The Anne Report brings you up to date with Anne's activities. The Main article, Waking Up to Enlightenment, reminds us that enlightenment is a journey to a place we never left. The Healthy Living article, The Mind, encourages us to feed our mind with thoughts that serve us. In the Anne Talk, What If, Anne suggests that we focus on our good, not on not so good. The Featured Product This Month highlights Anne’s third book, Words Make a Difference. Click to read What is EZosophy? Click to join Abundance Affirmations. Click for Shareables From Anne.

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

Living EZosophy, June 11, 2019
Published Weekly on Tuesday Mornings

Phone: 713.922.0242
Email: anne@annegillis.com

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  The Anne Report

The Anne Report

Dear ,

Days run into each other. I heard that one of the first things to go, when you face cognitive dysfunction or memory loss, is that you don’t know what day it is. I am in trouble. Since I don’t work a five day a week job, the days seem to fold, unidentified, into each other. It gets a little worse when I am out of town. Once, when I was in India, I lost track of the days. I would ask, “What day is it?” I was elated to be in such a free space that I let my need to know which day it was go. I was used to being on such a tight schedule that every minute was accounted for, but there I was, hanging free, with only the sun and the stars as reference points. Maybe people who make up the criteria for sanity and memory aren’t as astute as those of us who just don’t give a snap about what day it is. Being tied to time is a prison, and, though it is handy to know what day it is, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. So there. All this rambling may be more of a cognitive decline than forgetting the day, so I'd better move the narrative along.

We are in Charleston with our grandchildren and family. I spend each night telling a Hoppy, the Poppy Frog story. Hoppy, along with his friends and family, have all kinds of adventures. I make up the story on the spot, and I am often as pleased as the boys, with the outcome. We just love Hoppy.

We have been house hunting for a home in this area. It is confusing to house hunt, but we have found a couple of homes we really like. I have already made friends in the Charleston area. Now to sell our home in The Woodlands.  And that’s it for the Anne Report.

  Main Article

Waking Up to Enlightenment

There’s a peace-filled state; it shows up when our minds are in the right place. What is that place? It’s the place where the mind stops serving fear and lives from the heart. It’s the heart zone. Unfortunately, we tend to prefer entertainment over enlightenment. We choose to be zoned out rather than zoned in. Give me some sugar, a phone, a movie, a fight – anything to stave off my imagined enemy. We place protective belief systems around us for insulation. Rather than dismantle the armor of the past, we build prisons to keep us safe. We lock ourselves in, then go on a journey for a locksmith. No matter the door isn’t locked! We settle for a scenario we call our lives and fidget endlessly around familiar thoughts and beliefs. Even our arguments are recycled. We are transfixed, decorating and redecorating our prison cell with new thoughts and beliefs. There are infinite ways to improve ourselves and fix our situation. We may place a few affirmations on the wall and, since we never run out of self-doubt, the sky is the limit.

To belabor the point: we cry for freedom whilst constructing and reconstructing mind trap after mind trap. Every time we move or improve, we step on a mind trap and our lives explode. Life’s no longer boring; now it’s tolerable. There’s plenty of drama and intensity. This is the life!

Consider the alternative. What does it take to wake up from the dream? There’s an old story about a person who asked her teacher what it would take to awaken. He took her to the lake and held her under the water for several minutes. When he let her go, she popped up, grasping for air. “When you want to wake up as much as you wanted air, you will find what you seek.”

Some wake up slowly; they follow an inner urge, while others need a kick in the butt, a calamity; yet many never wake up. They go from birth to dirt, filling their days with busyness. It takes intense focus and great desire, but then, again, there’s always grace.

Once a young woman had a protective brother. He would not allow her to pursue her spiritual inclinations. So each night she climbed through her window and quietly made her way to her guru’s home. She was captivated by the truth he spoke. She excelled in meditation and spiritual disciplines and was told that on her next visit, she would receive enlightenment.

A nosy neighbor ran into her brother at the market. “You think your sister is so chaste. She leaves your house at night, when you sleep, and goes to meet her lover.”

The brother didn’t believe his neighbor, so the next night he followed his sister. She approached a strange house and entered. His heart was heavy; he felt betrayed. He peered in the window and saw his sister approach the master. At that very moment the master uttered the words that would bring ultimate peace and enlightenment to his sister. The guru heard a rattle at the window and turned and saw the brother. The brother heard the words and fell to the ground in supreme bliss. He made his way inside to the master and, through tears of ecstasy, thanked him. He fell to his sister’s feet in gratitude. Just one or two words, spoken with power and authority, awakened the highest in the brother. He had done no practices and no preparation, but the words pierced his heart. (Story excerpted from Words Make a Difference.)

Maybe there is no path to follow on the road to awakening, but rather than hope we win the lottery of enlightenment through grace, my advice would be to do spiritual practice. It is called sadhana. Sadhana can be structured, such as through daily meditation and yoga, or unstructured. Everything becomes a tool of enlightenment. We grow our awareness when stepping in dog poop, from being fully present as we listen to someone, or from sweating on a hot day. Gangaji says there are two things that keep us from enlightenment. 1) The belief that enlightenment only happens to gurus and masters, but not to me. Someone like me, an incompetent, striving seeker, will never be at this level. 2) The belief that enlightenment or awaking can happen to me, but it will happen some time in the future. It can’t happen now, and, with this logic, the future never arrives.

Waking up to our true selves is enlightenment. It’s not an end to seek; it’s just the movement in consciousness that makes the most sense. Knowing who we are should be the first order of business when we come into the world. But we live in a society that believes the world of things and accomplishments is the pinnacle of human existence, but, fortunately, there is a deep call that never leaves us alone. It is mistaken as a call for more: when we’ve done more, obtained more, and tried to be more, the pristine call of the self awakens. The seminal question: how will we respond? And, like the road less travelled, the way we choose will make all the difference. Good luck!

  Quotes

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  Featured Product This Month

"Books are waiting to be written. Thus, it was my privilege to bring this book to the world. It brought with it such grace and love. Words Make a Difference sparkles with aliveness and blessing and delivers the perfect information under perfect timing. We are called not only to heal ourselves and those around us, we are destined to hold a vision for the world. This book commands us to be architects of a brave new future and lights a path for us to follow." Anne Sermons Gillis

Order Words Make a Difference from the website or call me at 713.922.0242 to order directly from me. The price is $16.95 plus $3.99 shipping, for a total of $20.94.

Click for the Kindle version on Amazon for $5.99.

  What is EZosophy?

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NOTE: If viewing this on a cell phone, be sure to scroll right to see the other column.

  Healthy Living

The Mind

The idea of having a mind, is a concept. We have a physical brain, but the mind and the brain are not the same. What we call the mind is a series of thoughts. The mind, as we define it, is the process of thinking. If we look for our mind, we will not find it. The looking will reveal either awareness or a thought, yet, for ease of communication, I refer to the mind as something that has substance and reality. A thought or a belief does not have to be technically true to have influence or relevance. Some of the following views are designed to develop cleaner, clearer thoughts. Other thoughts are affirmations. Affirmations can be thoughts used to move our thinking in a better or more productive direction. Let’s take the “mind” by surprise and shower it with missives of well-being, power, and strength.

My mind is strong and focused.
My mind is steady and clear.
My mind is the perfect conduit for awareness.
My mind serves my being.
My mind remembers what it needs to remember.
My mind is safe and sane.
My subconscious mind is a reservoir for genius.
I have a healthy mind.
My mind is my servant.
My mind provides nourishing thoughts.
My short-term memory is improving daily.
My long-term memory is astounding.
My mind is entertaining, but it doesn’t have the final say on everything.
I can choose my thoughts. I don't have to be battered by harmful, errant thoughts.
I can watch my thinking without judgment or recrimination.
I am perfectly sane, even though I have a crazy thought from time to time.
I am not afraid of my conscious or subconscious mind.
There is nothing bad or wrong buried deep in my mind.
My mind is free.
My mind produces creativity.
My thoughts are ingenious.
I am not my thoughts or my mind.
Some thoughts are like drugs. I chose not to use drugs.
I will not be drug around by this crazy thought.
My mind is brilliant.

Give your mind a treat with these thoughts. They serve as a shower of blessings. Perhaps they will contribute to a new freedom and, for sure, they will make life EZier and EZier.

Excerpted from Words Make a Difference.

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

  Anne Talk

What If

Today’s Anne Talk is What If. Anne reminds us to think about our good, not our not so good. Time: 1:43    

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  Abundance Affirmations

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This group is a place to post uplifting affirmations and thoughts about prosperity and abundant living. Let’s create a right relationship with money so that we feel comfortable about money. Let’s use money as it’s meant to be used, and not as a way to accumulate power or to fill a void. We don’t need money to buy more stuff. We need it to create a world that works for everyone. We want to cast off old beliefs of lack and reclaim our natural state of abundance. Anne, AKA Dr. Money, posts a nightly goodnight for the prosperity team, and everyone who watches them becomes a part of the prosperity team.

  Shareables From Anne

The World's Best Weight Loss Secret

Thought Freedom

40 Days to Abundance

EZosophy Vows

Vows of Seriousness

Anne's Conscious Carols