ve all felt the responsiveness that comes from stopping the argument with reality.
Allegory can only go so far; it’s not that we eliminate karmic momentum. We learn to work skillfully with it. A bullfighter doesn’t stand still yelling, “Come get me!” He works nimbly with the bull. Your karmic momentum is the same. You don’t avoid it and you don’t run straight into it. You work with it. Look carefully at yourself—your temperament, your energies, your facets. Some you know well: “I’m smart, I’m quick, I can out-argue my spouse.” Don’t try that. The ones you don’t know well are the ones you’ve pushed away: the aloof one, the avoidant one, the wounded child. You must make friends with the inner scoundrel. Meet all the facets of yourself. That’s how you learn to work with karmic consciousness, and how it becomes something that points a way out of suffering—not just for you, because “you” begins to fall away.
Work skillfully and you inherit the universe’s resources. Yes, you inherit its suffering too, but you have everything needed to meet that suffering with compassion. There’s no need to repeat the pattern of sticking your head out when you know what will happen. No need for spiritual dramatics or symbolic humility. Just navigate your ocean. Stay with direct experience. Stay in the domain that has always been yours. Then the Garuda has nothing to seize; karma has nothing to feed on. You leave retreat not holding onto a rare state but remembering where you live. Even the realm of the Garuda becomes included—you’ve learned to work skillfully with the sky as well. The dragon doesn’t fear the sky; it learns to master it. That’s how you stay at home in your own life. Everything else takes care of itself.
There is an appreciatory verse:
The imperial order descends, the general’s order disperses.
Within the fortress, the emperor; outside the walls, the general.
Thunder doesn’t wait for the astonished bugs to crawl out.
You’ll never stop the wind or the flowing clouds.
The loom’s lower vast before sealing.
Originally, there is no ideograph or wormhole.
The imperial order comes from the center—stillness. The general’s order comes from strategy and reaction. That’s the split that happens when we don’t live in our original domain. This week you’ve been thrown into the waters. You’ve seen your birthright. As you leave, stop looking for the general. Stay in the imperial order of presence. Don’t chase strategy. Response arises organically when we are wholly present.
Learn the vastness of your ocean. If an old pattern surges, look at it carefully. Don’t block it. Engage it, but not on the terms of your reactive self. Meet it from presence. Drop back into the body, into the breath, into direct sensation. Remember where you live.
We always divide the world into “in here” and “out there.” That’s not it. There is a spaciousness that is unbroken, always present. There is nowhere you cannot go—unless you fall into the death-throes of the karmic self that tells you you’ll only be okay when something else happens. Stay connected to your practice. And your practice is nowhere else.
In the morning when we show up for meditation, we don’t show up for ourselves. We show up to encourage everyone else. It’s encouraging to see people arrive. If you don’t show up, no one shows up. There’s a quote on the zendo wall from JFK: “We do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard.” We push up against what challenges us. Encountering resistance directly, we find it subsides.
Another JFK line: “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.” When you are fully at one with the country—when you’ve done all that can be done—the problem called “you” drops away.
