Surrender Repeatedly

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Hey, welcome. Today's episode of the show. Hope you're doing well today, and I'm excited to be with you and to share something that is cutting edge and current for me. And it's a further understanding of what it truly means to be confident and fully confident in ourselves. And sometimes we can think. Confidence means being able to go out and do something in the world which is part of confidence, right? You want to be able to go approach someone, pull off a certain project, look a certain way in your company, lead a certain meeting, perform a certain task, whatever. Get the job, get the promotion, get the goodies, and we focus on that. And that is part of confidence. But it's also much deeper than that, isn't it, to really feel good about who you are moment to moment, to not just have the job or have the relationship, but to feel fully alive, fully aligned, fully healthy and happy and enjoying that thing that you work so hard to get or to create in your life. Of course. Right? That's what we want. We want the outer displays of confidence, but we also want the inner feeling of confidence. And what I'm gonna share with you today is really gonna help you with the second one, that inner feeling of confidence. And as a bonus, the more you get that inner feeling of confidence, the more your outward world transforms and the more success you have externally as well. So it's kind of a win win. It's just a different way to approach it. And the distinction that we're gonna look at a lot today is whether you are attached to or you've let go, whether you've attached or you've let go. And when I talk about letting go, I really mean surrendering into something, into life, into the process, into something bigger than yourself. So hence the name of this episode, Surrender. Repeatedly. So let me share what I mean, starting with the story, which is that I had this phase recently where I was just on fire, you know? You know I was kicking ass and taking names in the external, just taking on more, solving problems, approaching things more courageously and more directly, both in my business life, but also in my personal life, confronting issues, solving problems, just being more of a powerful force and a leader, speaking more boldly and directly, really crushing it and feeling great. And then stuff started to kind of unravel a little bit at the seams. I was like, no, no, everything's going so well. I'm doing so awesome. And it started subtly. It started where I was on purpose, sleeping less at the time. I was doing polyphasic sleep and getting less sleep, but feeling great. And all of a sudden, I started to feel a little more tired. Whereas before, I felt energized. Instead of feeling as up and positive, I started to feel a little more agitated, a little bit more irritable. But I did what anyone would do, ignored those symptoms and carried on. Why not? So I did that for a little while longer, and then, sure enough, like a week and a half, two weeks later, just the joy and the enthusiasm started to fade. And it was more like a bit of a grind to do all the things and all the things that I took on from a place of excitement now became obligation, now became stress. And I kept going, though, because what am I gonna do? Pay attention and slow down? F. That kept going. And then all of a sudden, for me, as you probably heard in previous episodes of this podcast, body pain. Ah, yes, good old body pain. For me, it's back pain. Pain in my postural muscles, my back, my low back, my buttock, down, my leg, intense hobble around, hard to walk pain, let alone run or work out. So sure enough, that kicks in, and I'm like, oh, this shit, man. I don't have time for this. I got an empire to build. Gotta conquer the world. And yet, nothing like pain to bring you to your knees and really have to slow down to examine. So I fought it for a few days, and then I started to examine and say, okay, what's going on? Obviously, my body is telling me something, so I need to slow down, I need to listen. And sure enough, I started to see more and more clearly that I had been residing in a state of attachment for weeks straight. And this is what you want to really look out for is right now, in this moment and throughout the day, am I attached or have I let go? And when you're attached, that means you are, like, needing something to be a certain way. And that word, needing. Notice how I'm saying it? That's how it Feels my son Armand, who's 2 right now, when he wants something big, he'll say really big. Like he wants food on his plate. He's like a lot of food, really big. And he makes the really sound. And that's kind of that I need it. And it's a constriction in your body. It literally is in your body somewhere. And you may or may not be aware of it, depending on your level of body awareness, but it might be in your chest, like kind of an emotional constriction. It might even be like a muscular skeletal constriction somewhere in your neck. Or for me, my low back is where I am in my buttock. That's I'm squeezing my glutes. For some people, it's their intestines. I used to have a lot of intestine problems as well. So we contract in some way and it's like, I need this to be so. And for me, where it was happening, it went from like, ooh, I want to do that. Ooh, I want to do that. That's so exciting. And then it became, I need to do all these things and I need to get them all done now. And it went from exciting projects to deadlines to get to the end of this process now. And there was this constriction there. It also became stress of, can I get it all done? How am I going to get it all done? I started getting stressed for time as well. And you know, basically when you're in a state of being attached, when you're suffering in some way. One question that my wife Candice, so she taught these workshops called Solsara, which interestingly enough, I mentioned it very briefly in my book. Not nice. I just mentioned, yeah, I went to these Solsara workshops. They were very helpful. And there have been several people that have flown out to Oregon where these things are to do Solsara workshops just based upon that little thing that I mentioned. And the woman who runs those workshops told me, she's like, whoa, did you like pitch this in your videos or something? I was like, I don't think so. I just mentioned it in the book. But those are very, very well, here I am mentioning it again. So if you're interested, check it out. S O L S A R A Solsara. But I found those to be very helpful. They are personal growth workshops all about authenticity and self awareness. Really good stuff. Three day immersions. They do these three day weekends. But what my wife used to teach those and the questions she would ask people to Help them see what they were attached to is what are you wanting or not wanting right now? And so I started to unravel that. Okay, this is what's going on. Every time I have this body pain, it's like, I'm like Columbo, a detective, trying to find the clues, like, what's going on here? Of course, after several days of trying to ignore it, but then it's like, okay, what's going on? And I looked and I say, hmm, okay, I've definitely been stressed. I can see that. I was more agitated than having fun, what was happening? And I realized, ah, moment to moment throughout the day. I was in a state of constriction, a state of attachment. I needed to get to the next thing. I needed this thing to be done. I needed to have all this time. I needed to have this, I needed to have that. And there was a complete lack of letting go. So letting go is a contrast to attached and needing something. Letting go is, I'm okay right now. I don't need anything right now. I'm okay. Sure, I want something. Maybe I'm going to work towards achieving something or accomplishing something or getting something, but I don't need it. I'll be okay either way. I have time. I'm okay. I'm safe. Because at the root of it, the constricted, attached way of being in the world is I'm not safe. I need X or I won't be okay. And the surrendered way is I'm okay right now. So what is the X that we need? I need this project to go a certain way. I need to complete something. I need love. I need this person to love me right now or I won't be okay. I need this person to not be upset with me or I won't be okay. I need a certain amount of money or I won't be okay. I need a certain amount of praise or accolade or significance from others or I won't be okay. And this can dominate our days, weeks, months or years. We can live virtually all the time in a state of some degree of attachment. You're worried about it, you're thinking about it, you're stressing about it. Or we can let go. And when we let go, something profound happens, like we relax all of a sudden. We can breathe all of a sudden the air smells better and the sky is a little brighter. I don't need that right now. I'm okay. I'm okay as I am right now. And then we'll get attached to the Next thing, the next moment. And we've noticed that. And so that's what I to shift out of the pain. I realized this stuff, kind of remembered it again because I have to keep learning this stuff again and again and said okay, here's what I need to do. Check my body dozens of times per day, take a full breath and notice like right now, am I relaxed or am I tense in my body, am I needing something or am I just able to be here? And what I've found is that to get out of the state of attachment, to really let go, I have to feel something. I have to be willing to feel something that I don't want to feel. That's why I'm running in the first place. That's why I'm attached. That's why I'm like convinced that if I just get to X, if I just complete all these projects, if I just finish this next thing then, then, then. And it's like driving forward non stop trying to get to the next thing, the next thing, the next thing. But there really is no end to that process because it's not about getting to the end, it's about staying absorbed. Why? So I don't have to feel. And so when I really turn towards letting go, turn towards the moment, then there's stuff to feel. And what is it? I don't know, what is it for you? You'll find out for me. When I slow down and I tune inwards, I just start to feel more in my heart, I feel more in my chest. My heart burns, aches, there's just sensations in there and I just breathe and slow down and feel them. And as part of this, as part of really giving myself that attention and slowing down and looking how to let go, I have been doing 30 minutes of just meditation, body focused peace process as I would call it. If you are not familiar with that one, maybe I have an episode about that. You should check it out. You can go to notnicebook.com and I have an audio version of the peace process there you can download. But it's just a body focused meditation where you get out of your mind focus on the sensations of the emotions in your body. And I do that for 30 minutes and sometimes it's just strong waves of sensation in my heart like ah. And I used to always need to know exactly what it was. I can't feel this until I have exact story as to what it's coming from. And now I tune a lot more into my body and just my intuition and sometimes it's something that I'm attached to. Like, oh, okay. You know, a little while back, there was ticket sales for an event. It's like, oh, I'm attached to needing people to buy tickets. And if not enough people come to the event, then I'm worthless. Then I'm not a good enough person. Okay, So I see that constriction. Needing to be a good person, needing to be worthwhile, needing to impress my dad or somebody, you know, prove that I'm enough. So tuning into my heart and just letting go of any need to make anything happen, to control anything. And then. Wave of pain. Ah, burn sensation. Right. Well, that's just. That's what the whole defense was or originated from. The whole story, the whole striving, the whole needing to get X out in the world to protect myself from this feeling. So drop the striving and just feel the feeling. That's what I did. Breathe. And the beauty is just feeling. The feeling is all you need without understanding it, without solving it, just breathing into it. Loving myself, loving the sensation and surrendering. Surrendering to the feeling. Surrendering to whatever history I had with my parents and with my dad. Surrendering to however many people buy tickets. I don't need to control anything. Surrendering again and again and again and again. And then it passes. And all of a sudden, without having achieved one more thing or accomplished anything else, everything's more. Okay, there's the constriction in the body because all that. Let me finish the sentence. The constriction in my body melts away because all that constriction is. Is about getting away from some feeling. And if you're willing to feel whatever's going on inside of you, if you're willing to feel what's happening in your heart, I don't mean think about it or think your way out of it or use some NLP or CBT or other judo technique to stop the thought and stop the feeling. I mean, just really feel what's going on in your body and your heart. And you're fully willing. You're fearless in your willingness to feel whatever is there. Then you stop being attached. Then the constriction melts away. This is beautifully described again and again in a book by David Hawkins. Dr. David Hawkins. H A W K I N S Hawkins called Letting Go fitting. Enough title, right? Letting Go. You can check it out on Amazon. You can get an audio version as well. But he just points at this again and again and again and goes in depth on how to, you know, apply this to a variety of motions, whether it's anger or fear or grief, letting go, surrendering again and again and again and again. And so I've been doing that the last number of days and just noticing it. And sure enough, after a day or even maybe two of this, the body pain melts away. Because the body pain is just constriction that's been there, that's been accumulating over days or weeks or months. And if you want to know more about that and how that process works, go back and check out some previous episodes in this podcast from earlier this year about how anxiety can create pain and tension. My interviews with Steve Ozanich as well. Really good stuff there to help liberate you from physical pain with this anxiety induced physical pain. But it doesn't even have to be intense pain for you, it could just be some sort of suffering. So here's what I want you to be very aware of is if you notice I need to have X or else, or you're ruminating about something again and again or you feel like you I'm just not satisfied with my body. I mean, it could focus on so many things. You get attached to how your body looks, you get attached to earning a certain amount of money, you get attached to needing to be right in a situation. All these things. I would encourage you just slow down and notice that tightness in your body. Breathe and be willing to turn towards whatever feeling you're running from right now and maybe even right now as you're listening to me, as you're doing this, bringing more awareness into your body, breathing and feeling your chest, your stomach from the inside. And just opening and allowing like not fighting or resisting any sensation in there. And if you notice your mind kicks in. What is this? It's got, you know, our mind's got a thousand and one ways to try to stop us from feeling. I know them very well because I'm a brainy, intellectual guy and so my intellect has had a lot of practice in blocking my feelings. It's only in the last, I'd say three to four years that I've really focused on and developed my capacity to live and reside in my heart and my body and less from my intellect that I still go there a lot. And I know that the solutions I'm looking for are rarely there. Sometimes I use my mind as a great problem solving tool, but understanding why my heart is burning doesn't make it stop burning. It doesn't solve anything. The only thing that my mind I found is useful when it comes to the strong sensations in my chest or my heart is to put some sort of meaning around the experience is helpful. So what I tell myself when I notice this ongoing burning feeling in my heart, which has been pretty persistent over, I'd say a year long period, when I really slow down, I'm not getting attached to anything and absorbed or obsessed on anything. I'll just feel that ache there. And if I just give it some attention, then it feels really good for a while and then it'll come back. And one meaning that I use my mind for, to help me be with the feeling is this is growth. This isn't bad, this isn't something wrong. Like this is good, this is growth. This is my heart coming more and more open and alive. Because there are so many ways that I shut my heart down when I was young, again and again without even knowing it. You know, I want a certain kind of connection with my dad and I can't have it. And then I'm, ah, that hurts. Ow. Ow. I want it, I can't have it. I want it, I can't have it. Ouch. Okay, Boom. Shut something down. And I want connection with friends. I want to reach out or have a girlfriend or do something like that. Can't have that, can't have it. Ow, ow, ow. That hurts. I'm a loser. I feel like a loser. Ow. There's too much pain. Shut down. And that leans literally just like constricting or doing something with my body and my mind and my emotions to feel less in my heart. And I have hundreds of instances like that from when I was young, especially when I had a lot of social anxiety. And then on top of that, using coping strategies to try to deal with that pain. Playing a ton of video games when I was a kid, watching a lot of tv, junk food and porn. Those are the things that I turned to starting at a young age, starting at maybe 11 or 12. And they became habitual, they became part of my personality, part of my identity, part of what I did. And as I've grown older and stopped using those as escape tools, as coping. Oh, did I mention cannabis? Smoked a lot of pot too. But as I've grown older and reduced or eliminated all those things in my life, then what do I do? Oh, shit, now I gotta feel or get obsessed and fixated and attached. Seems like I do that now and then too. Get really fixated on something, must reach these goals or else the world's going to explode. And then, you know, that unravels. And now I'm back to feeling. But each time I know I'm healing more and more and more and more. So this feeling, this and being with this is good, is healing, Is my heart expanding? Is me growing back into all the places of my heart that I shut down. And I get this image when I. When I imagine that meaning of like sort of areas of my heart, layers or rooms, I'm not quite sure exactly what the. If there's a visual image or more of just an intuitive sense. Layers are rooms that are like gray, grayscale. And then when I give attention to it and I breathe in, just expand my rib cage and really allow myself and I don't fight it in any way, that area of my heart turns into color. It becomes vivid and bright in color and there's like life comes back into it. And how many rooms do I have there to do this with? I don't know, thousands. So saddle up, partner. And I had a stage like this many years ago in my solar plexus where it just felt tight for months and months on end. And I didn't have nearly as many tools or self awareness or healthy environment to help me work through it as I do now. So now it's like, oh, this must be the opening of my heart. This is the next layer of my evolution. And if you look, yoga traditions and stuff, Kundalini and people who really study this energetic stuff, they talk a lot about the awakening of the chakras at different stages in your life. And I've done a little bit of Internet research on it, but it's not something that I know that much about other than, oh yeah, that does seem to be an area that needs a lot of focus right now. So surrender repeatedly. Notice when you're attached, moment to moment. Am I constricted in my body right now? Am I tight? Am I needing something? Am I holding onto something? Let it go. In fact, that brings us to your action step for today. Time for action. Action, action. Your action step is basically what I just said is to notice many times throughout the day, you know, a couple dozen, just check in even right now as you're listening, like, am I attached right now? Am I fixated? Am I needing something? Do I feel a sense of pressure or urgency or needing something to happen or stressing about something or worrying about something not happening. And then you know, what is it? What am I wanting or not wanting? What do I feel like I need right now in order to be okay? And then remember that that's just a story and then that you can be okay right now, even with something happening, even with there being a problem in your life? Because when are you gonna have a time in your life when there's not problems? There's gonna be different problems later on, so maybe higher quality ones, hopefully. But even while there's a challenge, even while something unpleasant, even while you're sick and you have physical symptoms that are uncomfortable, or even in this time in your life where maybe your grandfather died a little recently and you're feeling grief, like, we have this story that's like, well, I can't feel at peace until I'm not grieving and my body's healthy and I have all my finances and I have everything lined up and I have that relationship and I have the perfect job and everything's perfect. Then I can relax. Well, guess what? Now we're set up for perpetual attachment and never relaxing. And some part of us wants that because as long as we're striving, as long as we're. I gotta get everything in my life in order. What are we not doing? We're not feeling. Not fully anyway, so we want to slow down with those checks. Throughout the day, when you're attached, let go and turn towards whatever's happening in your body. Breathe fully, let go and surrender. Even if you can't surrender all of it. Surrender 5%, surrender 10%. Just a little bit at a time. Chip away at it. Get more and more focused on just letting go. Tune into your body, get out of your mind, and let that wisdom of your body guide you. Awesome. Thanks for being with me today. Always a pleasure. Hope this serves you on your path. And until we speak again, may you have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you're awesome. I'll talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks, and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to Social Confidence center dot com.