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Rick Archer: Welcome to Buddha at the Gas Pump. My name is Rick Archer and my guest this week is Martha Creek. And I met Martha a couple of months ago when she came to my town of Fairfield, Iowa, and did a very lovely session on the work by Byron Katie. Martha is a certified facilitator for the work, and most people listening probably will have heard of Byron Katie. In fact, about six months or so ago, I filled out this long detailed form on Byron Katie’s website submitted, asking to do an interview and they turned me down, but maybe after I’ve done you’ll, you’ll, you’ll kind of like be a stepping stone. Interview Byron, Katie, rather, Martha is also serving unity churches. She’s in a ministry serving unity churches, and over the last week or two I’ve listened to a number of audios of Martha, both in her capacity as a Byron Katie facilitator and as a Unity Church advisor. And also I’ve just started listening to a very nice teleclass she gave on Eckhart Tolle his book, new heaven and new earth. And all this stuff is available on Martha’s website, which I’ll be linking to from my website after this interview, and anyone listening can download it all and listen themselves. So welcome, Martha, and thanks for this opportunity.
Martha Creek: Thank you, Rick. I’m blessed to do it and just delight at what may come to us and through us, and I believe it’s a blessing for the world, what you do and what you are. And that’s my mission to to serve humanity. So here we go.
Rick Archer: Here we go. So one thing I heard in listening to you talk to various people and do some interviews is that you were born in bug tussle Kentucky, is that right?
Martha Creek: That’s right. That’s on the border of Tennessee, near just a rock throw over from Tennessee. It’s smack in the middle of the state. And it’s where the Beverly Hillbillies came from. So I have a claim to fame.
Rick Archer: You are on it. But you didn’t strike oil.
Martha Creek: We haven’t yet. And I’m really I’m really open to that.
Rick Archer: I wonder who named the town they must have seen a couple of bugs tussling?
Martha Creek: And that report and we had T shirts for a few years when I was kids that showed the tussle bugs and they’re actually dung beetles. Figure that out. tussling right along that’s that’s the reports.
Rick Archer: Oh totally means they were fighting with each other right? The bugs are just be
Martha Creek: this was more like dung beetles, which was rolling dung to do whatever they do with that.
Rick Archer: Okay, good. Is when I first heard the name of that was Beatles weren’t loving what is you know if they if they had such a difference of opinion that they had a town named after it?
Martha Creek: Just like humanity or not, I think what is yet most of
Rick Archer: us. So you know, I don’t imagine that in bug tussle Kentucky there was a great wealth of opportunities for spiritual unfoldment Oh, there must have been local churches and all that you attended as a child. So maybe we could sketch out the course of your you know, your spiritual trajectory.
Martha Creek: Yeah, you’re right about it. There was a lot of churches, actually churches on every corner and my family didn’t go to church, I was just really called to go to church. And I remember at three years old declaring out loud that I’m going to be a minister. And it was very frightening, startling and shocking to my family because a women are not ministers. And B, there was no indicator that you would just self ordain. So it’s like, there was no way no path to be seen about how that could actually be accomplished. And I got the neighbors to take me to church, I was that strongly called to go to church and define that and I had some radar about people as well and some distinct memories as a child about not wanting to be in certain churches. And it wasn’t anything to do with the teaching. It was more to do with the people that were there. And I had I had some kind of strange vibes from certain people that I found out later was really right on that it was one particular man for example that was actually molesting his children. And as a Even as a child, I had some awareness about that. And he was the minister of the church or oppression was, he was a deacon, a deacon in the church. So like a lead of the church. Yeah. And I just kept looking around, I just asked him to, I got other neighbors that was going to other churches to come and get me so, and I had a very strong conviction about what was reality, which I now call God, What was God, what is God and what what is the reality of God. So even though I was hearing certain things, teachings through the church, and their beliefs, I was very strongly convicted to my own. And I took the parts that seemed to work for me. And I knew I didn’t lose myself. In those teachings, I say, really true to what I believed.
Rick Archer: Even this is when your young child 5678 years old, yes, even so interesting. But I didn’t have a clue at that age, any of this and I had to be dragged a church kicking and screaming each Sunday. And what was your conviction or what God was at that point?
Martha Creek: I believe God is good. God is good at it. We’re a spark of that, so that we’re inherently good. And we lose track of that we lose awareness of that. And then through that lack of awareness, and we do very strange things based on what we’re seeking, outside of ourselves, and actually believing that it’s possible to find it outside of ourselves. And that it’s the reality is, it’s it’s who we are what we are all of what we are, and that to look inward, and to connect and commune with the essence of who we are really works and to look outside of ourselves and to distract ourselves outside of ourselves leads us down some very interesting paths that are mostly painful and very confusing. So even
Rick Archer: as a young child, you had that conviction that that that God was to be found within.
Martha Creek: Yes, and that God was all omnipotent, always present. And some in really enjoyed that as a child, just the elements, the Earth, the wind, the the smells, that whatever was here that I had some kind of notion that it was for me, that it that it was a gift to me that the gift of life was precious, and that it that it was all for me.
Rick Archer: And you must not have read that or even been told that by anybody, this is just something that you innately knew, is that
Martha Creek: right? That’s, that’s how I would say it are like I did fine idea. And that, and I didn’t, I didn’t, from a thought like that I didn’t vary from it, I actually believed it and then stayed true to believing that the first scriptures i read were from the Bible that was given to me by a Sunday school teacher. And she just gave all of her Sunday school children a Bible and actually read the Bible a bit. And I was drawn to things like Psalms and certain parables and stories that seemed to support what I was believing. So I found quickly, you know, and probably at age 10, or 12, I found some, what I considered a substantial indicators that what I was believing was was true, based on how I interpreted what the Bible said,
Rick Archer: that’s nice. I mean, there are certain spiritual teachers and authorities who have said that the purpose of Scripture is not to sort of just give you a, you know, a package of beliefs that you should, you know, just accept blindly, but rather, they should be a sort of a confirmation thing to, you know, confirm and, and supplement what you’re actually experiencing, you know,
Martha Creek: yeah. And that’s, that was my experience. And it was, it was a very solid teaching for me to the way that it was presented, the stories that were told the parables were very meaningful to me. So it was a it was easy for me fairly easy for me to integrate that like this is a this is solid ground here, like, this is the way to live.
Rick Archer: Was there a fair amount of fire and brimstone being thrown at you at the same time?
Martha Creek: There there was, and I found it interesting. And I didn’t have any effect of that. I don’t recall ever being afraid of that. I simply did not believe it,
Rick Archer: essentially. And you said it’s cool that you’re such a young child, you were you had that level of discrimination that you were able to kind of separate the wheat from the chaff and, you know, take what you need and leave the rest.
Martha Creek: Yeah, it got interesting too, because I was known as being like a fearless child. That things didn’t really frighten me. And even to the point of I, I didn’t believe in death. I don’t believe that death is the end of anything. So I had less identification than some. And I remember an example of that is my father was very much afraid of fire, and the thoughts of fire and then of storms and tornadoes and wind and things and he would wake us up as a child, our family and asked us to go to the cellar, which is an underground place that fruit was stored a canned fruit and vegetables for the second coming. And I want I just when he woke me up one time to go, I just set out, I’m not gonna go,
Rick Archer: was there a storm coming? Or was he just Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Martha Creek: And it was a strong enough No, for lack of a better way of putting it that he didn’t question me. He didn’t try to convince me. And what happened instead is from that day forward, this family never went in that cellar. Again. Interesting. You
Rick Archer: kind of set the trend? I did? Or it did. Yeah. A lot of times when I hear stories like this, you know, like your proclivities of, you know, with such a clear conception of what God is, and such a strong conviction, and then your father’s fear of fire and tornadoes, and I can’t help but think of past lives, you know, with, you know, certain tendencies ingrained in us that we bring into this one.
Martha Creek: Yeah. And I’m open to that, too. I don’t have any explanation for it. And that, that seems right to me. I don’t explore. I’ve been very open to past lives. I’ve had several people to offer their insights about past lives I’ve had and all that. And I find it very interesting. And it even seems right meaningful to me. And I don’t spend much time examining that, because this life is a full time job.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s just it’s sort of an interesting theory, but I wouldn’t dwell on it too much, myself, either. So as you moved into your teenage years, did you get into any of the usual teenage confusion and, you know, crisis you just cruised through? Hmm,
Martha Creek: I did. And I was just an old soul considered wise, I recall a people even my high school principal went, there’s a story about us having a fire drill in our school and we went out, we had to evacuate for the drill. And it was almost over. And our next period, our next class period was basketball. And that was my real love sports and activities and things. And I just had an idea, let’s go on and get dressed, you know, and get ready for basketball, because this is going to be overrun a little bit. So when we went back in the building, we didn’t report to the class that we had left, we were now ready for the next class. And the principal came over the intercom and actually said these words, would Martha Creek and her little congregation, please come to the office. So that that’s kind of an indicator of that, that there was a following of some sort that there was a calm about me, and, and something that was attracted to people that that that was not afraid. And that was what they would call very positive thinking, even Pollyanna ish, and things like that, that that was the way I was living my life out.
Rick Archer: And I just said that, because I’m sorry, go ahead.
Martha Creek: I recall asking my mother wants as you’ve never told me what time to be home, I found that so shocking that people were told what time to come home, and I wasn’t. And she said, I would have never had to tell you what time to come home. Like because you just came. I just went home.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I was funny that you, Brent, you brought up that story about your little congregation, because I was going to ask you whether, you know, having such strong convictions and you know, really being different than people in many respects is not many people think that way made you sort of an oddball who didn’t have many friends. But now you’re saying it actually attracted people to you?
Martha Creek: Yes, yes, it was the opposite of that. And I was a friends with people that it didn’t make sense to be friends, too. So there was I didn’t have gender kind of issues. I didn’t have socio economic things, I felt as comfortable with somebody that had so called everything. As someone who didn’t have too much, I felt a very sense of very much a sense of equality, and oneness with people that really didn’t make any sense.
Rick Archer: Did you find yourself coming to the defense of kids who are being picked on and you know, that kind of thing that happens in high school?
Martha Creek: I did. And in a calmer way, though. It was more like a mediator. You know, and just and and there’s, there’s evidences of that of, of actually breaking up scuffles and fights and things. And it was very easy for me it there was never any question about whether to do it. It was just like walking in and going. Stop this. And I didn’t, I didn’t have any kind of setup in my mind. That one was right or one was wrong, or somebody caused it. It was just like, stop this here. So it was like what a teacher or somebody trained would have done and I did it. I just did it as a child and there’s a story about my uncle. We lived and worked on a farm and we worked in tobacco and going up this windy road to the tobacco Back of field one day, that my brother driving a tractor, the tractor hit a tree jarred the wagon, my uncle fell off the wagon, under the tractor wheel, the tractor rolled back on top of his body, I jumped off the wagon and held the tractor wheel and kind of took my foot and raked him out from under it. And then turned around, and I was 10 or 12 years old. And I looked around at everybody there and said, you do this, you do that you go get the car, you help me pick him up, you and then we loaded him in the car, I looked at the driver, which was my mother and said, drive him directly to this hospital, do not stop for anything, just get him straight to there. And looking back on that it’s like it would make no sense that you’re running, like triage for something when you’re a kid, so to speak. And I just had a sense of calm in a sense of a clarity of my mind that’s not fogged over, or kind of whacked out in in some kind of crisis situation like that. That was I was able to have a presence and functioning about me that have no words to express the gratitude for
Rick Archer: oh, it’s very, yeah, very fortunate. And you’re not saying that you had like superhuman strength, like they hear mothers lifting cars off their children, you stop the tractor by virtue of that, you’re just saying that you just kind of had a lot of presence of mine, and were able to sort of orchestrate the
Martha Creek: Yes. So it was so it was not superhuman, just enough that you could actually stop a tractor from rolling just with my strength. I’m a big and strong person.
Rick Archer: Yeah, but a 12 year old girl can’t stop a tractor, you know by Well,
Martha Creek: it’s the tractor was stopped. It was just rolling. So
Rick Archer: you know, you’re able to apply enough force to keep on rolling. Yeah, brother.
Martha Creek: Yes, yes. Yeah, yes. So not I don’t consider it superhuman, though. Did you question it? It was more like a common sense. Something if your minds clear enough to actually see like, see that and then respond in that way? Hmm.
Rick Archer: So it sounds like you never went through a 60s drug phase, like many of us did.
Martha Creek: How was born in 1960? Oh,
Rick Archer: you’re much too young for? Well, it’s actually the drugs phase started then and never stopped really? So. But it sounds like you missed it.
Martha Creek: Well, and the truth is, I’ve never taken a drug. I’ve never had a drug. Like, I’ve had Advil or Yeah, something like that rarely, and nothing. Nothing really outside of that.
Rick Archer: That’s great. I’m saying it’s great. Because this is stuff that I I mean, a lot of what you’re saying is the antithesis of who I was, and what I went through when I was a kid and a teenager and everything else. So it’s refreshing to hear somebody who managed to bypass all that. Well.
Martha Creek: And it was, it’s interesting, because it didn’t really come to me to do it. And then when when I would actually consider it, it was like the answer was just a solid, no, inside of me. Yes, is a no. And I’ve rationalized it back then by is, I was had a lot of energy and would often, you know, didn’t sleep very much naturally. And if there was a substance of some sort that would extend that, that I felt like I would be highly addictive to something if I could actually find something that was that where I didn’t have to sleep at all, that sleeping was such a drag to me, as there were so much I wanted to do and be so much life to have. And that was the thought really that stopped me from doing it all the times is that if there was really some power and some drug that would prevent me from sleeping, that I would probably be highly addicted to that. And yeah, that seemed like a good enough reason not to do it. It didn’t have any real moral or ethical considerations. I didn’t I never saw it as that. It was really just more practical.
Rick Archer: Yeah. I mean, ultimately, I think all all boils down to physiological considerations with those things, and it has very serious diminishing returns. Couple of days, you might not have slept, and then you’d pay for it.
Martha Creek: Yeah, I feel like I feel really blessed about that, that we’ve all got our things, you know, what our crazy confused thinking will take us to and I felt like that that was Grace in some way that that just wasn’t my thing.
Rick Archer: So at what point did you, you know, start actively pursuing actual spiritual practices of some kind, because I know you’ve been through.
Martha Creek: Yeah, even as a child, I can feel like I prayed daily meditated. I read the Bible. I had a reference for what was how I wanted to live who I’ve come here to be. And then as an adult, I started exploring things of transcendental meditations and I went to Mystery Schools and I’ve done various rituals and practices and things over the years and still ongoing in that loving what is is actually a spiritual practice for me letting what is questioning the inquiry of the mind is a meditation. And it’s, it’s the, it’s the most significant spiritual practice that I’ve had. Because it absolutely works for me 100% of the time, and 100% of the situations, and in my belief, it will work for 100% of people that really do want to open their mind and really do want to get to the other side to see what the truth is,
Rick Archer: shall we get into that now? Is there anything of significance in your kind of biological, autobiographical account here that, you know, such as some of these practices and all that real highlights that are worth mentioning?
Martha Creek: Some find it interesting for comes from that three year commit three year old commitment I made when I was 40 years old, I’d had I had quite a success in the world as far as corporate life and startup businesses and achievement and all that, and I was absolutely committed to and all that when I turned 40, which was in the year 2000. So I started a bigger search for spiritual groundedness and even seminaries, I looked at seminaries and where I’m going to go get official training, and credentialing to be a minister, when I was 40. So I left what is what most people would work their whole life to achieve and a half in the way of title and position and money. I left it just clean a clean break from that at age 40. To go do what I felt like what was my life’s calling to do. And I felt like every single thing I’d done in my life, though, was preparing me for for what I was going to do when I was 40. And even though I was in a corporate environment, I always felt like I was applying spiritual principles which I attributed to the success that I had, as a result of, of living and out and from a spiritual realm that I was approaching everything from that way.
Rick Archer: That’s great. So you, essentially, you were able to retire at about 40. And, you know, and begin to dedicate yourself to your your true love and life.
Martha Creek: It’s true. Yeah. And then I started studying mediation skills, conflict resolution, and that really came from looking around in the in these ministries and these organizations, not just churches, but in organizations. And what I saw as a lack of preparedness that people had, particularly ministers, and spiritual people in these organizations that they’re there, they were not prepared for what was what was going on in the field. And including myself, I had a naivete about that that was shocking to me, that I thought if I could have the success that I’d had in the corporate world, that by the time I got into these deeper spiritual venues and organizations like churches, where we’re all such nice people, and spiritual people that it was going to be like, you know, just just so amazing ease and flow. And it was the opposite of that. So I was really not even shocked about what woundedness apparent woundedness and, and distress and suffering and insanity that exist even even in our churches and what it was like for leaders to to try to navigate that. And so that became my ministry that I started studying these practices, taking these practices, including a conflict resolution, mediation skills, communication skills, and more effective ways of being together, particularly when the heat’s turned up. And when we’re in crisis situations are not getting what we want to actually be with them with a great deal more presence and functioning than what I’ve seen people be able to do.
Rick Archer: And at what point did you finally meet Byron, Katie?
Martha Creek: I’d say around 2004. I don’t I don’t have much of a reference for time or years. Seven years ago, maybe. Yeah. And I actually invited her to come to Louisville, Kentucky, and she was not available to teach to do a workshop to lead and facilitate a workshop. And I got a very clear inner message that was you do whatever you want Byron Katie to do. So I started teaching workshops and seminars straight away without any training whatsoever. Other work on the work and NSA training, like I mean, formal training, I was practiced in the work it was a spiritual practice for me. I’d read the book several times.
Rick Archer: Had you been to see her at this point on some?
Martha Creek: No, no, I’ve never never seen her until then. And after doing the workshops and seminars myself and facilitating people like really sitting with people facilitating them, I’ve actually went to the school, the nine day school and then I’ve been back five or six or more times since then and other weekend intensives and, and various other ways of working with her to move the work out in the world and and still do that still will do them.
Rick Archer: So, you know, you’ve you’ve had quite a potpourri of different practices and things you’ve looked into and explored, what is it about the work that you know makes it for you, you know, the best thing or the, you know, the most effective teaching,
Martha Creek: and it works 100% of the time. It doesn’t cost anything, it requires no devices, it requires no person, it doesn’t have any dependency on another person. And it is just four simple questions. Even one of the four simple questions actually taken in and answered has the power to, to clear the mind.
Rick Archer: Even the title of her first book loving what is if all you read was that title, you can get quite a quite a bit of benefit out of it, I think, if you understand what she means, but
Martha Creek: Well, I think that’s right, Rick. And I think there’s also an even for me, there’s there’s some appall at the at the title also, like loving what he is, is too hard, Martha, loving what is just too hard. You’re asking too much of me in a I’m not asking anything of anybody. And do I love what he is? Seldom, rarely, often I don’t. And I’m closer to loving what is and I’ve ever been in my life. So I think it’s a direction that I’m headed in. And I think it’s lofty to think that we go from living from these aeons old ways of being in the suffering we’ve seen since recorded history too loving what it is. And it’s it’s for me, it’s not a spontaneous arrival somewhere. But it’s absolutely a direction that I’m moving in. And the more I practice, and the more I question what I’m thinking then, the more I love what is and at least I’m neutral to what is.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I think people when they first hear that title, or that phrase, might think, oh, what does that mean? You love rape? You know, you love Auschwitz. You know, you love malaria? I mean, there’s there’s all kinds of horrible things in this world that why would there? Why would anyone want to love them, you know that they should be opposed? They should be fought, they should be changed, you know, they should be cured. If Roosevelt and Churchill had just said, Oh, he said of love what not what Hitler was doing, we’ll just kind of let him do his thing. The world would have been a very different place today. So perhaps you could, you know, respond to that objection. I’m sure it’s not a very informed one if one really understands what the work is all about, but it’s an objection, which I’m sure you’ve heard before. It is
Martha Creek: routine. And so it’s a question not of Me of whether I love it or not. It simply is what is. So I don’t love rape or war yet. And I understand that it’s what it is. And opposing it creates more of it, it perpetuates itself. So to the degree that I hate war, that I make war on war mongers, I make war on people that do war, and that will not end the war in the world to do that. Doesn’t mean that if you are about to shoot somebody, and I can actually stop you shooting somebody, I absolutely would. And it not because it’s right or wrong, because I’d hate to see you do that to yourself. You shooting someone, I would hate to have to live with it myself, I’d hate to be the killer. So then I believe that that would be hard on you, too. So if I can stop it, I will. And it’s, it’s not I don’t run the world yet. So I can’t do what I cannot do. And I’ve learned from working with people that have been raped. Just this week, actually, just a few nights ago, a lady said that she was raped and abused. And when I asked a simple question, like I was raped and abused, speaking for her, what does that mean? You were raped and abused. And that means that and she said, I’m worthless. I’m worthless. There’s something wrong with me. And then the tear start, because even after the pain of the rape and the abuse are over 40 years of that the pain has not is all over. And the deep pain, the pain, that’s what’s really running our show, is caused by a thought that we’ve not questioned like I’m worthless, or there’s something wrong with me, I don’t deserve love,
Rick Archer: as he’s piling an interpretation on top of something which doesn’t need to be there
Martha Creek: ever. And that’s really the pain and suffering. So even a concept from your, what you just share with horrible things happen in the world. It’s like, we’ve made that up. We’ve looked at everything we don’t agree with and said it’s horrible. When we don’t get our way we say that’s horrible. Now that’s us calling it that. So when we give it a meaning, that is horrible than we get the experience of horrible and until we question that what good has come out of it. What good is the universe’s Family, if God is good, then what good has come from those horrible things. And then it sends the mind in a different direction that does not deny that that was horrible, or that we wouldn’t have preferred that we certainly wouldn’t want that in anybody’s life. And the reality is, it’s here it occurs. And it’s been happening since recorded history. And we’re still telling ourselves things like it shouldn’t happen. It shouldn’t have happened. And to the degree that we oppose reality, we lose reality rules like it or not, and were then disabled paralyzed, mortal, FIDE, afraid, panicked, terrorized, shut down, powerless, pitiful, victimized, fill in the blank as a result of believing a concept like
Rick Archer: that. But I presume this doesn’t disempower a person. If you were a doctor, for instance, it would not mean that you will not eliminate your motivation to say go to Africa and help people who are suffering from AIDS or malaria or something, you might throw your self totally into that. Right. Yeah,
Martha Creek: I mean, exactly. That’s exactly it. Rick, it’s the opposite of disempowerment, it’s like your mind is clear, you’ve got all the energy that we have spent arguing with what is 100% of that energy can be put toward doing something about what we can do something about and if it’s people that are hungry, feed them, if it’s people that are distressed, give them a blanket, apply medicine to them. So we were then freed up to be to be loving action, actually.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And a few minutes ago, you said, you know, with regard to war, the solution wouldn’t be to fight it, because that stops more wars. But when you acknowledge, like, take my world war two example, you know, the the allies, basically had to step up and oppose Hitler militarily? Because otherwise he was just going to keep running rampant all over. Absolutely.
Martha Creek: And that’s an That’s an insane thinking that would call something like that. So when you’re not dealing with some body or something, and it’s right mind. So when it’s when it’s somebody who’s not coming from their right mind, then we’ve got to have a boundary of some sort and to say, You got to stop that. And regardless of what it takes to say, that must be stopped.
Rick Archer: Yeah, there’s a there’s a saying in India takes a thorn to remove a thorn. And sometimes you need a thorn.
Martha Creek: Exactly. And which means that’s, that’s part of our role here to you know, that we’re going to, we’re going to it’s not one or the other, you know, it’s not is it going to be just that or just that it’s going to be both and, and I think that’s going to free up some of our suffering, is to understand that it’s not one or the other in these situations. That is their war. Yes. And there’s Is there a possibility of no war? Yes. And instead of making it good and bad, it just is what is. And yeah, that in itself is a little less suffering, it just is it’s so it’s just not, it’s not good or bad. And the mind has to draw the line and say, This is good, this is bad. And then it has to be right. So it gathers evidence to support itself. And then we’re further and further into believing it instead of questioning it. Like, what if we didn’t have a concept, you know, if something’s good or bad, and an example in my own life is I got a diagnosis of cancer a few years ago, and I absolutely did not mind. When I got the call that I had cancer, I didn’t have a reference for it was bad. It just is. And I had less identification than even I knew that I didn’t believe that it was my breast, so to speak, when I would hear them say it’s your breast. It’s like, I didn’t have a reference for that. Like, it’s it’s not my brand. It’s like, it’s it’s not out of a denial or something. But it’s like, the body is a temporary, something or other here. And when the bodies is the body changes, I don’t look like I did when I was one year old. I don’t look like I did just two years ago. So the body’s having its own life, you know, it’s doing what it’s come here to do. And it’s not to do with who I am. I don’t pick what happens. And then there’s no war in that. And then I can just follow the directions. You know, it’s like, here’s a cancer in Nebraska. And here’s what you do about that. And if it feels right, it made sense to me. That’s what
Rick Archer: Yeah, it’s like if your car’s transmission blows out, it’s not you that’s blowing out. It’s your vehicle. That’s damn actually, you know, get the vehicle fixed.
Martha Creek: Yes, that’s another perfect example of that to rake when we even when you hear the word my like, you know, when we hear somebody else’s car got scratched. This is from a car totallys work, you know, if you hear somebody else’s car got scratched, it’s like, oh, no, that’s too bad than the stock. My car got scratched. It’s like oh, wait a damn. That’s a different story, my car, my car, my body. So we have a big reason. When we think it’s my body, you were
Rick Archer: saying that, you know, things are not so much good or bad, they just are what they are. And you know, you love them as they are. But how does that relate to the idea of having preferences? You know, like, if you go into a restaurant or something, there’s one food, you know, perhaps that you know, you’re going to enjoy or even forget restaurants, I mean, at home, you know, there’s certain things you like, you cook those yourself, and there’s certain things your dog likes, you wouldn’t eat those. Yeah, we do as human beings have preferences.
Martha Creek: Yeah, it’s right. So a couple things I want to clear up in is that this notion that I don’t see things as good or bad is not really true. I’m not there yet, Rick, so I still will have an experience of not liking something. And I’m quicker now to catch my mind calling something bad. And I don’t believe that much anymore. So even if the mind says that’s bad, a quicker to catch that. So with enough practice, I’m less likely to kind of go down that path. So I’m not there yet. It is a it’s a direction I’m headed in. And I have got a real, more, much more solid foundation of, in your case of food, like, I can think I’m going to prepare a food, for example, that I will have liked, I may have liked most of my life. And I can prepare it believing that it’s going to turn out a certain way, and actually tasted or put in my mouth. And it wasn’t what I had in mind. For whatever reason, I may not like it. And if I’m attached to liking it, or if I’m believing that it’s what I’ve got to eat, or it’s what I’m supposed to eat, and I’m not really liking it, then there’s a big internal war there, versus just accepting what is and that for whatever reason at what I used to, like I don’t like anymore. And that’s been that my case that certain things I ate for a lot of years have left me that I don’t prefer them anymore. And that if I think I know how something’s going to turn out, I’m absolutely insane. There’s no way to know a future that doesn’t exist. So I can say I can cook this egg the same way I’ve cooked it always. And I cannot know how it’s going to turn out. And if I’m attached to how it’s gonna turn out, then I just won’t have much peace. Because then when it doesn’t turn out the way I like or prefer, then I have a little tantrum.
Rick Archer: Yeah. and burned it. You could always cook another one. Yes,
Martha Creek: well, if there is another one, rather than the man has, the man has a lot of conditions put on things, there has to be a certain kind of egg or a certain size egg. And it’s got to turn out a certain way. And it’s got itself set up quite substantially to always get what it wants. And then when it doesn’t, and that’s the bottom line to it. Really, I think, Rick, what happens in us when we don’t get what we want, regardless of what it is. And if we think that something’s right or wrong, or we should have gotten a and we got B, where does it leave us? And it’s not much of a life for me to think that I know how things ought to be because it leaves me too much gap and my peace, and I’m more interested, it’s more interested in having peace, regardless of how things turn out.
Rick Archer: Yeah, it’s couple lines from the Gita have come to mind. One is you have control over action alone, never over it’s fruits. That’s one and another is satisfied with whatever comes on asked beyond the pairs of opposites. So it’s like, you know, you you have control over this moment, or you appear to anyway, but not over the the outcome, you know, and so whatever outcome comes, you didn’t have control over that. So you’re satisfied with whatever comes on asked beyond the pairs of opposites.
Martha Creek: Exactly. And to the degree that I can live that out. That is That is my interest. And that’s very, very exciting to me to experience that and to actually believe that. That is possible. And when I don’t do it, I return as quickly as I can.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And that kind of leads us into the work itself. The four questions and the turnaround and all that because that’s a tool that you found very valuable for inculcating this way of, of behavior, this way of being.
Martha Creek: You tell, I’d love to go right into that. And you told me offline a description of humility that I’d love to hear again,
Rick Archer: if you’re well, that’s right. You know, we just had a little glitch Martha and I were I forgot to resume the pause button after we had some little interruption. And the line was that it was marshy, Mahesh Yogi actually have to define it this way. In his commentary in the Gita. He said, humility is the quality of not insisting that things happen any particular way. I mean, often a humid, the word humility is used to connote sort of a self deprecation, you know, I’m just a miserable slugging on, I’m nothing. But what he’s saying is, it’s more of a, you know, again, not insisting that things happen everywhere, any particular way, not sort of superimposing your ego on the flow of events and trying to sort of, as you I’ve heard, you say, many times, not trying to do God’s job,
Martha Creek: you’ve got it. And that’s, that’s what it led me that my definition of humility had come somewhere along the way of just continuing to loosen and loosen, loosen my opinions. And it doesn’t mean that I don’t have one, I’m just less and less invested in them, and less and less attached to them so that I can say, you know, are you going to vote A or B? And it’s like, I vote a, and I don’t think that it means anything.
Rick Archer: It was Yeah. Or at least it doesn’t mean that all the people will be a bunch of idiots, you know, after
Martha Creek: exactly or wrong, which idiots equals wrong, which is how the minds drawn the line like, I’m, which is usually it’s not usually, I’m right, you’re wrong. My way is the better way, my way is the right way. Or if the coin turns up, I am a miserable warm up the earth.
Rick Archer: Well, you know, that a lot of wars have been fought in which people on both sides felt that God was on their side, you know? And so, you know, I would say either you’re gonna say, Gods on no sides, or Gods on all sides, but it’s not going to be one side of the other.
Martha Creek: That’s what I believe to that God is. God is there. Yeah. Something created us something is breathing us something is in charge here.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And he’s breathing the, you know, the tiger as well as the gazelle. And you know, the murder as well as the victim. And I mean, everything is being animated by that same divine force.
Martha Creek: Absolutely. What else could be possible?
Rick Archer: Yeah. So maybe we could, have you ever been married?
Martha Creek: I was married to the only person I dated.
Rick Archer: Oh, that’s nice. But that that, again, is like symptomatic of your, your sense of your certainty and conviction in life at a young age?
Martha Creek: Well, it’s actually the opposite of that. That was the there’s been about twice in my life. And I’m really glad you went into this race, because there’s a couple times in my life where I left myself.
Rick Archer: Or you got blurred over,
Martha Creek: I got blurred over I left myself, I left my conviction. And one of it was when I got married, I got married when I was 18 years old. And I never wanted to, I did not believe to do that. And I got blurred over and I left myself, I lost myself in some kind of standard or norm or just a state of confusion, I would call it and actually got married. And I stayed married for five years. So I was with somebody for about eight years total, as a child as a kid as an 18 year old, and I’ve not been married since that time. And did you have any children? I didn’t. And that was another conviction that I had as a child that I would not have children. So I didn’t I didn’t waver from that, even under a great deal of pressure. From a lot of peers, family and a husband actually do have children. And it was an absolute no for me.
Rick Archer: And marriage to had been a No, it wasn’t that you marry the wrong guy is that you hadn’t wanted to get married period. Right?
Martha Creek: I didn’t want to get married period. Yeah, I didn’t want to get married period. And then. And that’s an example of this belief system. Because even though I didn’t want to do that, and did, I would not end it based on a belief that was very simply, if you make your bed, you got to lay in it. Now you that’s been generations old and handed down. So divorce is wrong. And you kind of did this so you’re stuck with it. And that was an example of how one belief that you don’t question will absolutely paralyze you from doing what you know, is the kindest, most intelligent, caring thing you can do for yourself. And for another person that I absolutely was, was able to get a divorce from that man, because I believed that it was unkind to him not to do it. I believe for me, I could have stuck it out and just lived like that. And what what kept me from doing it was it was not kind to him to be in a marriage with someone who did not want to be married.
Rick Archer: Did you see it as a possible course of events that you would stay married and that difficult as it was? The difficulty in itself would be evolutionary for you? Or was was it just so incompatible that that would have not been an you know viable.
Martha Creek: It wasn’t it was viable. It was viable. And I it was. It just felt dishonest. I don’t know the word for it actually. But it was, it was not. It was a dishonest thing to do would be deceit, but to be stay married, it was not integral. Right. And, and therefore the the, the war in me was was too much.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Did your husband end up remarrying? And is he a happier man now?
Martha Creek: Uh huh. I don’t know what, what his life is like in his heart in his mind. I have a strong belief that it’s better than it would have been otherwise.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Good. All right. So 2004 or so you met Byron, Katie, you started actually, you know, teaching the work or facilitating little workshops with it before you even trained with her even met her just on the basis of reading the book and all. But at a certain point, you went deeper and got more formal training. So I have a kind of a sense of how the work works, because I’ve read her books and everything. But a lot of people listening might not know anything about it, we keep referring to it. So maybe we better talk about that a little bit. And so people know what we’re talking about.
Martha Creek: I’m delighted. Okay, I want the workout in the world. So anyway, can move like that?
Rick Archer: Yeah. So why don’t you lay it out? For us? The basic points of it, it’s pretty there actually, are some pithy little points that you know, summarize. And that’ll give people a sense of what it is?
Martha Creek: Well, it’s a very simple technique of four questions to question your mind. So any thought that you have any thought that becomes a belief that you have that causes you stress, you can write down that thought, or ask these questions to yourself or be facilitated in these questions, to see if what you’re believing is true. And an example is, if I have a thought that somebody is unkind to me, I asked me is, can I absolutely know that that’s true? That they’re unkind to me? And then he will, yes. Could be the answer.
Rick Archer: But the word absolutely is pivotal. There.
Martha Creek: It is, to some of us, not always, Rick, but it could be that’s a that’s a sign that you’ve actually questioned your mind a bit, that it would be pivotal in you. That’s not always the case. So the question the answers to questions, the first question is actually, is it true? And then the answer is yes or no. And there’s no other answer to questions. One or two, yes or no. And the mind will want to go off and go Yeah, but yeah, but and Oh, but if you only knew, and it’s like, that’s not the work, the work is simply here’s the question, and then it’s either yes or no,
Rick Archer: I’d have a hard time answering yes or no at that point. Because I would say, Well, yeah, but not entirely. I mean, I can see to some extent that it’s not true. So how can I answer yes or no? Yes, that leads to the second question.
Martha Creek: Well, it does. And it’s just it will also was a demonstration to yourself of the wildness and the slyness, even of the mind that conditioning of the mind to not just land on the answer even when you hear Rick The answer is yes or no. That we absolutely cannot just say yes or no, we it’s very difficult to just land on yes or no as simple as it sounds, because the minds got to be right. So it’s got to go out and rationalize it justified. Explain it. And that’s really the internal war is all that mental gyration it’s not what’s happening. It’s all the the mental gyration that goes with it. So it’s Question one is, is it true? She’s unkind to you. Question two is Can you absolutely know that to be true? That she’s unkind to you? Question three is how do you react? When you think the thought she’s unkind to you? And then his answers whatever the answer is, it’s often things like, well, I get avoid her. I gossip about her. I teach her a lesson, I give her the look, I may cut off from her. So it’s like, well, that’s how I react when I think and believe somebody is unkind to me. So the short answer is, when I think and believe somebody is unkind to me, then I’m unkind to them. So it’s not hard to see with much of a look that I’m doing exactly what it is. I don’t want somebody else to do to me or out in the world. Question for then is who would you be? If you didn’t have the thought she’s unkind to you. Who would you be without the thought? She’s unkind. And, you know, people have their own experience of it. could be more focused for your calmer, saner, more balanced. And the work. I think some people that haven’t taken the work as deeply as possible would give off an answer like peaceful, calm, kinder. And it’s one thing to answer the question like that, and it’s an entirely different thing to actually experience your answer. So to say that you’re calm or calmer is one thing to actually experience calm, and calmer is a different matter. And I think that’s where we fall short with the work and the power of the work is not to actually ask the question, answer the question and experience the answer. And I think that’s another level to the work,
Rick Archer: it seems like to experience the answer, your perspective would have had to have shifted quite a bit by that time in order for you to really, you know, live it. Yeah.
Martha Creek: Yes. So it’s, it’s less made up and more experienced. And then there’s a great power in that, from my experience,
Rick Archer: right. And people’s perspectives don’t always just turn on a dime. Sometimes, there’s a lot of conditioning takes a while to unravel it.
Martha Creek: Very seldom turn on a dime. Yeah, even if we’ve got a sense of it, because the mind is infinite. It’s very quick. So it’ll come, it’ll come in, even if you’re saying calm and going, Well, yeah, but She better not do that. Or She better not do that. And if she does that one more time, and there was that one time, and so it’s very quick to fight back, even when you’re questioning and getting a sense of what it would be like heaven. How do I react when I think she’s unkind? Hell? Who would I be without the thought heaven, and will still go back to hell over and over and over again. And then it’s powerful to see that as a question. She’s unkind to me with the thought that she’s unkind to me, I suffer. Without the thought I don’t. Now it’s, then that’s very clear that she’s not my problem. Now, this freed me the day that I really got that people are not my problem, that if there’s a problem here, it’s thinking. So my thinking is what was causing all of that not somebody, not some person. And then, and then that applies across the board when people stop being the matter with us. So who’s the matter with me? And how much we’ve lived that out over our whole life, who’s my problem? And when who’s my problem doesn’t exist anymore? Then you got a direct shot to working with your thinking, which is the cause of all the suffering. And Eckhart Tolle these words are along the lines of the work is like a razor sharp sword that cuts right through the illusion that there’s anything problematic here, but the thinking, so then we have a thought we write it down, we ask these four questions, and then we turn it around. And when I have a thought, She’s unkind to me, one of the turnarounds is, I’m unkind to her. And I’ve already seen that from Question three, how do I react when I think she’s unkind to me, I see that that, that I do that also. Another turnaround is I’m unkind to myself. So if I want unkindness to stop in the world, that I’ve got to stop it right here where it started, which is in my own experience, in my own mind, and in the way I treat me, and others. So to the degree that I’m unkind to me that I’m also going to be unkind out into the world. I’ll send off and turn it around with what’s the opposite of unkind is kind. Now this takes a radically open mind or a willingness for your mind open to look at how is the same person that we told ourselves, sometimes our whole life, we told ourselves, she’s unkind, that we start to open the mind up a little to see is it possible that she’s also kind, were one example in our life, that she actually was kind to me. And then we can start to find one little way that she was kind, and then you can find two ways and three ways and four ways and to the degree that we send our mind in that direction, then it actually has a new balance to it. A re calibration, if you will. So we’re not as far off, we’re not as insane. We’re not as far off the center.
Rick Archer: It’s not a black and white universe, is it?
Martha Creek: Not that I know.
Rick Archer: I mean, there’s always, you know, there’s always gradations and spectrums and shades of gray and good mixed in with the bad and vice versa.
Martha Creek: Well, and that’s wholeness in itself, like if we didn’t have the line drawn down the middle and saying, This is good, and this is bad or this is right and this is wrong. And we understand it’s not one or the other. It is one and the other. This is key. And then to the degree that we get that, that it’s one and the other. What would we react to? Yeah,
Rick Archer: I mean, there’s so many examples of where people try to make everything black and white. I mean, you know, Democrats are good, Republicans are bad. Abortion is bad, you know, or abortion is good, or, you know, I mean, there’s so many issues that occupy so much of our news in this day and age, that are just, you know, people shouting from polarized perspectives, whereas it’s really a much more of a, you know, integrated mosaic of all kinds of qualities and so hard to, you know, categorize anything in absolute terms.
Martha Creek: Yes. And it to any degree that we do, it’s all made up. Yeah. And then we are, we’ve lost touch with the fact that we made it up. And then we’re, we’re reacting to what we imagined in the meaning that we’ve given something we’re reacting to that meeting, not what is.
Rick Archer: Yeah, yeah. So I kind of interrupted you, I guess, because there’s more than just those four questions. There’s a there’s the have we done the turnaround yet? Did you mention that
Martha Creek: the turnaround that yeah, the turnarounds were, she’s unkind to me turns around to she’s kind to me, turns around to she’s not unkind to me. And then you find examples for how that’s also true. Another turnaround is I’m unkind to myself. So I got to I get to wake up then to the fact that we’re the same, you know, and to any degree that unkindness exists in me, then naturally, I’m going to see it out in the world, because I have projected it there. Yeah, that anything that is unresolved in my own mind is projected out into the X apparent external, so that I get to see it.
Rick Archer: I remember when I listened to loving what is on as an audiobook, there was one thing which I couldn’t quite digest, which was that there was some woman who had been sexually abused as a child, or a very young girl, by her father, uncle or somebody. And, you know, Byron, Katie took her through the questions and then you know, tried to turn it turn it around to say, I abused him. Or correct me if I’m, if I’m not remembering this, right. But I couldn’t understand how an innocent child could in any way have been the culprit there to any extent, you know, yeah.
Martha Creek: Well, and that’s, that’s the exact point in that book, where a lot of people reportedly attempt to me have report that’s where they they abandon the work, so to speak. And I’d love you to listen to that again, Rick, I love to listen that over and over again. So I believe. I want you to experience what I experienced naturally. So I want that for you. And what happens in that dialogue is Katie asked her what was your part? So we’re just looking at turnarounds, we don’t know what they are. So the opposite is, I abused him. And then Katie’s question to her is what was your part to a little nine year old girl? What was your part? And she eventually said, After that happened, I could get anything I wanted from him. So now,
Rick Archer: You’re blackmailing him? Yes. Yeah. Like I’m gonna, well, if you don’t get
Martha Creek: it, well, I didn’t get it like that. It was like that, Rick, it was more like, that was our way, our only way to get love approval. And, and, and appreciation. That was our only way to get the love that we were seeking. And we would do it at any price. So even a little nine year old girl would would sacrifice that kind of pain to get the love that she was seeking. So she, her part was she did that seeking something from him. And then after it happened, she could get whatever she wanted from him. But so then it became it became strategy, a tool.
Rick Archer: So so the implication was that she was a willing participant in order to get what she wanted.
Martha Creek: At some level. Now, it also didn’t miss that he could have done. I don’t know if you can see my hands, but like, she he could have done this much. You know, like 1000 fold. He did that much harm. And she did this much, right. 100% of her pain was in the park that she had. Yeah. So did he do 1000 fold over? Yes. She did one teeny little part of it. And that’s where 100% of her pain is? Because she had she had not, that was not okay with her to do that.
Rick Archer: So would you say that there really could not be any circumstance in which the victim is is totally innocent, that we’re always culpable to some extent.
Martha Creek: I don’t know. I know that I what I believe is whatever action and reaction we had is thought based. So it’s it’s not even so much for me, Rick, what happens is like, what was I thinking that caused that? And then I get to work at the level of the cause. And when I question what thought caused it, then I can see what hurts and what doesn’t. And then I’m enlightened to that. And then I can stop hurting me, and I can stop hurting you to the same degree.
Rick Archer: So in other words, it’s kind of I’m just pursuing this a bit. So I totally understand what you’re saying. So you’re saying it’s kind of fruitless to try to analyze the occurrence that may have happened 40 years ago, and determine what the percentages of blame and whatnot may be? Because you really have no control over something that happened 40 years ago, what happened happened, but what you do you have control over is how you’re living with that now, how you’re reacting to the the impression of that now, is that what you’re saying?
Martha Creek: Yes. And that’s the one thing we can control is our internal world. So I’m still reacting to what happened 40 years ago, just like it’s happening again today, and it’s over. Now, and I can say it shouldn’t have happened shouldn’t have happened shouldn’t have happened. And I lose to every time I tell myself and believe it that it shouldn’t have happened. And it did happen. I’m stressed. Right, so the rape is over. In this case, a rape is over, and I’m still raping me over and over and over every time I play it through my mind. And the minds got the picture made up in graphic detail, showing it to us and we’re reacting to what the mind has, has is projecting instead of the what’s in front of us, which is in this moment. Now, there’s no problem here. You know, a woman on chair.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Yeah. So I think it’s good that we’re dwelling on this because, you know, without, you know, if you read things like that, it can seem a little heartless or cold or something. To, to say that the girl had some kind of responsibility for the circumstance. But I mean, if well, you just said it very beautifully. If we can, somehow. Well, woman sitting on chair, if we can somehow just be in the present, and not relive 1000 times something, things that have happened throughout our lives, then we’re free.
Martha Creek: We are exactly and it doesn’t change what happened. And no, no amount of praying wishing wailing is going to change what’s over.
Rick Archer: Did you ever hear that Zen story about the two monks an older one and a younger one walking along and they get to a stream. And there’s a beautiful young girl that is waiting by the side of the stream and she wants to cross it’s muddy thing or something she can’t get across. And so the older monk picks her up and they walk across the stream and put you puts her down, they keep on walking. And a couple hours later, the young monk finally can’t handle it anymore says, What did you do? We’re not you know, we’re not supposed to touch women. And yet you picked up that beautiful young girl. And the older monk says, Oh, are you still carrier I put her down on the other side of the stream.
Martha Creek: That’s exactly it. And I love that. I’m glad you told it again. I love hearing you tell it and that’s from when out where I read that was from a New Earth Eckhart Tolle his work.
Rick Archer: He told it to Yeah, it’s an old story. It’s written in that book. Yeah.
Martha Creek: And that’s what we’re doing right? Whatever it is even a minute ago, you know, exactly. If you took on shame, for example, for not hitting the pause button.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Oh, what are they gonna think of me? I wasted 10 minutes of our time.
Martha Creek: Yeah, like that’s possible. And he like that’s not possible for you to do it. And the reality is, the thought did not come to you press the pause button. That’s all that happened. In you cannot have a thought that you don’t have. There’s no amount of efforting wishing strategizing that’s going to make a thought appear to you, that doesn’t appear to you. And instead of just staying in that reality, we take it on like we’re inept or incompetent, or we got shame and guilt about it. And we worry what somebody’s got to think about us versus just seeing our own innocence in that and, and the fact is that a thought didn’t come to you to push the pause button.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I did a whole interview with this lovely lady named Betty Ensign. And we went on for two hours. And then when I went to process the video, I discovered that there was no audio, that mic hadn’t worked. So I thought Donna, it was such a good interview. We’re going to do it again. So I set it all up again the next night. And we did another two hour interview and I went to process it and the audio worked fine for 20 minutes, and then it stopped working. So we lost that one too. I got to do it again, actually, because she had such a good story, but but I must admit, you know, I felt a little bummed. But I kind of was like the duck and Eckert totally story. I shook my wings a bit and Okay, move on, you know, whatever. Maybe those are reason why the first two ones didn’t work?
Martha Creek: Yeah, we’ll drop the maybe. Yeah. Yeah, there’s the reason whether we ever understand it or not. And we can spend the rest of our life assessing it, evaluating it, talking about it, or being in being bummed about it. Or we can just notice it’s what he is, and then gone about our life.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I mean, it wasn’t gonna bring back the interview for me to beat myself up over it.
Martha Creek: Well, that’s really wise. Yeah.
Rick Archer: We mentioned that Bartoli a few times, does he? I’ve heard actually, that he, on some occasions actually prescribes Byron Katie’s work as a sort of a way of doing what he does what he you know, arriving at a technique for arriving at the state that he’s eloquently, you know, describes this being present. And I’m sorry,
Martha Creek: it’s my interpretation. That’s my interpretation to it. And I didn’t mean to interrupt you, Rick. That’s my interpretation, too. And that’s how I’ve heard it said is that, what by Eckhart Tolly, is what to do? And Byron Katie is how to do it. Yeah. So it’s, it’s the how to do it. And we’ve, you know, we’ve read for centuries what to do. And, and now it’s time to do the work. And there’s a reason it’s called the work.
Rick Archer: Yeah, that was good. Because I’ve met a lot of teachers, even contemporary ones, are very good at describing the state they’re in. But they’re kind of offering that description as a way to be in that state. But unless you’re in that state, it doesn’t work. You know, I mean, you can’t just sort of like a man on a mountaintop describing the view, it doesn’t help the people who are way down the mountain someplace.
Martha Creek: Precisely and my techniques. My My short answer for that is it’s just more blah, blah, blah. Yeah. So and in, which is what I say in workshops that, don’t try to believe what I’m saying, because it’s just my blah, blah, blah, until you take this on and experience it yourself. Then you’ve got another theory to talk about, instead of like, really taking this in and seeing what’s happened, what shifts in you, when you really question what you’re thinking. Yeah.
Rick Archer: Now, you know, Eckhart Tolle is, he’s kind of a mystic in a way in the sense that he’s not just describing a philosophy, he’s having an experience. And he’s speaking from his experience, he’s, you know, in a certain level of awareness, awareness, or awakeness, or whatever. And by I get the same thing with Byron, Katie reading her books, especially that one 1000 names for joy, which in which she used the Tao Te Ching to kind of comment on her own experience, and elaborate it is very beautiful book. Fact, to me, it was the most readable of her books. But you know, what we are talking about here is not just sort of, not merely a way of learning to deal more smoothly with mundane issues and concerns. We’re talking really about enlightenment, as far as I can tell, ultimately. And, you know, but we’re talking about a teaching from a woman who spontaneously became enlightened or became awakened. So I guess what I’m leading to is, you know, to what extent has that become a reality for you? Let me ask that one first.
Martha Creek: Well, there’s nothing been spontaneous for me, I can tell you that. And that’s also not my understanding of what happened with Katie. It’s also it’s described as she had an experience of where she saw that there’s no her and that something was seeing through her eyes, and that when she believed her thoughts she suffered. And when she didn’t, she didn’t. And then she worked diligently on that for years after that, sitting alone in asking these questions, so she had quite a trek, from the way I understand it, including how this work was formulated and what it was like to lose orientation and identification to where people that show up and say, I’m your family, and you don’t have a reference for what family is or who these people are. And you just go with them. Because you don’t know, you don’t see a reason why not to go with them. So mine has been a practice mine has been a systematic writing down in questioning my own mind and thought and then facilitating other people to do that. And while I facilitate other people to do that, I’m also doing my work when I do that. And I feel like that I’ve had a lot of grace in that, that there’s things that I never worked on, so to speak, people I never worked on, that stopped bothering me. Things stopped bothering me. I stopped being affected by things that had been affected by my whole life as a result of me doing this work. And that’s what I would describe it as a very high level exponential effect of this that it’s not a fit Do you 1% 52% 53% It was a 51%, and then a 61%, and then an 85%. And the more I do it, the better it gets. And the more my mind clears, the more energy I have, and the more sanity I have. And then the more joy I have. So to talk about living a life of joy is one thing and to actually live a life of joy is something else.
Rick Archer: Well, you seem to have a lot of energy, basically live out of a suitcase, as far as I can tell. traveling all over it’s,
Martha Creek: it’s true. It’s true. And, and, and it makes no sense. Rationally, it makes no sense how, how I physically can do what I do.
Rick Archer: Well, but you love what you’re doing. You know, and and I think when people love what they’re doing, they have abundant energy.
Martha Creek: I think you’re right about it. And that’s, that’s my experience here too. And I’m more excited. I remember hearing Katie say a few years ago that eventually, you know, you might go a day and not have much of a problem. You go a week, you haven’t had much of a problem, you go a month, and then eventually you go years without a problem. And then eventually you can’t even find a problem. And I remember thinking, Oh, horse patootie Give me a break. You got to be kidding me. And I can tell you now this a few years later that I have a glimpse of what that means that Sure, I have a glimpse of not experiencing things as problems that I never would have believed that it would be possible.
Rick Archer: Well, it’s probably more than a glimpse. I mean, when’s the last time you really felt like you had a problem?
Martha Creek: I have I have slight off. Yesterday, I had an actual concern about what somebody would think of me. And that felt very strange. And I was very excited about it. I can tell you that because I knew that there’s something there for me. So years ago, it would have been bombed, I’d been bombed like, Oh, brother, something bothers me. And now it’s more like, wow, what is that, like an opportunity, like an opportunity literally, literally, literally, that and it’s, it’s like, there’s something there for me. And it’s like the breadcrumbs back to myself, my pet my trail back to self. And I mean self with a capital asterik a trail back to God back to reality of where I’ve got lost out in the illusion again. So it was subtle, and the more subtle, it’s gotten in my life, the more powerful it is. So I’m very much more open now to it. When it comes, it’s exciting in some way that there’s something left of me. And it that’s, that’s a marker, that’s a pointer to say turn here, like, go in here and sit down and see what’s happening.
Rick Archer: That’s great. I mean, that’s a very refreshing. That’s one thing, if people only remember one thing from this interview, that might be a good one to remember, which is that anytime you feel like you have a problem, it’s it’s an opportunity to, you know, see where you’ve got some kind of shadow work to do within yourself, you know, some kind of place where you haven’t shown the light yet.
Martha Creek: Exactly. In Reiki, if we understood that all that shadow, I mean, even that terminology, you know, our shadow work our underworld, if we really understood that, that’s all just thinking, that it’s not the essence of who we are that it’s a thought that caused all that. You know, like, I’m not good enough. Something’s wrong with me, you know, I’m unlovable. Life is hard, like fill in the blank that all that caused, all of that was a thought that we haven’t questioned. So it’s very doable, to just have one thought at a time and then write it down and ask the questions and turn it around.
Rick Archer: Yeah. I wanted to just revert back to something we were talking about a minute ago. It seems like from what I read, Byron Katie did have a kind of a sudden, unexpected awakening. She’s sitting at a halfway house and a cockroach crawled across her foot. And all of a sudden, there was this awakening. And similarly, Eckert totally, you know, said he was like, on the verge of suicide, practically. And he’s just questioned, you know, wait a minute, if I can’t live with myself, who was there to me who was I with whom I cannot live, and next morning, woke up and it was a whole new situation. But both of them you know, had several years at least of kind of working through a lot of things and integrating and making sense of it all. I mean, Byron Katie and her way I, Eckert sitting on a park bench feeding the pigeons just sort of gradually sort of making sense of it all. And I think that is the exception rather than the rule, the norm that that kind of abrupt awakening followed by years of integration. I think most of us are proceeding incrementally, you know, layer after layer working things out, as you’ve been describing.
Martha Creek: And, and I think so too. And it is the layer after layer now just seems a little a lot less arduous, a lot less kind of intimidating because it simply is the only layer, there is a thought layer, thought caused it all thought is the cause of it all. So that’s, that’s not as ominous that we just see that, oh, if thinking is the cause here, everything else is the effect of that, then we don’t have to spend too much more time in the effects. And to the degree that we understand that thinking caused at all like, what are we going to react to that all that’s ever happening is a thought appearing, thought appearing, thought appearing thought appearing, and we can’t have much reaction to that. Hmm.
Rick Archer: Some people say that the more difficult stuff is the last to go, you know, the deeper, darker stuff, because if it were easier, it would have gone sooner. And you know, we kind of prove, but you’re kind of saying that it’s getting easier and easier for you. Or maybe it’s easier to deal with deeper stuff, you know, cuz you’re, you know, I mean, one man’s one man can lift 100 pounds easily and another can hardly lift 10. But if you’re strong enough, then the 100 but it’s all relative?
Martha Creek: Well, it’s also meaningless.
Rick Archer: How so? What do you mean? In what way?
Martha Creek: There’s, there’s no, there’s no reality, there’s no meaning to all the concepts are made up. So even concepts like deep, right? Like, that’s deep. It’s like, we made that up. We don’t know what that is. Yeah. And then we react to a concept like, oh, that’s deep. And how do you react when you think that’s deep? In the psych? Oh, my goodness. So it’s like, who would you be if you didn’t have a concept of deep? If we understood that, it hit that all the meaning that deep has is what I have applied to it. I made it all up. Right. So it’s, it’s a blank slate, it’s a blank field. It’s a and I’m projecting on it my own meanings, and then reacting to the meanings that I’ve projected as though the reality.
Rick Archer: So in other words, what I just said was really sort of over complicated speculation. And what you’re, what you’re doing is just in a very simple way, just sort of questioning thoughts as they arise. And, you know, if, and seeing how substantial they are, and, you know, then they they kind of dissolve and and, yeah,
Martha Creek: question them as you question them. Yeah. It’s like, yeah, they leave you they dissolve. Right, right. And then you believe them less and less, you know, an example I often use, it’s been meaningful to people. I’m so struck about what what really is meaningful to people. Like if I said to you, your hairs green, how does that how does that affect you?
Rick Archer: Not at all, obviously, because it doesn’t roll your eyes.
Martha Creek: Yes, you spontaneously laugh. Like it was just just joy. And you like, oh, like she thinks my hair is green? And if and so we don’t believe it. So it doesn’t affect us. Right. And I could say you’re the worst excuse for an interviewer I’ve ever seen.
Rick Archer: And if I thought you were serious, I probably think Oh, my God, you know? Yes. And you just grabbed your heart. Yeah, I feel like my, my solar plexus would tingle or something.
Martha Creek: Yes. So that’s, that’s an exact measure of how we believe a thought. So and then that’s also an indicator to that. I still believe that because I had a visceral reaction to that. I had a body reaction to that my body is a feedback feedback mechanism that tells me I believe that and then it then I get busy with Oh, write that down, ask for questions, turn it around. And then eventually, that can affect me. You know, I could say you’re the worst excuse for an interviewer and you would just say, I’ve had that thought also. Yeah, I think that too, sometimes. And then it’s like, okay, if she wants me to be a better interviewer, I want me to be a better interviewer. It’s like, what what suggestions do you have for me, give me
Rick Archer: some feedback and read some books on it or something. Watch Larry King.
Martha Creek: Exactly, exactly. So in to the degree then that we get that it’s all just thinking like, we couldn’t react too much. We would just see this as a thought appearing. And there’s no thought that I can have that you haven’t had. There’s no new thought in the whole world. So what would we be afraid of?
Rick Archer: Yeah, like the word as a certain I’m sorry, go ahead.
Martha Creek: The worst I could think about you. You already think about you. Yeah. So we can live fearlessly.
Rick Archer: Sometimes there’s a certain amount of psychic energy though in, in, in, infused in, like, if someone is yelling and screaming at you, it’s not just the, the meaning of their words that is impacting you. But there’s this sort of like, stressful, you know, you know what I mean? I mean, my father was very abusive, he used to drink a lot and yell at my mother all night long, and, you know, eventually drove her into a mental hospital. And there was a lot of, you know, it wasn’t just the content of what he was saying, it was the sort of the atmosphere that was created, you know, with all that anger and negativity, just sort of. So how do you deal with that, as opposed to just the content where, you know, let’s say, You didn’t just say I was a bad interviewer, you started screaming at me, and, you know, there was all this emotional psychic energy coming through?
Martha Creek: Well, it just wouldn’t have anything to do with you, Rick, my, my screaming is an effect of my own thinking. So if you understood that you couldn’t react to that either. And then your mind would be clear, like, I don’t like this. And then you could just disconnect your hang up on me, you could say, Well, that didn’t turn out quite like I had in mind. She’s not, she’s not suitable for my show. So you’d have, you’d be empowered to do what felt right for you to do. And you’d understand that all all of the effects coming out of me is an is a result of my own thinking, you know, just like if I somehow gave you the look, you know, gave you the look, somehow, it’s like, that look on my face, is an effect of my own thought. It’s nothing to do with you. It could never be anything to do with you. And we’re so identified with this, you know, with this ourself, we think with this thing, we’re so identified that we think it’s got something to do with us. So then whatever look is on their face. We take it personally, like, oh, that’s me that they’re looking at. And it’s like, no, the look on their face isn’t a result is an effect of the thought that just occurred to them. Which could be you know, you’re ugly, you’re fat, or inadequate, or whatever. So whatever thought hit them, that look on their face isn’t is an effect of that. And it has nothing to do with me.
Rick Archer: It’s easy to get identified, I mean, even going to a movie, and you know, it’s a movie, you know, but if it’s a really suspenseful movie, you know, you’re sitting there, you’re chewing your fingers, don’t open that door, you know, don’t don’t go there, don’t do this. You’re I’m sure if they hooked you up to various instruments, you know, your heart would be beating faster. And, you know, even though you know, you can think anytime this is only a movie, but we react to things you know, we get sucked in.
Martha Creek: That’s exactly it. And so the life is a movie also. Yeah, exactly. And we’ve lost ourselves in it. It’s no different. We got the same stimulation in the body that we would be just like, it’s happening to us. And it’s, it’s all thought caused. So we’ve just we’ve, we’ve, we’ve forgotten that it’s a movie.
Rick Archer: And even if we remember, though, you know, even if we know it, there’s still we still react, we still get caught in. Yeah. Like, like you said, you know, get blurred over.
Martha Creek: Yes. And and until we don’t, then our thoughts are going to run the show.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I know, people, you know, especially living here in Fairfield, who had been meditating for 40 years and stuff. And, you know, very often, it’s like, there’s this analogy that you can move a table by pulling any of its legs and all the other legs are gonna come along. And a lot of times people feel like, well, if I just do this, you know, this going into a state of inner silence, everything else is going to work itself out. But you very often find people who’ve been doing that for decades, who still have a lot of baggage, and a lot of stuff that maybe it would be good if they pulled two legs of the table simultaneously keep doing their meditation if they want, but also, look at this, look at that change, learn how to change one’s thinking, as in the way you’ve described, might move the table along a lot more easily. Well,
Martha Creek: and that was my experience. And I still, I consider the work of meditation, and I used to sit in, in meditation and had Mothra and that and would consider it peaceful and and it was gentle. And I felt renewed by it. And the minute even before my eyes was open, the infinite mind was recreating itself. So even in the meditation, there was little peace sometimes because it would be a thought like I need a pillow or Oh, somebody should be here meditating with me or how long ban or is this really gonna work or it’s like, so instead of I found something through questioning the mind that was metadata. hatIve and that had a result that was mind blowing to me. And that is effective and sustainable. And, and assessable It doesn’t require anything except to, to ask the question and then to answer it, if you really want to get to the other side,
Rick Archer: you mentioned, you know, when you, when you started in this, you moved, you felt like you’re moving rather quickly 51% 61% 81% like that, do you feel now you know that to a great extent, universal awareness, or pure awareness, or vastness or whoever, whatever terminology, one we want to use, has become quite, very much part of your living reality as a result of all this.
Martha Creek: I do. I don’t know what percentage and I don’t believe that. I don’t believe that just because I’m experiencing it right now that it’s going to last. And I cannot know the future, I don’t know that somebody won’t knock on the door here in a minute, you know, and stick a gun in my ribcage. And I don’t know how I would react to that. I just know that ever, how I react to that would be based on the thought that I was having at the time. So it’s got nothing to do with the gun, or the person it’s to do with the thought that I’m having. And that that is that solid ground for me.
Rick Archer: So you know, as you speak, somehow the metaphor comes to mind of a musician tuning their instrument before playing. It’s almost like this whole process you’ve been describing is a way of, of kind of tuning oneself, you know, so that when we play, it doesn’t sound that sounds like it’s supposed to sound.
Martha Creek: That’s the way I see it to break. And then when we when the mind takes over again, or I’ll lose myself again, then I’m not is it? I’m out of tune. And if I can hear myself and I’m going to restore tune tuning, I’m going to return attune, attune, and atone before I proceed very much. Yeah,
Rick Archer: yeah, I used to play in a band. I was a drummer, and very often between songs that guitar players would have to just tune up a little bit again, because it had gotten off slightly. Yeah, you know,
Martha Creek: and, and we’re going to get off with just one thought that goes unquestioned. You know, it really is that simple. It’s not as easy as it sounds, sometimes it but it’s like it, there’s really just two paths, thought appears. And then you either believe it and stuff or you question it and don’t. So in I call it peace or pain, and also call it go within or go without. Yeah, so it’s which is it going to be? Which is it going to be?
Rick Archer: Screw? So having heard all this, if a person thinks, Well, this sounds like an interesting approach, I could get into this. What should they do?
Martha Creek: Debbie, Debbie adobea, though work.com, t h e w o rk.com. Free Resources, free audio streams, video streams, all the books excerpts from the book, a page of certified facilitators have a helpline where people serve for free to facilitate people through the work. And then the books loving what is 1000 names for joy, I need your love, is that true? It’s got great exercises in it, and the practices are laid out there. And if they want to work with me directly, they can contact me at Martha Creek dotnet. And I work on a blood offering basis. That means they pay whatever they want to pay, and I facilitate them based on appointment. So there’s, it’s it’s available 100% available to anybody who wants it free.
Rick Archer: That’s, that’s great. Well, I always feel when I do these interviews, and this one in particular that I’m enjoying this so much. I could go on all night thinking of questions and talking because it’s so nice, but I think we’ve really we’ve covered it pretty well. Is there anything you feel like we haven’t covered that you’d like to throw in there. But before we conclude,
Martha Creek: I’m especially grateful for you, to you, and for whatever is motivating you to do this. especially grateful for that, and privileged to sit with you. And I delight at the pebble in the pond here and for the waves may go in no different than how we met in the first place on the rare chance that I would be in Fairfield, Iowa. And there I am. There you are. And here we are today. And what we’re getting here is, is meaningful and appreciate it.
Rick Archer: Thanks, Martha. What motivates me is just the joy of it. I mean, I just enjoy this so much. And not only I mean even if it were just you and I talking and no one was ever going to hear it. I really enjoy this. And I really enjoyed tuning into a different person each week and there’s so many lovely people out there. But I also enjoy you know, when people Other people are inspired by it and benefit from it. And you know, each, each patient I speak to has a different, you know, slightly different way of going of presenting themselves. And, and you know, I’ll get, I’ll do an interview like this, and I’ll get feedback from one person saying, you shouldn’t have interviewed that person, they were lousy. And then 10 minutes later an email come in saying, Oh, that was just what I needed to hear. So I like to mix it up. And I think yours has been a very beautiful contribution.
Martha Creek: Thank you for that. It was interesting to have questions about my story about my wife and my childhood. And it was, it was fun today to tell it. And to not diminish in some way. Like, that’s a story. That’s a story. That’s a story to just answer the question. And it’s also very humbling, and it’s very, I have a great deal of gratitude that even as I was telling that story, that I didn’t believe for a second that it’s who I am. That and that’s how we know. You know, that’s how we can test how much of this has taken hold of us. Like if we can answer the questions and tell the story with still some investment in somebody getting it hearing it versus, you know, it’s so irrelevant. Really.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Right. Well, you have an interesting story, story, even though it’s a story, and people like stories. Yeah. And I think they’re illustrative they’re, they’re edify, you know, and a lot of people can, you know, they can relate to different facets of different people’s stories and say, Well, you know, I can relate to that. And so maybe there’s hope for me.
Martha Creek: And I get a lot of feedback about that. So I’m dedicated to telling it, for that reason, that it’s yeah, it’s gonna it’s beneficial.
Rick Archer: Yeah, that’s actually the little subtitle of this whole program is and the title of it Buddha at the Gas Pump, the implication being that, you know, very awakened people in ordinary circumstances, and the subtitle is interviews with ordinary, spiritually awakened people. And, of course, I guess ultimately, everyone’s ordinary, but we tend to kind of put people on pedestals and feel like whatever they’ve got is unattainable, you know, and couldn’t pass. I couldn’t possibly be like Eckhart Tolle a or Byron, Katie, or somebody. But, you know, the fact is, you know, we’re all bozos on this bus. And
Martha Creek: yeah, we can. Yeah. And we’re one thought away from it. Yeah, dude, when, when thought and question.
Rick Archer: Yeah, and that’s another thing we were carrying on a little bit that we were about to conclude that there were some more good stuff here, which is that many people feel like, oh, you know, it’s just not going to happen to me in this lifetime. It’s so far away, you know, maybe decades from now, maybe on my deathbed or something, I can have this kind of liberation or insight. But that one thought away phrase is very, I think, encouraging for people. Me too. Yeah. Good. Well, thanks, Martha. So let me just make a couple of concluding statements here that I always make. Which is that, depending on how you found this interview, there’s one place to go if you want to sort of find all of them. There’s batgap.com, which is an acronym for Buddha at the Gas Pump. So that’s bat gap calm. Go there. And you’ll see all the ones that I’ve been doing and will do, and you can sign up to get an email if you’d like. To be notified every time a new one is put up. It’s also available in podcast form. If you don’t want to sit in front of your computer and any more than you already do. You can get this on your iPod or your mp3 player and listen while you’re walking the dog or whatever. And there’s a little donate button there. Which if you feel the impulse to click it, go ahead, don’t resist. I just had to shell out a bunch of money to buy some more equipment for my dear friend, Ralph Preston, whom I really should mention, at the end of every single one of these interviews. We were buddies in high school and haven’t seen him since but we’ve been working together on this project and he does all the post production work and spends more time than I do probably, you know, getting all this in usable form. So and there’s a link to his website on on my website, which you can check out he had a stroke several years ago and made a remarkable recovery and is doing stuff to help other people who have had strokes. So wonderful guy. So in any case, that’s my what I want to say in conclusion, I thank you for watching and I will see you next time.