The Power Of Full Acceptance With Martha Creek

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. Welcome to today's episode of the show. Today we're going to be looking at how to feel more peace, more inner confidence, more of an internal sense of value, worthiness, safety, and to move through the world from that place. And I'm excited to have a guest with us who really embodies this and has been teaching people how to do this for many years. And so she shares a lot of really valuable and actionable insights with us. So I personally just learned a ton in this interview and I, and I know you will as well. And what I love about my guest is it's not just what she says and kind of more information, it's who she is. And I feel like a lot's being transmitted beyond than just the words she's saying. My guest today is Martha Creek. Martha is a humble and humorous public speaker. She, as she'll share in the interview, is a lifelong student of this life and a teacher for others. She uses her own experience and insights to help people not only learn about, but experience the power of living from their own truth and realigning with their divine nature. And as I said just a moment ago, you experienced this through our conversation. It's very powerful. She's on a sincere mission to serve as many people as she can to be residing in this state of acceptance and presence and, and in alignment with her divine nature. She's no stranger to challenging situations. She facilitates churches and organizations in the midst of conflict and change. Individuals in emotional, financial, physical and spiritual distress and extraordinary people in struggles with day to day challenges, looking for another way. She's dedicated to serving individuals and realizing their full potential. Yeah, there's so many things that I think you can help our audience with because you know, there's so much more to if we're feeling anxious, we're feeling low self esteem, we might think, oh, I just gotta, you know, be a little more bold or I just gotta learn how to talk A little better. And sure that's part of the journey, but I think you know and I know that the journey is so much bigger than that. Just so people can have a bit of an orientation or reference to you and your story. Can you share a little bit, you know, your mission, as you were sharing with me before this, is to spread empowering information to as many people as you can on the planet. I love that. That's a big mission. Can you share a little bit about how you came to do what you do and be drawn to that mission?

Well, yeah, all the details about me are also on that website, MarthaCreek.com for anybody to see. So it's a journey of some. Somebody was born in a very rural part me of Bug Tussle, Kentucky, which is on the border of Kentucky and Tennessee, in a very poverty stricken area there. I'm the oldest of three children born to two youngest parents. So I say I had a distinct memory of looking around when I was 3 years old and saying, oh my goodness, I'm the oldest one here. So I believe that I didn't see it was an option for me to be confident that I took it on as a small child. Like it's up to me here to go about some strategies, some coping, some ideas, some creation and being an adult really as a small child. So I think I also came into this life with it, that my incarnation here, my very existence comes with a certain wiring and a certain hard wiring, certain soft wirings, and it's proven scientifically that we can rewire and set different trajectories for our life and different ways of thinking and being, being with the circumstances in our life. So I feel like I had some insight of that at the very beginning of my age, of my life at that early age, that I had some understanding that I am causative and that how I go about this and how I experience this life experience is partially up to me, that there's certain things I cannot control, can't control, I can't change. And there was some wisdom intact with me even at that early age to know there's certain things about this plane of existence, this physical plane and this life situation that is here for me to accept. So then early on to then be about of changing what I could and what I couldn't change, to change the way I experience it so that I'm going to be less and less likely then to fall under a spell or a trance of there's something wrong with me or there's something wrong with the world or there's something wrong with the situation versus everything in the life, everything in the plane of existence is included. So this, this is the way of it, this is the way of it. And I don't have to like the way of it, I don't have to agree with the way of it and this is the way of it. So that left me generally bit a bit more empowered and clear minded and more actual and factual about what I'm going to take on and not take on and try and some willingness and a confidence to go about it, to see what was possible. Believing in infinite possibility, infinite potential and going about life more like in a laboratory. That this is like this is to be tested to see what's possible here. So I've gotten plenty of chances to practice that. My family didn't finish school. My father quit at the fourth grade, my mother quit at the eighth grade. Both of my brothers, one just one year younger than me, one seven years younger, me never finished high school. And I had a desire to go to, I wanted to be in school, I love school and I wanted to go to college. And there'd been nobody in my family that went to college and they couldn't comprehend that why I would want to go to college. So it was, it took then an inner drive in me and an inner orientation to these are the goals for my life. They're not the goals for somebody else's life, they're not the goals for their life. They, they have, they don't have a, the same kind of height of value around this as I do. So then it meant having a plan for that, a strategy then about how I'll get to college, if that's important. And I did and I finished, I did college in very non traditional ways because that's what it took really for me to do it, to keep working full time and other things like that. And I'm still enrolled, I've got three or four more degrees since then and various studies. So I feel like I'm still a student to life. So I hope that spoke to what you were wanting to bring forth here.

Yeah, I love that there's so much in there and some of those insights that you realized at a young age and maybe built on around what you can or can't control. Letting go, allowing a flow of life, experimenting as if this is a laboratory. I mean these are things I think that for many they discover that much later after many years of banging their head against the wall. I certainly didn't have that kind of perspective at a young age. It came from a lot more suffering. And I think that's fascinating. And so some of those. Let's unpack those so we can help listeners get a grasp of really how to do this more. I think one of the biggest challenges people have with allowing life is some sense of if I don't control things, if things don't go the way that I want, or at least pretty good, that's going to be a lot of pain. I'm going to be hurt, I'm going to suffer in some way, whether it's physical pain or more often, emotional pain, hardship. And so I think that's why we can have this ball of tension, wanting to control reality, even though we know on some level we can't. And I know you, you do a lot of work with helping people around this, and I'd love to go that way with, with you now. You have any thoughts on. On that?

Absolutely. And it's like there's no question that there's suffering here. I think that is also a part of the allowing to allow that there'll be some amount of suffering in my life experience here. So there's no human being, there's nobody with a pulse that is not going to have some suffering. Losses, change, wanting that's thwarted, that's not fulfilled, imagined and experienced as real needs that are not met and I should have done this and should have done that, and the deep and inherent pain and shame and guilt that's built into all of that. So I know in my own life and the people I've witnessed now thousands and thousands of lives that understand that we're going to create more suffering by trying to avoid suffering. And no sane person wants to suffer, but we're absolutely going to have some. So no sane person wants to see their child sick, for example. And children have sicknesses. They have illness. Every human being has an illness. So if you haven't had one yet, it's not your turn. But it's like there's no one here free of a diagnosis or more of sorts, some kind of ailment, some kind of condition, some kind of issue, some kind of something. And saying that there shouldn't be suffering, that there should not be suffering, or that suffering can be avoided, creates more suffering. Because then we've got the pain of the loss or the pain of something not going the way we imagined, the pain of it not turning out to our dreams. And then we've got this, I shouldn't be suffering, there shouldn't be suffering. I should have got that that should have turned out that way. I could have done that. I should have done so. Then all of that is heaped on top of that. So we're exponentially creating more suffering by opposing suffering versus accepting there's going to be a level of suffering here and I'm equipped for it. I don't have to like it a bit, and I'm equipped for it. So I accept there'll be some times of suffering, and then I'm going to draw on my own innate inherent power, my own innate inherent desire for safety, and create a sense of safety within myself, a sense of power within myself, and a sense of value within myself. That would leave us then less and less seeking power, value, safety, seeking to be somebody, seeking to be okay from anything outside of ourselves, which leaves us in a freer, more liberated life. And then when, when suffering comes, it's like, well, this is unpleasant, this is not. This is not pleasant, and it's not fatal, Even though it may feel at times like it's going to kill us. And it's like, well, there's discomfort here and this is not fatal. This is a part of our human learning experiences. This is a part of relational dynamics. This is a part of professional dynamics. And it's like we get so concerned about we're going to lose a job, and it's like, well, the job was our assignment, I believe it was. We were there for a time. And when that time is up, then some circumstance will take us out of that. So. So that we're then assigned to wherever we're to be next. And if different company, a different profession, a different city, a different family, a different whatever it is. And we get more and more attached, if we're not careful to getting our ducks in a row and getting them all lined up. And it's like, now my ducks are in a row, or spending our life efforting to get ducks in a row, when it's an absolute unattainable task, an absolute impossible task to get all of this lined up, even though the mind is wired for predict and control. Figure it out, predict, get a formula here, and then control that versus have a plan for sure. And have goals and go in the direction of your goals, go and make sensible steps towards your goals for your life and get less and less dependent on them, less and less demanding that it turns out like you're going to. And kind of a practical example of it is people. So I'm often questioned about this. Like, what do you mean you have no goals for your life? Of Course I have goals. Like I have a goal for the airplane that I'm going to fly on on May 1 to take off on time. I have a goal to go to another country. I have a ticket for that. I have reservations for that, of course. But if I get to the airport and that doesn't go that way, if the plane is canceled, the plane is delayed, there's some kind of weather situation or a mechanical situation, I can't let my peace hinge on that because that's the law of the land. Things like this are included here. Changes, breakdowns, mechanical things, weather conditions. For goodness sake, what planet do you live on to think there's not going to be weather conditions here and there? So I don't want my peace hinging on whether my plans hold or not. So then there's more suffering. I've got the suffering of the. Of the trip may have canceled or the trip is delayed. I've got that natural suffering, but now I've got all this suffering of this awfulizing it. Oh, ain't it awful? Ain't it awful? Ain't it awful? And there's a lot more suffering in the awfulizing than there is in this plane is delayed, period. This plane leave tomorrow, period. Or there'll be another plane at 7pm period, which is what's actual and factual and there's just less suffering in it. So it's like living in a. In relationship to life on life's terms and then changing what I can and then creating which what we say in new thought and in the positive thinking world. Is that what I call this. If I call this awful, I'm going to experience it as awful. If I call it tragic then I'm going to experience it as tragic. And if I call it a plane delay, I'm going to experience something less than awful, something better than terror and trauma. So there's real potential here. And it's an absolute radical departure of the 2000 year old inertia that we've been caught up in and how we, how we see this and how we approach with it. So it's a radical departure from the awfulizing to what's actual. This is awfulizing it and this is what actually happened. And then here's the sane, sensible action I took toward meeting it where it is, the way of it.

I love my piece is not going to be hinged upon my plans. And you also mentioned earlier how we're looking for power and value and safety externally and the more that we can source that internally then those two go hand in hand. I'm not trying to get power, safety and value from my plans and so I can be more at peace. And I'd love to explore that one more with you about how we can reclaim that power, value and safety in the moment in our lives even before things go way off course of what we planned. Just the small things the day to day. And then of course that I think can prepare us for the bigger things.

Well, you're right about it. Absolutely right about it. And it's like this, practicing it in the very day to day things that's going to build some stamina for this. It's going to build some groundedness for this. So that when something happens when the winds blow out of left field or when a harsher wind blows in a more intense energy of some sort, I'm not so undone about it. I'm not going to. I'm going to be less and less likely to experience it as though a rug's been pulled out from under me versus I'm going to be able to meet this with a groundedness. I'm going to be able to meet this with innovation, with collaboration, with thoughtfulness, with resourcing. So if and just like a one little example is that I'm looking that I'm dependent on a friend and I find out the friend didn't bring me to their party, they didn't invite me to their party and it's like then I'm dependent on that friend to be a somebody. Then the mind will go off down a hallway to hell that is like they don't love me, they don't respect me, I'm not lovable, I can't trust them. I've been rejected, I've been left out into infinity instead of what actually happened is they didn't invite me to the party and the mind and then a period in there instead of a comma, they didn't invite me to the party, comma. And then all the meaning that we make up follows that comma, which is then I'm not good enough. Something's wrong with me. They owe me, I deserve to go after all I've done for. I mean it just go on and on and on. Versus I'm seeking to be a somebody. I'm drawing myself from another person. So it's like having a pseudo self, a self that's not grounded, a self that's not looking inward for its own self, ability to be a self less and less dependent on others, on relationships, on invitations for that sense of self. So how to go within to have a sense of self. Then I'm free. Whether they invite me or not, I'm free, I'm liberated. So sometimes I'll be invited and sometimes I won't. And that's the way of it. And then my mind then gets clearer, like, well, everyone either. So then I'm going to be less reactive when they're mad about that or upset or frustrated about that because I've had that experience, I can relate to them. I know generally what it was like. And it's like saying that we're dependent without. It's the difference of hearing, oh, I've lost my job, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? Instead of I've lost the job, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? Then the mind is free to go, well, I could tell 10 people, I'm going to send out an email, I'm going to get the resume updated, I'm going to get on these job sites and then it's all about solving that. It's all about closing the gap of that. And there's such a lure, however, to fall off into that awfulizing and to fall off into that, omg, I've lost my job. Instead of, well, of course I've lost a job. It happens to everybody alive sometime in their lifetime. They're not going to have the job they once had. Now it's my turn. And yes, there's grief to it and yes, there's relief to it. Also, most of us look back over the jobs we quit, quote, lost. And we're glad after some time of processing and getting another job, that life spared me from that. So life had its way of getting me out of a situation, you know, into another situation. So it's then the empowerment of that. I'm not looking to the job for my power. I'm not looking for the profession or the career for my power that I'm looking again inside myself for. What would a sane, sensible person do here that wants to be employed, that just got deemployed, unemployed, they just got de hired, so then I can just stay stuck and bound up in that or like I'm off to find a job, which is my goal. That's what's motivating me and that's the same sensible action I'm taking here. And this applies to whether it's power, value or safety. And we, until we have some kind of sense of my dependency on others, jobs, professions, people, relationships, anything is going to be unattainable over time. There's no person, place, relationship, job, company, anything that can ultimately fulfill that. So it's spoken about in almost every faith tradition is like the God, the hole in you, the holy, the hole in you that we're looking to fill and looking in all the wrong places to do that. And it's part of our human nature.

Yeah, that is a great lead to where I was wanting to go next, which was that. So you're describing less reactivity, less awfulizing, less just looking at how it is and then being resourceful and, and creative and adaptive and following that. And I'm wondering there's kind of the self component, self reliance, like I can do this. A willingness to believe in ourselves and bet on ourselves. And then there's. I'm wondering about a bigger component around faith or trust in you said if we're appointed to the right time or place, like sort of what's doing the appointing and how do you use that in your life and with people that you support that bigger force that's guiding or steering, how do you see it? How do you integrate it to give you more of that non reactivity to circumstances that faster surrender perhaps?

Well, it is, it is similar. I do use the word surrender. That's my direct experience of it. It's an acceptance of what I cannot change. And I don't really get in with. When I work with people, I don't get into their theologies or their religions and all of that. I feel like that's very personal. Whatever, however how they see that, whatever they call it. So even if I may use the word God, I'm likely to use the word life or universe or the way of it or creation or creator or mind or universe. So I'm very inclusive about that. I'm very broad spectrum about that. And whatever it is for people, I would say whatever that is breathing you. So we have a breath, a breath comes and goes. So whatever that is, it's the way of it is setting the way of it. So then my relationship with that, my relating to that is the part that I have that says okay, what can I do in this situation? What can I do in this very situation, in this very circumstance? What would be sane, sensible action for me? And the mind has to be trained, reconditioned, rewired, new neural pathways, new synapses that says yes, when things happen, I'm going to look through a different framework of how normal this is instead of how awful this is. So this is a normal occurrence in life. This has been happening since recorded history for 2000, over 2000 years, since the beginning of creation, the same things that are happening today have been happening all that time, and we're still in resistance to it. Like, no, no, no, I want none of that. I want people to be kind all the time. I want 100% kindness in my world, then it's impossible, because then people are going to be Alpha and Omega. They're going to be everything from A to Z. So they'll be kind at times and unkind at times. They'll be respectful at times and disrespectful at times. And then when I'm believing that people ought to be kind to me and they're not kind to me, I don't respond very kindly. If I believe people should be kind and they're not, then I don't respond kindly. So now I've just perpetually, exponentially put more unkindness in the world while I'm preaching and teaching kindness. I haven't lived it out. So I'm not demonstrating in the world. I'm not living in the world the very things I'm claiming to believe in. So it's a cognitive dissonance that says I'm a teacher and a preacher of kindness, but anytime it doesn't show up in my experience, I respond unkindly. So it's then a calling to step back from this, to say, wait a minute, this was pure fantasy. To say we're going to live in a world that's 100% kind all the time, instead of, we live in a world where there will be kindnesses and unkindnesses, there will be drought and flood and everything in between. And my liberation, my peace of mind, my causative use of my mind, the direction of the energy that I have to create is going to be dependent in relation to how much of that I accept instead of demanding kindness all the time. And it's no different, really. It's really quite insane. It would be like saying, I'm only going to inhale. I want no exhales. Ex. Inhaling is better. Inhaling is really good. Exhaling is not so good. No. There's going to be inhale and exhale. There's going to be times they like me and times they don't. Times they include me, and times they don't. Times they want to be close to me, and times they want space from me. Times they will have the understanding of me, and at times they won't be able to comprehend at all what I've just done and the both end of that is where all the power lies. The including. It's not Alpha or Omega, Alpha and Omega. Everything is included. And until we do, we live a victim to the parts of it that we say we don't want or that we've set up as bad or wrong or unfortunate. So there's some real invitation here to say, okay, what would it be like? What would it be like? How would I be in life differently? Which means then how would I be in a job search differently if I didn't, if I wasn't dependent on them hiring me, if I wasn't dependent on them liking me, if I wasn't dependent on them understanding me, Then they say, no, Martha, you're not what we're looking for. And it's like, great, I don't know where it is yet, but I know where it is not. So don't know who's going to hire me, but I know who ain't going to hire me. So then I'm off to the next. And that will disable us if we get too caught up in that. It's like, oh my God, I got turned down, I got rejected. And then feelings of abandonment. I'm not good enough, there's something wrong with me. Then here comes the all the reservoir of that that's been suppressed, depressed, disowned, disintegrated, denied for millennia instead of it. What actually happened is I applied for a job and I wasn't a match according to their thinking.

And what, what I love about this is there's, it makes me think about this. There's a certain kind of. There's like faith and then there's almost like an immature version. Maybe it's not even really faith, it's something else. Maybe it needs a different word, but it's kind of like, you know, I want things to go my way and if I, if I pray right or if I'm good, then things will go my way. Sort of almost like a bartering with the divine force. And then there's, you know, this, this alignment with how things are unfolding, how it goes, that I didn't get the job. And what, what fascinates me is that, that the way, the way of it as you described, which I love, it seems to be so beyond my personal desire for whatever pleasure, success, being somebody, getting what I want in the timeframe that I want. And this was exemplified. I just watched this, it's a two minute clip on YouTube of a cheetah at the edge of a little pond somewhere out in grasslands of Africa. And the water is completely immobile, completely still. Just a little bit of ripples of wind, but there's nothing, no indication. I watched the clip several times and out of the water, right as the cheetah is drinking, emerges this gigantic crocodile that's just like lightning. Quick strikes exactly where it needs to with its mouth and pulls it in the water. And the whole thing is done in five seconds. And standing right near there is the cheetah's mother as a cub, it was a year old cub. And the cheetah, she just kind of looks at the water and paces back and forth and then walks away. And just watching that, I just thought, wow, you know, this thing, this, this space that we're in, it is so much bigger and so beyond. I just, I took it as a, as a kind of a. Sometimes there's like a warm fuzzy faith and then sometimes there's like a little bit of a smack upside the head faith, you know, God grabbing you by the ankles and shaking you upside down and just being like, whoa, there's something so much bigger here. And so I can use faith, almost, quote unquote as a way to almost resist. You know, like, no, it's not going right, I'm going to steer it the right way, or you know, alignment to the dao, to the way of it. And that's what's emerging as you're talking here, is how skillful can we become, how swiftly can we relent and get in alignment with what is so. Because then we can ask the question, okay, this is so what now? What next?

Which is a very powerful question. That's a very powerful question, like, what's next? And I love that you saw that video. And I see it in my mind. See, even as you describe it, I've just seen the video. That's what the mind does. It'll make up images. So now, without looking at the video, I've actually seen it in the video of my mind and in that example, then it's like, who's the victim there?

Hmm?

The alligator doing its nature, doing what it's hardwired for, which is to keep something out of the water and then to eat whatever it can find. So it's like, then we say, oh no, the poor cheetah, the poor baby cheetah. It's like, that's a victim there versus this is the natural unfolding, the way of it. This is the circle of life and it includes life and death and birth and death and illness and wellness. And you've Nailed it, honey. As far as I can tell, with this notion of what we generally call faith is a fantasy based, fairy tale based three year old perspective on faith, which is God, life, universe is a Santa Claus and if I'm a good, good girl, then I'll get what I want. And then somewhere over time we see that that's not the way of it, that I don't, I don't know what's good for me, what I, what I got that didn't feel good to me turned out to be not as bad as I thought it was, or there was something better for me that I didn't even have in mind. And until we grow ourselves up in this. So this hope, most of the hope, faith, what, whatever words you would use for it is based on this mentality that it's going to go my way, which is a three year old mentality of I'm going to get what I want in life, I'm going to get what I want from life. And then anytime I don't get what I want, anytime it does not go my way, then I am mad, sad, upset, resigned, apathetic, irritated, frustrated. So then I'm putting that very energy of that back into the world, back into the world instead of saying I'm going to grow myself up, which accepts there'll be times I get exactly what I wanted, there'll be times I did not, do not get exactly what I wanted. And then I'm going to get what I want and then I don't want it anymore. And then I don't get what I want. And I got something that I hadn't even thought of, that I liked. So it's far more complex, far more mysterious than that. And you know, I believe that our hope, our grounded hope, an actual hope, requires us to include hopelessness and that our faith is in what is. The only faith there is, actual faith is in what is. So then until I'm willing to have faith in what is, that there's going to be drought and flood and everything in between, that everybody I know will absolutely die. There's nobody that makes it out of here alive. So I have faith that they're going to live, faith that they're going to live, faith that they're going to live and then they die. It's like, no, my faith has to be in that they're going to die. So I can't count on them living infinitely. When the law of the land, the way of it says no, everybody will die in a time, in a time. So Then my faith is off. If I continue to believe that they're going to live on and on and on. So it's not actual faith, it's delusion, absolute delusion, than to say the only faith there is in then is what actually happens. So then the hope that we speak of, the hope is not a grounded hope. It could be a hope, you know, that it will anything. Like we just make up something. I hope this will happen. And it's like, well, it could. The opposite of it could also happen too. So the only trust there is that I'm trusting somebody's going to be honest with me all the time. It's like, well, that's impossible. We're not even honest with ourselves all the time. We're not honest with others all the time. So if I keep saying I'm only going to trust people that 100% tell me the truth, then eventually there won't be anybody because it's absolutely unattainable, impossible versus actual trust is in. I trust human beings are going to do what human beings do. I trust whatever happened is a part of the human learning process. And it's a much more grown up, mature, grounded way of being with life than this. I want it this way. I demand it to be this way. It better be this way. If it's not this way, I'm going to be mad, sad, upset, frustrated. Instead of like, I'm gonna have madness, I'm gonna have sadness, I'm gonna be frustrated at times, gonna be irritated at times. Of course. And there's another option for me, which was your question, which is a powerful one, then what am I gonna do now? And just like the mother cub, the mother of the cub, what am I gonna do now? Off I go to feed what babies are left to look for a mate, to make another baby, to rest, to sob, to cry to whatever I need to do in relation to what just happened.

And I'm curious, do you. So one way that I've heard that people deal with this, I mean, what you're laying out is sort of like, these are the facts with any level of, of clear seeing what you're saying is absolutely what seems to be verified when we just look around. And so what we see that there is a way of things that we don't have total control and we can hope and we can wish, and sometimes we get it, sometimes we don't. And you know, one philosophy around that is that there is. Everything is unfolding in some way that is for the greater good. And so if I Didn't get that job. That's because there's something else that I'm steered towards. There's a purpose behind it. There's something behind it, whether that's a personal purpose for us, guiding us on our individual path or journey through this human experience, or a grand design in which we're little pieces in a symphony that's way beyond us, that we can't even maybe comprehend. And so there's an orchestration that's not even about our own personal pleasure, but something bigger. We're being used in a way for this greater design. And people might call that divine intelligence. And I'm curious, do you perceive the world through that lens or not? Or how do you see that?

Well, I think the way I understand the way you put it is if it's a yes or no answer, it's like, yes. And I generally believe that. I generally experience it as that. And that we have. The mind is active in laying out what it thinks it wants. And it may or may not be true. And the mind will lay out. I want her to apologize. I want her to apologize. I want her to apologize. And I'm not going to be happy until she does. It's like, so be it. Then the apology doesn't come and you get to be unhappy all the way to your grave. Or I can give up the wanting her to do what she's not doing. I can accept the apology is not coming. And, oh, by the way, if I want her to apologize, guess whose job it is to apologize? So I'm not willing to do what I'm demanding that she does. So then we even say, the universe is withholding something from me, or the universe is shaking me by the heels, or the universe has turned me upside down. It's like it's me doing that.

Yeah. Something makes me think of the idea, like, oh, this is tearing me apart. And it's kind of like, well, if we let go, it wouldn't tear you apart.

Absolutely. Which is a powerful answer to that question. Like, what's another option for me here besides suffering through this? It's like to let go of this, to surrender this. And it's like, who. Who would I be then if I didn't want what I'm not getting? Who would I be in this situation if I accepted that this is the terms of it, this is the way of it for now in this situation, this is the way it's unfolded, then there's going to be less suffering there. Then there's no big bad universe out there. No big bad monster, no big bad Santa Claus that didn't deliver my wish list. For me, it's like, no, it's a more mature understanding of the mystery of life. And then for me, my greatest spiritual practice is accepting the mystery of it. Like, it's not to be understood. It's not to be figured out. It's not. It's certainly not to be controlled, but to say that I accept the mystery of this. So then I stopped trying to make sense out of things that do not make sense or to try to understand what is not to be understood. So it's more of a mystic's view of it that says, look, there's like, I can't even comprehend what's going on here. And I get little glimpses of it, and it's enough to keep me from getting dependent on it turning out any specific way.

This is beautiful. I love this. I have one. One more question, then we can hear if there's ways that people could learn more from you. The question would be, I know that we're talking a lot in here about acceptance, surrender, and I know you are a fan of David Hawkins and his work, and he teaches a lot about surrender, and I've talked about that on this show as well. I'm curious when it comes to the actual practice of this, because there's sort of an agreement, perhaps people might have, as they're listening, like, yeah, that sounds sane more than what we might do. How do you practice that? Is it because there's sort of a. Can be a getting out of the head and focusing on the sensation of the feeling in the body and being with that. And I'd just love to hear any thoughts because I know you've practiced it a lot. Help other people with it. I'm always curious about subtle things that I can keep learning about how to really just practice this in the moment.

Well, the answer's complex, too, honey. A thousand ways. And I've. I've done. In the. In the very first pages of Dot, one of Dr. Hawkins books, letting Go, the Pathway to Surrender, he lays out four or five pages of these antics that we've tried. And it's funny. We ought to do it again. If you ever want to do this, we'll put it on the podcast. Just all of these things we've tried, instead of letting go, instead of surrender. So the actual mechanism, the process itself, is to, when a feeling arises, to turn toward the feeling, not away from it. So stop suppressing, depressing, disowning, disintegrating, or Even expressing it, and to stop correlating the feeling to somebody caused it, to stop correlating the feeling within a situation or a circumstance or that's what happened back there. That's what happened in my childhood. So to stop interpreting the feeling and just allow the feeling to be what it is and to literally then allow the feeling space to rise and pass. So feelings arise and pass, sensations in the body arise and pass, and we get so frightened and scared of them, try to control them, resist, suppress, depress, disown, and the neurosis and all sorts of things are effects of that. I also work at the level of the mind. So Byron Katie's work, for example, which is considered cognitive behavioral therapy, looks at the thought I'm having. She doesn't love me, she doesn't care about me, and questions, is that thinking true? So this is a way back to surrender. Can I absolutely know just because she yelled that she doesn't care about me? Can I absolutely know that to be true? It's like woman yelled, period. But if I don't get the period in there, then woman yelled, and there's something wrong with me. Woman yelled, I'm not good enough. Some woman yelled, I'm not safe with her. So it's like, okay, well, what's the consequences? I keep believing this, and then who would I be if I simply didn't believe she doesn't care about me because of the yelling? Well, I'd be confident, free, calmer, more resourceful. I'd be certainly more compassionate. Compassionate. I'd be understanding what it's like when people yell, what kind of shape I'm in when I yell. I'd be integrative, I'd be inclusive. So there's a whole new world that exists if I simply don't resist what is happening. So I approach it through this, working with thoughts and the thoughts as cause and feelings as effect. I also approach it as feelings or cause because a feeling of sadness will go out and dredge every time I've had that feeling and will correlate all that thinking to it. So one feeling can take us into a deep dive of a reservoir of unquestioned thinking. So I approach it from both ways. I also use breath, work and taking a breath, calming breaths, and everything that I've ever learned or been taught to pause and presence myself before I respond. Martha Creek's three P's pause, presence myself, then proceed. Which leaves me in a higher part of my brain, less regressive, more than resourceful, more choosing how do I want to be in this situation, what would be sensible action here? So I'm actually then with that pause and presencing myself or pause and praying or whatever you want to say there, then I have a whole new world available to me as far as how I can respond to this instead of be so knee jerkish in my reaction to this. So there's a lot of answers to that question about how I do it. And it stems from a lifetime spent at a laboratory of seeing what's effective and what's not. And I am all about expressing it. I'm also about not expressing it at times. So I want to have space and time for big emotional expressions and safe anger work and grief and wailing and also want to be able to bear those big emotions and the intensities of those big emotions and feelings and not express them all the time either. So it's a spectrum of practice and a spectrum of approaches and I'm still learning and I'm still willing to try anything that I think can be effective or more effective than what I've done.

Yeah, that's a fitting answer for a life that's seen as this is a laboratory. Right. And a student to keep learning, to keep growing. And there's always refinements. And I also love how it's of course it's going to be varied and I think sometimes we want a simple, we'll always do X. It's like, well, yeah, intellect doesn't work and then we got to have many other approaches. And I really appreciate there's so much that you're sharing with us in the words, but also your wisdom and your life experience comes through. So thank you for being with us today. And if people would like to learn more from you, I know you teach in a variety of ways. What's the simplest way for people to learn more from you?

Thank you for having me today too. It's a pleasure. And as I said it, it fulfills my goal, my own vision for my life, which is to serve those who are serving and to get empowered teachings out to the whole of the world. So this is a portal to that. So all of you listeners then just know that someone's caring about you with you here as a fellow human being on this journey. And you can contact me for any reason@marthacreek.com Martha Creek.com My phone number's there, the email's there, free podcast, videos, coursework, workshops, how to be in touch with me is all there and you're welcome to it.

Beautiful. And we'll have that link as well below at Shrink for the shy guy. If you just go to the website there, you'll see the link to click too. So thank you again, Martha. Pleasure.

All blessings. Thank you also. You're welcome.

That brings us to the end of the interview. But of course, there's one more thing we got to do before we go. Time for action. Action, action. Your action step today is going to be to look at where in your life are you in resistance? What are you fighting against? That was a big theme in the interview was acceptance and was sort of the insanity of the fighting and the resistance. You know, one thing that really stood out to me is this humbling in a really beautiful way of like, it's not like life is supposed to go my way. It's like life is going the way it goes, and I want to align myself with it so that I can steer, so that I can navigate, so that I can, you know, whatever I want to do. You know, contribute, serve, impact, connect, love, grow, experience, amazing things. Like, so if I'm fighting life, I'm spending a lot of energy. So it really highlighted that for me. And then I started to think about that, where am I fighting right now? Where are you fighting life? Is there a relationship? Is there a physical challenge? Is there social experience? Is there an anxiety? Is it a feeling? And as Martha was saying, you don't have to love it, and it's here. So can you let go of the resistance? And I highly recommend checking out Martha's work. She's got online classes and other things to help people with this. But just as a first preliminary action step right now, what's the one thing that comes to my mind that I'm resisting a lot right now? Make an intention to find your way to acceptance, to letting go, to surrendering. Just see what that opens up for you in your life. Beautiful. Thanks for being with me and with Martha today. 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. 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.

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Sam.