The Anne Report, Traveling Again, tells of Anne's and Jim's latest adventures. The Main article, Life is Your Art; Creation is Your Paintbrush, encourages us to use our creativity to paint a beautiful life. The Healthy Living article, The New List, suggests that making a "to be" list will make our lives EZier. The Anne Talk is Light Meditation. Learn about Anne's newest book: The Living Book. The Featured Product this month is Offbeat Prayers for the Modern Mystic. Click to read What is EZosophy?

The EZ Mantra: "Everything can be EZ or at least EZier." -- Anne Sermons Gillis

Living EZosophy, October 10, 2017
Published Weekly on Tuesday Mornings

Phone: 281-419-1775
Email: anne@annegillis.com

Anne's Websites:

  The Anne Report

Traveling Again

Dear ,

We are traveling again. We were excited to visit Greenville, SC for the first time. The city is built around a river full of waterfalls, trails, and lush greenery. We visited Falls Park on the Reedy and found ourselves grinning widely as we explored the natural beauty afforded through nature. Stone-lined trails welcome the traveler and the hometown people. What a great way to build a city, around natural beauty.

Falls Park on the Reedy, Greenville, SC
Click the image to see a larger view.

That's how we need to build ourselves, around our natural inner beauty. Too often, we try to decorate our bodies to make them acceptable, but if our inner light is not central to our lives, our beauty and sense of peace are fleeting. As I aged, I've discovered that the outer beauty fades, not that I was any kind of raving beauty, but there's one thing I do that brings out that brings inner beauty – I smile. I reach down to the depths and smile. I always feel better, and when I look in the mirror and smile, I find a reflection that gives me a boost.

My birthday was yesterday. I was happy to spend it with my grands and family. I'm sixty-nine and happy to be healthy, mobile, and excited about life. That's it for the Anne Report.

  Main Article

Life is Your Art; Creation is Your Paintbrush

"We are immersed in guilt, and guilt requires punishment. When we choose a discipline, we may belittle ourselves for not doing our practices often enough or correctly. We may take a guilt trip. Guilt is perhaps the egoic mind's most helpful tool. Guilt chimes in on everything we think, say, and do, but to thrive as spiritual beings, we need to say goodbye to guilt. Guilt has bullied us for too long. It creates so much suffering that we harden ourselves against its assault. That hardness dulls the guilt as it numbs us.

Escaping guilt requires us to bring guilt to the forefront of our minds. This awareness exposes guilt as the effective show stopper that it is. Guilt stops the show of our lives and sends us home with drooping hearts and battered souls. We release self-criticism and guilt so we can leave the past behind. Self-forgiveness does not give us carte blanc to go out and make the same mistakes again; it frees us from cozying up with the ego...."

The above is excerpted from The Living Book, my most recent book. I enjoy reading what I write, because it seems like a personal message, and I need plenty of help! Material floats in. I show up and hold a pen to hand or sit in front of my computer. Sometimes I'm in bed and I get an idea and must write it down. If I don't write the material down immediately, it will get lost, never to return. One day, I after finishing my walk, I heard a book coming through. I ran to get pen and paper. I couldn't make it to my office. The words were too insistent. I stood perched at my kitchen counter as a delightful story unfolded. I was electrified as a fictional character, Mrs. Dominos, came to life.

I meet people who want to write a book. I tell them they have to show up, sit down, and write. They usually say they've tried, but nothing comes to them. Maybe what I forgot to mention is that if you want to write, you need to do this several days a week, preferably every day, and do it for weeks, months, and even years.

One of the easiest methods to get one going is to handwrite one page per day. Write about anything that comes to mind, even if it's just, "I don't want to do this, but since I want to write, and several people think this technique is helpful, I am going to commit to doing this. I have a very bad attitude about doing this on a daily basis, but I really do want to write a book, and certainly writing about nothing won't hurt me. Etc."

Writing may not be your thing, but creativity is everyone's thing. People say, "I don't have a creative bone in my body." But that is not true. Every bone in our body is creative!

For the last two weeks, the newsletter spoke about love and our mission in love. Our mission is to realize the love that we are and to share it with others. Part of that mission is to share love in creative ways. It could be through music, song, dance, cooking, or creative solutions, but to not use the creative side of ourselves, creates depression and even illness.

Hildegard of Bengin started having visions. She heard from a very bright light, that spoke in a heavenly voice, to share her experiences with the world, but she didn't. She became ill. She was riddled with anxiety and was afraid what others might think. At some point, she mustered the courage to write down her experiences, and immediately her health improved. She went on to compose music, create works of art, and to become a beloved and respected teacher. She was canonized in 2012.

We may not hear heavenly voices from a beautiful light, but something deep calls each of us to share creatively. We don't have to share with the world, we just need to create something. We need to express something through ourselves that comes from the expansive dimension. Creating in our world is a spiritual imperative.

If you are not already immersed in the art of your life, if you don't know what it is, just start writing. Writing will jumpstart your creativity and lead to your art. And if you know what your art is, be sure to allow time for it. Just do it. Create something, because when you do, you will find that your life is EZier and EZier.

Anne

  Quotes

Quotes

"The earth sustains humanity. It must not be injured. It must not be destroyed … Creation is the song of God."
-- Hildegard of Bingen

"The language of Angels…is so full of wisdom that they can, in a single word, express what we cannot say in a thousand words; and the concepts of their thinking can encompass the likes of which we cannot grasp… because angels' language flows directly from their affection. Angels can express in a minute more than we can say in a half an hour, and can present in a few words things that would make many pages of writing."
-- Emanuel Swedenborg

"The Universe is NOT out to get us. It is present and can lift every burden, bring peace and satisfaction, and illuminate all of life. The Universe is on our side and by our side, with these words, "Tag. You're it." And when we realize we are "it," the abundant nature of life reveals itself. When we truly understand and trust the beneficence of life, we can always be sure that our lives will get EZier and EZier."
-- Anne Sermons Gillis

  The Living Book

The Living Book, by Anne Sermons Gillis

• Suppose someone told you that you could change your life radically, for the better, if you spent just three minutes a day doing inner work? Would you believe it? Maybe not, but wouldn't it be worth an investment of three minutes a day to try it?
• The Living Book offers just this. Devote three minutes a day to this process and your life will become a living testimony to the seed principle. A tiny seed can grow into a mighty tree, but it must be planted. Plant your daily seed for three short minutes and notice both subtle and miraculous changes in your life.
• In addition to the daily practice, one can use the process when they are stumped or afraid or angry. This process transforms anger into love. When we plant seeds of light into our thoughts and emotional bodies, we move into higher frequencies of well-being.

Learn more about The Living Book, by Anne Sermons Gillis.
Paperback $5.00. PDF Download $0.99. Kindle Book $2.99.

  Featured Product This Month

  Healthy Living

The New List

Most of us make to do lists. We mentally relax when we put things on paper. Who wants to struggle to remember a multitude of things? Sometimes our to do lists are liberating, while at other times they create pressure and overwhelm.

Perhaps making two lists might ease our dilemma. Make out the traditional to do list and also make out a to be list. Here are some great ideas for a to be list:

• To be present
• To be happy
• To be abundant
• To be relaxed
• To be gracious
• To be humble
• To be grateful
• To be open-minded

Whenever you start a task, look at the to be list and incorporate something from the to be list into the action you take on the to do list.

There are unspoken to be items that set the stage for our doing. A few items from that list are:

• To be harried
• To be hurried
• To be irritated
• To be resentful
• To be burdened
• To be slow to start tasks and to dread getting started
• To be entitled

These are attitudes and behaviors that limit us and keep us spinning in ineptitude. We no longer need to throw our lives away, task by task. We have the ability to imbue each task with power, pleasure, passion. The seminal question is, "Do we want to be passionate about life or to be pressured by life?" We long for freedom from the patterning of our families and our societies. It's always the time to break the chain that binds us, and the best place to start is in our daily living and while doing ordinary tasks. We must make the ordinary the extraordinary and the mundane miraculous, because when we do, life gets EZier and EZier.

If you have any healthy living tips for the newsletter, send them to me at anne@annegillis.com.

  Anne Talks

Light Meditation

Today's Anne Talk is the Light Meditation. Time: 9:24

  Anne Art

Click the image to see a larger view.

Click the image to see a larger view.

Tree with expansive exposed root system in The Falls Park on the Reedy
Click the image to see a larger view.

NOTICE: Here are two shareables from Anne. Feel free to pass them along.

The World's Best Weight Loss Secret

Thought Freedom

  Anne's Schedule

All times here are Central Time
unless otherwise specified.

Sunday October 22, 2017
10:30 AM Service
Rev. Anne Sermons Gillis speaks
Northwoods Unitarian Universalist Church
1370 Millbend Drive
The Woodlands, TX 77380
281-298-2780

Call or Email Anne Now to Schedule Her for Your Meeting.

You may reach Anne by phone at 281-419-1775 or click the button below to contact Anne by email. Anne is also available to officiate at weddings and funerals.

  Anne's Services

Need a Coach or a Rent-a-Friend?

Interested in getting ongoing support? Try life coaching with Anne. Anne offers both short-term and long-term coaching. Contact her for details. Click here to contact Anne by email or Click here to view information on Anne's One Year Seminar and other training too.