Let me tell you about martyr programming and how it gets wired into your nervous system.

I learned early that a good woman gives until she disappears.

My first husband taught me that lesson well. I was barely twenty, fresh out of a sheltered childhood, and I took his every word as gospel. There was no rest in that house. If I was sick, I still had to serve. If I'd just given birth, I was expected to clean the kitchen. If he was sick, the house had to fall silent while I tended to him like a nurse in a chapel.

That rhythm—constant giving, constant depletion—followed me for years. It felt holy somehow, like proof of devotion. But it was just self-erasure dressed in virtue.

But here's the part that really fucked me up: my dad was the one who taught me that receiving meant you were selfish in the first place. He made it crystal clear that good women give, serve, sacrifice, and never ask for anything in return. That was the sermon I heard my whole childhood.

And the real mindfuck? He'd point to my mother as proof. He'd say that's what was wrong with her—that she was selfish, that she took instead of gave. And after twenty years of marriage, he left her because of it.

So I learned early: asking for anything, receiving anything, meant you were like her. Meant you were the problem. Meant you'd end up alone.

Here's what I didn't understand then: the refusal to receive wasn't humility. It was a survival strategy.

When you're raised in systems that reward self-erasure and punish visibility, receiving becomes dangerous. Because receiving means you matter. Receiving means you have needs. Receiving means you're allowed to take up space.

And women who take up space get punished.

So we learned to pre-emptively shrink. To say "I'm fine" when we're drowning. To refuse help even when our bodies are begging for it. To call it love. To call it devotion. To call it holy.

But it was never holy. It was control.

If you're starting to see how this pattern shows up in your life, take the quiz to discover what your obedience contract is actually costing you.

My body finally called my bluff.

Heart racing. Blood pressure spiking. The kind of exhaustion you can't pray away. A doctor told me I had supraventricular tachycardia, a literal heart that couldn't keep up with my lack of boundaries.

I had to have a cardiac ablation.

And lying there afterward, chest sore, wires still fresh in my memory, I thought: This is what happens when you worship sacrifice.

That was the day I began saying no. Not as defiance, but as survival. No to over-giving. No to martyrdom disguised as love. No to running my body into the ground just to prove I'm good.

Your nervous system stays in overdrive. You're constantly scanning for who needs what, anticipating everyone's needs but your own. You develop stress-related health issues. Adrenal fatigue. Migraines. Chronic pain.

Because your body is screaming what your mouth won't say: I need help.

Your relationships suffer. You think you're being generous, but you're actually teaching people they can't give to you. That the relationship is one-way. That you don't trust them enough to be vulnerable. And here's the thing: when you never receive, you never let people know you. Because being known requires being vulnerable. And being vulnerable requires admitting you have needs.

Your money stays stuck. You can't call in abundance when you're energetically pushing away everything that comes toward you. Every time you refuse help, you're telling the universe: I don't deserve support. And the universe believes you. Learn more about how this shows up in your pricing and wealth here.

But here's what nobody talks about: when you refuse to receive, you're not just hurting yourself. You're breaking the chain of reciprocity. You're teaching the next generation that needs are shameful. That asking is weakness. That community is optional.

And we all stay isolated. Depleted. Fighting alone.

The refusal to receive isn't humility. It's hoarding your suffering. And suffering isn't meant to be hoarded. It's meant to be shared, witnessed, and metabolized in community.

Now, some of you might be thinking: But isn't it better to be self-sufficient? Isn't independence strength?

Here's the thing. Independence and isolation aren't the same.

Patriarchal systems—churches, corporations, families built on traditional gender roles—they need women who won't receive. Because women who receive get dangerous.

A woman who receives support has time to think.

A woman who receives money has power to leave.

A woman who receives help builds community instead of isolation.

A woman who receives rest remembers who she is.

That's terrifying to any system built on control.

So they dress up refusal as virtue. They call it humility. Service. Selflessness. The Proverbs 31 woman who never stops working.

But really it's just another way to keep you compliant.

After I left my first husband, people from the church offered help. Meals. Childcare. Money. And I said no to almost all of it.

Not because I didn't need it. I desperately needed it. But because accepting felt like admitting I'd failed. Like I was a burden. Like I was less than.

It took me years to realize my refusal wasn't protecting anyone. It was just keeping me isolated, exhausted, and easier to ignore. The system didn't care if I suffered. It cared that I stayed quiet while I did it.

If this is resonating and you're seeing the pattern of over-giving without receiving, read this next.

So if refusal keeps you small, what does real reception look like?

It's not passive. It's not waiting to be rescued. It's not spiritual bypassing with affirmations about worthiness.

Reception is an active practice. A choice you make in your body, not just your mind.

Start here. Say yes when someone offers to bring you dinner, even though your kitchen is messy and you feel like you should handle it yourself.

Accept the compliment without deflecting. Without making it a joke. Without immediately giving one back.

Let someone pay for your coffee without reaching for your wallet or keeping a mental tally.

Take the nap when your body asks for it, instead of pushing through because there's still laundry.

Notice what comes up in your body when you receive. Notice the guilt. The shame. The immediate urge to give something back.

That discomfort is the old programming recognizing it's being replaced. Let it burn.

The voice telling you that receiving is selfish isn't your voice. It's the echo of every system that needed you depleted to stay in power.

And you get to stop listening.

Here's what nobody's saying: when you refuse to receive, you're not just protecting yourself from vulnerability. You're teaching everyone around you that reciprocity is optional.

Reception isn't taking. It's participating in the flow of energy that keeps communities alive.

When you receive, you're modeling for the next generation that needs aren't shameful. That asking is brave. That community is how we survive.

Devotion looks different now for me. It looks like slow mornings. Like asking my kids to bring me food when I need rest—something that once felt unthinkable. Like sitting on the deck, surrounded by trees, remembering that I'm part of nature too, not its servant. Like letting my spine melt into the bed and calling that prayer.

When my back aches or my pulse pounds, I know I've crossed the line again. That's my body's sermon: rest before the altar becomes a hospital bed.

They told me self-sacrifice was love. But the truth is simpler: love that costs your life isn't love. It's a slow death dressed up as devotion.

For more on how rest and reception create wealth instead of blocking it, read this.

Now I know what you're thinking: But what if I become one of those people who just takes and never gives back?

Here's the truth: if you're worried about that, you're not going to become that.

The women who exploit others don't lie awake at night worried about being selfish. They don't read blog posts about martyr programming.

You're here because you give too much, not too little.

Learning to receive doesn't turn you into a taker. It turns you into someone with enough in your cup to actually give from overflow instead of depletion.

What if your refusal to receive isn't protecting anyone?

What if it's just keeping you exhausted, isolated, and stuck in patterns that were never yours to begin with?

What if the work isn't learning to give more, but learning to receive without guilt?

This is deconditioning work. This is remembrance. This is you recognizing that the voice telling you receiving is selfish isn't your voice. It's programming. And programming can be rewritten.

Take the quiz: What's Your Obedience Contract Costing You? It takes two minutes and shows you exactly which pattern is running your life right now. Not in a vague way. In a "holy shit, that's why I can't rest" kind of way.

You'll get your result immediately, and you'll see exactly what needs to shift.

Because you didn't come this far to keep living someone else's idea of holy.