A Note From Anne

Dear ,

Anne

  Celebrate

On Sunday, May 26, 2013, I will speak at a Unity Church on the topic of celebrating life. I’ve been pondering the subject. Life without our superimposed values is great. It’s our definitions and expectations that mess up our experience of life.

One of the ideas that gets in the way of our participating in the ongoing celebration of life is the subtle idea that we can’t do what we want. The idea and limits come in these forms:

• I can’t do what I want because I am too old.
• I can’t do what I want because of my health.
• I can’t do what I want because I don’t have enough time.
• I can’t do what I want because I don’t have enough money.
• I can’t do what I want because my partner/mother/culture would disapprove.

Do What You Can When You Can

Sometimes our minds make sweeping generalizations that keep us tied to our limits. It may be true that we have a lot of tasks on a certain day, but I’ve found I can take at least ten minutes off to go outside and commune with nature or care for my plants. I can take ten minutes to draw. I have my drawing instruments in a box, so my art studio is portable. I can draw or doodle from any room in the house. I can clean a shelf in the refrigerator for ten minutes. I love to look at a clean, organized shelf. I like cleaning and organizing the house. It calms me. I may not be able to take months or weeks off, but I can always take a little time off for myself today. I can and should create “Me Moments” every day, even if it is only ten minutes at the time. Ten minutes is enough to renew us and to get the essence of what we want. We all need breaks from our habits, chores, and plans.

You may not have enough money to travel to far off places, but most people could afford a trip to a nearby city and have a mini adventure. When it comes to doing what we want to do, it shouldn’t be an all or nothing situation. Some of my greatest adventures have been right where I lived. Once I took the day off to follow my intuition and follow my hunches all day long. I ran into a man who was with his mother. He was surprised when he saw me because he had given a copy of my book to his mother and she was currently reading it. I called a friend and found she was in the hospital. I went and spoke very frankly with her. She was happy that I understood her life and her struggles. That was the last time I saw her. She died soon after. I encountered a homeless man and stopped to listen to his story. I extended my hands to giving healing energy to his frost-bitten feet. It was one of the best days of my life. I went on a one-day quest in my home town.

Do It Now

Last year I had a dream. I was standing in the driveway of my childhood home. There was a television at the end of the driveway. The TV was on and it delivered message after message. I recognized the messages as the wisdom of the ages. I woke up from the dream into another dream. I told someone in my dream that I could only remember one message from my dream. “Do it now. Don’t waste your life. Don’t put it off.” I am not an advocate of trying to stay busy and productive; this message directed me to do the things I enjoy now. I should not put them off until later. And I should do them daily, not just every once in a while. If we spend day after day, just accomplishing tasks, cleaning up, or taking care of our lives, we live very limited lives.

I had a friend who read Ram Dass’ book, Be Here Now in the ’70’s. It impacted her so much that she and her husband completely changed their lives. They moved to the country. They started gardening. They decided to live the lifestyle they always wanted. She got pregnant and was living life to the max. Then tragedy. Her car was hit and she and her unborn baby were killed. What fortune that she lived life on her terms. If she had waited because she thought she could do it later, she would have missed a vital part of her earthly experience.

Waiting has its merits when it means going advisedly into a situation informed and ready, but it can also be procrastination or self-denial. Once, while in meditation, I saw a hand reaching out with what looked like a formal invitation addressed to me. I opened the invitation and found in print on the front, “It’s Your Life.” I opened to the second page and read “You’re invited.” What part of this impossible thing you want to do is possible now? Today? Be creative and do it. You can’t do everything you want to do all at once, and you may not be able to do all of what you want to do now, but you have the ability to do a little piece of what you want to do each day. This is a contribution you can make to your life. Tomorrow may never come. It’s your life, and you are invited. It’s time to jump into your life.

  Health Tip: The Power of Music

Play that funky music, white boy. Music is magic. It can pick you up or calm you down. If you feel depressed and need a lift, fast music with a strong beat will do the trick. Of course, it has to be something you like. Funk music and some rap do it for me. The other day I downloaded six songs that put that extra hop in my step. One of them was Play That Funky Music, White Boy and the other was Brick House. I’d been swinging with those songs for years and never owned a copy. It was time.

My friend Sherry called one day and said “I’m sending something that will change your life.” It was the Pointer Sisters CD, Break Out. She was right. if you listen to the songs Jump and So Excited, you’ll be hopping in no time, if you are a Pointer Sisters fan.

When frazzled, it’s best to listen to slower music, such as classical, slow jazz, or spa music. That’s a generalization, because the most important thing in our relationship to music is to be aware of the effect it has on us. Music can lower our cortisol (the stress hormone) levels. It is powerful medicine. If I’m feeling good, a song that has negative associations might or might not produce stress. If I am nervous, even something I would normally like, might raise my cortisol level.

When I first heard the sound track of Phantom of the Opera, I became addicted to it. I didn’t know the story; I just felt the music taking me over. I told my sister, Jo, I had to get off that music because it was too intense. She had given me a tape of the music – this was pre-CD. We talked a lot about that music. Seeing the live performance brought the music alive to me at an even deeper level. It seems to awaken a sense of mystery to me. Music moves differently in each of us. When we are sensitive to that movement, music can become a potent ally.

There’s a space we can tune into in meditation called “Music.” When connected to that realm, you can hear the music of the spheres. I’ve only heard it a few times; sometimes I could hear a complete unwritten symphony in just a flash of time. It’s a “wow” experience to hear music at the source level. There's a story that people who could hear Source music developed the instruments that could play the music they heard. The music came first; the instruments followed. Music rocks our souls. Find the music that rocks you to sleep or rocks you awake.

I love the following video presentation on the power of music. It's called The power of music: A few notes can change your life. Click the graphic below to watch it.

Here's another article about the health value of music. Click the image to go there.

Note: The graphic above was created with a free resource, the Mini Infographics Creator. You can enter your own text and graphic into the page and then save the resulting image file. It's a useful tool if you need to create something like this for advertising an article or an event.

  Anne's New Book: Standing in the Dark

Anne's Newest Book Click the image to learn more.	Anne’s new book, Standing in the Dark, is a salve for the out-of-control mind. In a high-speed society that forces time to do double-time and stuffs minds with inestimably complex information, we need mental medicine. Popular mind-bending methods encourage us to come up with the highest thoughts, to be positive and powerful, and to live our passion. Yet That Which is The Highest is beyond what words can touch.
Click the link below to read a review of my new book, by Charles Heineke, my editor for this newsletter, a "Top Reviewer" at Amazon: "Standing in the Dark can be EZier than you may think".
You can buy Standing in the Dark in a printed edition, a pdf edition, or a Kindle edition. Printed Ed.  |   PDF Ed.   |   Kindle Ed. If you don't have a Kindle application for your computer, phone, or tablet, you can download the free Kindle software from this link or connect to the Kindle Cloud Reader in your browser. Your reviews of the book on the Amazon website would definitely be appreciated. If you like the book, you can use the icons below to share it on Facebook and Twitter. Also feel free to share it anywhere else you socialize.

  Quotes

"Living in the now will be the wave of the future."
  – Swami Beyondananda

"The best way to illuminate the darkness is to make light of it."
  – Swami Beyondananda

"Each of us is totally unique -- just like everyone else."
  – Swami Beyondananda

“These quotes can be purchased as refrigerator magnets.” http://www.wakeuplaughing.com/refrigerator-magnets.html

  Video Bits of Wisdom

A while back I recorded a series of 21 short inspirational videos on a wide range of topics. Most of them are under 2 minutes. I'll be spotlighting a different Video Bit each week in this space, with a link to it below this message. When you go to that page, you'll need to click the Play button to start the video.

This Week: "Shall We Dance"
Click Here for This Week's Video Bit

Click the graphic above to see all of the Video Bits.

  What is EZosophy?

What is EZosophy? Click the graphic above to find out.

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

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  Anne's Schedule

May 30, 2013, 11:00 AM CDT
Conversations with Dennis Tardan
with guest Anne Sermons Gillis
Live on BlogTalkRadio
Live Call In: 818 739-8827
Click here to listen at the show time

June 3, 2013, 8:00 PM CDT
The Searcher's Road Map Show
with guest Anne Sermons Gillis
Live on BlogTalkRadio
Live Call In: 347-838-9142
Click here to listen at the show time

  Ask Annie G

Dear Annie G,

What is the most important thing in a relationship?

JG, Texas

Dear JG,

The answer is simple, but living the answer, can be challenging. The most important thing in a relationship is that we like the other person. This is not “I like them in theory” kind of like. It means that you hold a warm spot in your heart and always think the best of them.

If two people go to a counselor and they like each other, but still have problems, they have a good chance they can work through anything. If a couple goes in for counseling and they don’t like each other, nothing the therapist does will work.

Communicating well with someone you don’t like is like taking castor oil for your immune system. It’s not anything you do with fervor. You do it because you think it is good for you. Liking someone gives our differences a compassionate edge, and without that edge, relationships can never flourish.

When I get mad at my husband, I work through the upset internally or maybe we talk, and then I feed my mind with things that I like or admire about him. I think of fun we’ve had together or of our similar quirky sense of humor. There’s no doubt that when I send out good vibes about him, our relationship improves.

Thanks for asking,

Annie G

NOTE: Send your questions on life, health, food, spirituality, and relationships to Annie G.

  Anne Art

“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” Pablo Picasso

This is the original pen and ink drawing.
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This is the reverse image.
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Editor: Charles David Heineke of  TheDoorwayBlog and TheDoorway

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