What is spirit walking? We’ll come back to this…

What is Sanctification of self?

Sanctification is the act or process of acquiring sanctity, of being made or becoming holy. Sanctification of self is taking this process into your own hands. I call this process “spirit walking.” The following is a somewhat detailed account of my day spirit walking last Sunday. I’m going to share each photo in the order that it was taken. It’s important to take this previous post into account “Grandma and Grandmasters.”

Finding the First Book I’ve Ever Lost

I’ve read A LOT of books in my time. Because of how often I journal and the way my memory works I have always been able to remember the title of a book that had a piece of information I was interested in. A few weeks ago I ran into a situation where I couldn’t find the book I was looking for. This NEVER (I mean like… never ever ever EVER) happens. I spent WAY too long looking for the book because, like I said, that’s never happened before. That really bothered me… I eventually let it go (but didn’t forget about it).

While I was in my mom’s house in Milwaukee last week I decided to rummage through the house a bit looking for… I can’t even remember. I walked into my mom’s room for a second and a red dust jacket  caught my eye. A red dust jacket is one of the only identifying qualities I had for that book. I went and picked it up to discover it was that book I was looking for two weeks ago!

I mostly understand, but it will hard for me to explain why but… I broke down in tears. It wasn’t just because of my grandmother having passed a couple days earlier. I was hit with HUNDREDS of connections flowing through me all at once. I saw paths to me from my grandmother and beyond, I saw the martial links to me to Master Yin and Huang Xingxian and beyond and I saw a link to me to the books and authors and all of the experiences they had that led to the books they created that I then read. Not mention all of the people and places and experiences that led me to this moment.

What was the significance? I can be overly into “signs from the spirits” at times, but when I experience something that seems astronomically improbable (I have a fuzzy kind of math I do) I attribute to “the spirits” what many write off as coincidence. It can be dangerous constantly looking for “signs,” but when you’re slapped in the face by a sign it’s best, in my humble opinion, to listen.

What made this so crystal clear to me was the chances of me forgetting a book title, the chances of me finding it AND the subject of the book (specifically that last chapter). I can’t remember much about the beginning and middle but it ended on a note of creating your own “innerverse” using all of the digital technologies we have available to us. I immediately realized that I was surrounded by my “innerverse.”

That experience opened me up, then I started taking it all in…

A Message from Grandmaster Yin (and His Teachers)

The first thing that caught my eye was some of Grandmaster Yin’s calligraphy hanging on my mom’s bedroom wall.

“It is my firm belief that there is a purpose in life; one must create and work hard to achieve his goals. However, without good health everything would be in vain.

Man should control his passionate desires for the sake of his well being. To this end, the Chinese martial art (Kung-Fu) can indeed help to enhance one’s physical strength and capability. In fact, if it is practiced diligently without delay and interruption, it would naturally bring about good health and tranquility.

If one would carry out my aforementioned directive, longlife happiness would be assured.” – Chian Ho Yin

I figured this was OK to put on the Facebook fanpage of Grandmaster Yin that I created. I had made a vow to put no more posts on his page because I wasn’t a direct student. It seemed like this was OK because it was actually something straight from the hands of Grandmaster Yin and, through connection, his teacher.

Posting on Grandmaster Yin’s page may seem like a relatively small deal but it is HUGE for me. While I am varying levels of serious for a wide variety of things I take things mortally serious with matters associated with Grandmaster Yin. This is because he “spoke to me” during my very first spirit walk (that is WELL beyond the scope of this post). Something else I want to briefly mention is that I believe everything we see and experience that is a result from a “someone” IS that “someone.”

For example, watching the Avengers 2 movie and seeing Bruce Lee on Tony Stark’s shirt and being like “FUCK YEAH!” is no different that the “FUCK YEAH!” you would experience watching a movie of his while he was dead or alive OR on set directing Bruce yourself. The only thing separating you and Bruce Lee (whether he’s dead or alive) is time and distance. It’s his spirit that makes you go “FUCK YEAH!” not the 80% water and elements (physical body) which house his spirit. It’s hard for me to explain, but that’s what I got.

Additionally, all of the imagery you see of Bruce Lee (or Grandmaster Yin) on or offline is, in my opinion, THEM. I’m not managing Grandmaster Yin’s Facebook page. Grandmaster Yin(‘s spirit) is through the discipline and virtue he passed to me through Shelton (my teacher).

That blog post I wrote last week? My grandma, Grandmaster Yin and Huang Xingxian wrote it, not “me.” I was merely a vessel to transmit something from their spirits (this isn’t always true all of the time for me or anyone).

Genetic and Spirit (Memetic) Trees

Everyone is OK with the science behind one’s genes. That’s easily studied in the physical realm. I don’t need to spend any time on this.

But what about your “spirit” (or memetic for those more scientifically inclined) tree? Almost NO science has been put into studying matters of the spirit. The leaders of this “science” of thought/spirit are the various religious and spiritual traditions. I mean… it’s MIND boggling (for me anyway) to look around and be SURROUNDED by things that came STRAIGHT out of a group of people’s minds. We’re swimming in mind! We’re swimming in spirit! Attempt to think about all of the things that influence what you do and who you are. Imagine trying to write down all of the things that influence what you do and who you are? Seems like it would be impossible to do in words (although people do all of the time in biographies).

Now… imagine creating a visual spirit/memetic tree.

Remember how I was talking about connections? Think of all of the connections each one of those pieces of media has. All of them spidering backwards into the past, but coming focused towards me there on the bottom (or me presently typing this). The first thing is the Daodejing which, in my philosophical tradition, represents the void, the genesis of all things. Perhaps, for you, the bible would be up there. From nothing births the something, then the everything (the 10,000 things). Here’s one line of videos I popped in there.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much these three movies effected my life. They were hanging out in the house for a reason, especially given that I’ve given away practically everything I’ve had throughout my life. All of these things created “Mr. Nice Guy” (forgot to mention him above, that’s what that yellow coin bank represented), which in turn created miltownkid, which created miltownkid ZEE, which created Casey Abbott Payne which will create miltownkid ZEE 2.0.

You do not exist (the way you think you do). You are merely EXPERIENCING the crossroads between the physical (genes) and the spirit (memes).

Blessing from My Master

I meditate everyday and usually practice taichi with the meditation. Normally I meditate inside and do taichi close by. Since the weather was nice I decided to take a walk to the park to meditate. On my way to the park I decided to make a video for Senator Lena Taylor because… Why not?! lol

In this video I talk about what I want to do because of the effects of Grandmaster Yin’s teaching. I even mention him by name. The spot I go to in the park has CRAZY significance from a different spirit walk but that’s beyond the scope of this post. I get to the spot and meditate for 18 minutes. Then I stand up to do the Yijin Jing. While doing it I here someone and some kinds come up behind me. The older guy tells the kids “Quiet. He’s doing kungfu.” When I get done I figure I should say hello to that gentleman before moving on to the form. I turn around and, the first fucking words that come out of his mouth are…

GRANDMASTER YIN!

DA FUCK?! The next thing he says is “If Grandmaster Yin was here he’d say BEAUTIFUL! BEAUTIFUL!” DOUBLE DA FUCK?!

We hugged, I told him he was a kung fu brother and we talked about Grandmaster Yin. He told me I need to come back to teach his grandchildren and help him with his drinking problem. He also knew Teju (who ended up being at my first taichi seminar). He also wore all white because of Teju.

When you look at the picture above you might see me and a random Black dude in all white. When I look at the picture I see me and Grandmaster Yin. I could also see Grandmaster Yin and a random Black dude in all white. I could also look at the picture and see only Grandmaster Yin. I know the scientific would write all of this off as coincidence. I know coincidence when I see it and this was far from it. Finding the book was already off the charts. Then I just post on behalf of Grandmaster Yin (which I vowed to never do), then took a walk to the park thinking of Grandmaster Yin and got to the spot (which has CRAZY spiritual significance) for the first time since that experience to practice taichi and to then have a guy in all white yell “MASTER YIN!” at me is, to me, mathematically impossible (especially combined with an event I already thought was mathematically improbable). If you want to say it was just a coincidence you’re either really bad at math or refuse to see what is plain as day because of the programming you’ve been fed your entire life (in my humble opinion). I have one more event that happened today that I will finish with that, if you still are not convinced that there is at least SOMETHING going on behind the scenes of the physical world well… That’s cool. Do you! 🙂

(Note: I’d like to point out that while I lived in Milwaukee growing up I practiced in a number of parks doing a number of different things and never had a person recognize what I was doing as Grandmaster Yin’s art. The funny thing is that in the past I was actually doing Grandmaster Yin’s stuff, it’s all I did. This guy saw me doing Master Wang’s stuff. It’s something that’s similar to what Grandmaster Yin did, but different still.)

My Search for a New Pair of Fly Adidas

After that I decided to wander down 27th street in search for some new kicks (I need new Adidas to complement my Black Horse suit of armor). I got all the way to Wells before I realized everything was closed because it was Sunday. On the way to Wells I noticed an old busted apartment building was replaced with this sweet ass park.

Being all connection minding I got to thinking about how someone’s dream to create a place to serve and protect the city’s youth transformed that busted old building into that community garden park (I also went to Neighborhood House growing up). Much in the same way Grandmaster Yin’s dream of creating upstanding traditional martial artists created Shelton… and a guy who’s trying his best to live up to Grandmaster Yin’s greatness (me… lol)

This was my third trip back to Milwaukee and I met with Amar every single time. He had been trying to draw the miltownkid (ZEE) out of me with each visit. He was talking about ALL of the things miltownkid was (is) about. Previous to reconnecting with Amar I had decided that I was going to leave all of that behind to focus on a simple life as a wannabe taichi master. But no… Amar had to poke the dragon pheonix.

It’s beyond the scope of this post but I was ALREADY a phoenix in my spiritual cannon but… I didn’t really understand why. Seeing that mural last week made me understand why. The miltownkid died. Perhaps there was a faint beating, but he was on the way out. It may not seem like a big deal to the reader but I even let miltownkid.com expire. A domain I held for over 10 years (a name I used for over 15). I had been toying around with new online identities to start. I finally decided to use Casey Abbott Payne (it was an easy decision for obvious reasons. 🙂 ) Casey Abbott Payne is a simple taichi guy who wears all black, humbly does work and is slowly building a taichi business for himself. miltownkid ZEE is… well… he’s a colorful character, much like the phoenix in the picture. What that picture represents for me is Casey Abbott Payne being the ashy remains of miltownkid for miltownkid ZEE to be reborn from. The funny thing is, and I hadn’t thought about this until I started writing this post, I found my fly new pair of Adidas because of that trip looking for them.

The Guiding Hand of Grandmaster Yin

I wonder what the naysayers will say of the following. They’ll probably say I photoshoped this photo. Or that I did it on purpose somehow (I honestly wouldn’t even know how to do it). Shane’s mother left a comment on a post I wrote about being bipolar (Shane’s mom is actually in my spiritual canon too now that I think of it… Not like that!) For some reason when I went to reply I was acting as Grandmaster Yin… I have ABSOLUTELY NO idea why. If you look at the photo you’ll see that, in the upper right hand corner, my profile is still there. Normally when you’re acting on behalf of the page the profile pic of the page will be up there. This happened RIGHT at the start of me writing this (check the time on the photo and the time of the post). AND, for some icing on your naysayer cake, look at what the fuck she posted?!

You are much strong….little grasshopper.

DA FOOK!

This is going to have to be part 1 of an at least 3 part series… Also, I ran into this book because of this post. It seems as though spirit walking is a thing. Who knew?! “Spirit Walking: A Course in Shamanic Power“