[2026 February DCTB Mindfulness Tip]
There is no permanent place of safety. There is no fixed point of stability. What is always present, however, is support.
Last June after a week-long migraine, my intestines began seizing. This was followed by intermittent spasms of the muscles that allow you to move from sitting to standing. The internal spasms spread and my heart stopped for 14 seconds. I lost consciousness on the bathroom floor. This wasn’t the first time my heart has taken a break. The previous September on the way to a birthday party, my heart paused for 12 second. I felt weird, like something had suddenly snapped while I was riding in the car with my husband. I also felt a bit more lightheaded than usual for the rest of the day, but had no idea what had happened until my cardiologist who monitors a loop recorder implanted in my chest called me the next day. So apparently my limit before losing consciousness is 14 seconds in between beats!
When my husband found me on the bathroom floor, I was dazed and confused, so he called an ambulance. As they moved me into the ambulance, I lost consciousness again. My blood pressure had dropped dangerously low. I woke in the ambulance stretcher thinking I was having a vivid dream. When my intestines finally let go, I knew it was real life in all its raw sensorial vividness.
My odyssey to create stability and safety in this malfunctioning body continued much as it had before this episode. To ensure accurate results of the numerous tests that followed over the next several months, I went off all of my medication. This created more instability. I felt less safe. But it was the only way to know what my body is doing without chemical additives. The autonomic tests revealed abnormal results in 3 out of the 4 tests administered. I have not yet learned what that actually means. Now that I am back on the medications, I am finding my rhythm again. Specialists in Autonomic Function are rare, so waiting times are long. (My appointment with a local specialist is this week in case you are wondering.)
Throughout this entire ordeal, moments of safety and short periods of stability arose. Any attempt to cling to these though, forced me to face that there is no permanent place of safety and there is no fixed point of stability. However, in every moment, even in the most painful ones, I found support.
My husband was there for me when I passed out and when I recovered. Doctors tried their best. Friends took care of me when I traveled to Palo Alto for specialized consultations and testing. And most of all, my spiritual practice supported me, and continues to support me.
In fact, we all always have support. The very Earth is holding us, unconditionally. The sun shines on us without question. Support is an interesting thing – it derives directly from our attention, and more specifically from our repeated thoughts and beliefs. Castaneda called this “having to believe” – and indeed we must believe in something in order to connect our body and mind and world. Without belief, we float in a sea of disassociation, unable to function.
Our need to connect with the relative world is so strong that if we do not consciously choose our beliefs, they will form from wherever we place our attention. Master manipulators and common advertisers understand this need, and often use our craving for safety and stability to get us to buy into the beliefs they seek to promote.
Beliefs create a structure which provides us support. Depending upon what that structure is like, it can give us a feeling of safety and stability. Or it can make us feel fearful and off-balance. We can appreciate the ground beneath our feet and the light of the sun as good and wholesome, and feel the sense of safety and stability it provides. Or we can curse the hardness of the rocks and the heaviness of the clouds as enemies, and feel the danger to our bodies and the insecurity of shadows.
Everything, including us and our beliefs, are ever-changing. We cannot stop the earth from turning any more than we can keep the leaves from budding on the trees in spring. Nothing in this world can create permanent safety or fixed stability – although we certainly try!
If we want to be free, we must look at what beliefs we are supporting, and how they are supporting us. We begin by noticing the patterns of our thoughts and feelings. Through this exercise we see where our attention goes and how it builds into the beliefs that support the view of ourselves and the world we experience.
There is nothing we do to create support – it is already here. By giving support to a belief system, it in turn supports us. It is inherently reciprocal. Our power is in consciously cultivating the type of support that serves us best.
This is done through our practice of Trikaya Buddhism. In meditation we learn to be steady as thoughts and sensations rise and fall within the mind. With mindfulness we train the mind to point towards beauty and gratitude – two powerful beacons of essential goodness available in every mind state. We contemplate the patterns that knock us off balance and uncover the attachments. It is these attachments that create a support system that makes us feel unsafe and unstable! By witnessing these attachments, we naturally release them in favor of a more beneficial support. If one handrail is slimy and sticky, we let it go without hesitation and instead use the other side.
When bodies fail and global civilizations are shifting, it is not easy to remember how powerful our minds and our spiritual practice truly are. In this world, it is not always easy to cultivate beneficial supports. This is why we seek community by gathering with our sangha to practice and to play. This is why Dharma Center of Trikaya Buddhism exists – to help you to discover the support of Buddha nature that is already within you.
We cannot do the work for you, but we can walk in the Light together.
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