Someone in my “I Ching and the Practitioner” course asked about Chinese dreamworking. Though delving into the subject fell a bit outside the scope of the I Ching, I thought it’d make an interesting closed-circuit blog entry.

My mother’s specialty is dreamworking and oneiromancy. She works primarily through the realm of dreams. Allegedly. The lawyer in me, I think, or maybe it’s just the enduring skeptic, feels compelled to add “allegedly.” This rambling does not come from a place of personal expertise, because I’ve always been the opposite of my mother. I am not a dreamworker. I would say I don’t dream at all, or at least I rarely remember my dreams. I don’t receive prophecies, divination, or forecasts of any kind through my dreams. No–that’s not entirely true, but it’s true enough for me to assure you that I am no expert. So I’m speaking from a point of neutral, outsider observation, as the daughter of a shamanic dreamworker.

By the way, she would never identify herself as a shaman. She doesn’t use anything to identify herself. Others, however, when she isn’t around, or when describing my mother, may use certain terminology. But she would never call herself anything other than “wife, mother, daughter” those kinds of titles. I’m the one taking the initiative to say “shaman” because it’s descriptive of what she does. You’ll see what I mean.

Mom’s energy is…oh man, I don’t want to say it’s darker than mine, because that’s definitely untrue, but I have to confess that “darker” would be the first word that pops into my mind even though immediately after I am self-aware enough to correct myself and say that’s not entirely accurate. What does “darker” mean anyway? If anything, it’s more revealing of my mindset and my biases.

Let’s start with some generalities about Mom’s background. She comes from the deep south of Taiwan, the heartland of Taoist magic, witchcraft, sorcery, shamanic work, and honestly, who knows what else. She grew up in abject poverty, the youngest daughter of a peddler who sold tofu, rice cakes, and local Taiwanese perishables from a crate pulled behind a bicycle, along with herbal medicines and magical healing remedies he concocted himself. I used to joke to Mom, “So he was engaged in the unlicensed practice of medicine. Got it,” to which I’d receive a dirty look. Grandma would from time to time support Grandpa’s work by crafting other talismanic remedies and amulets. Somehow, Mom managed to get herself married into one of the wealthier families in Taiwan, the son of a tea plantation owner in the north, someone who, despite coming from the same island, came from a diametrically different culture. That would be Dad. Mom was never accepted by Dad’s family for pretty obvious reasons. (I talked a bit about Mom and Dad’s hookup in the final video module of the “Tarot and Shadow Work” course, for those who are enrolled in that class and are interested in more details.)

In stark contrast to Mom’s background, since Mom married Dad, I was born into a world of privilege. For all of my formative years, I was kept in a perfect, comfortable bubble, so I’m not going to have the grit that Mom has. Any grit I have at all comes later, from, you know, growing up and having to learn how to adult. Mom, on the other hand, had to learn grit from the moment she entered this world.

Mom has a heightened sensitivity and awareness to what we Asians refer to as “hungry ghosts.” Throughout her girlhood, she suffered from night terrors and nightmares. When she was in high school, her older brother was believed to have become possessed by demons, and he had called out to her in desperation, saying they (the demons) were afraid of her, so she needed to come closer. She went closer and instinctually, began ordering them (the demons…) to leave. Apparently, they left. From that point on, she realized her connection to what she perceives to be an underworld.

After people die, Mom says she can see them in her dreams, or go to where they are. She is particularly connected to those who weren’t very good while they were living and so have now gone to somewhere dark or cold. She works with those who died in an untimely manner, who had a difficult passing, those who think they still have scores to settle, those with unfinished business. It would be much easier to dismiss her stories if she didn’t then come back with information for the deceased’s relatives that Mom had no way of knowing. Including prognostications of future events. On the bright side, Mom knew how to help these souls out of their murky predicaments and get them to move onward, err…toward the light. As it were.

Mom is deeply religious and deeply superstitious, surrounding herself with what I might best describe as Buddhist love and light, because I think it helps her manage the fact she sees and feels the shadow. Yet oddly, for all that love and light, when I was a little girl, she complained about my gentle, docile nature (baby Bell was very not Queen of Swords, or even Page of Swords…). She worried about me, I think. For those who are into energy work and believe in the portfolio of beliefs Mom buys into, you’ll understand what I mean when I say she was obsessed with shielding me and drilling into my head how to shield myself.

She has always been totally okay with me not buying into all of her beliefs or hierarchy of worlds, just so long as I kept up with my meditations, shielding recitations, and continued to do good in the world. Oh, she has always been obsessed with doing good and good karma, too. To laughable extents, really. I mean, she named me “good.” Or benevolent. In case you’ve never read my “About Me” page. That’s where Benebell comes from. Benevolent. My Chinese name is literally Good. And so is my sister’s and other sister’s. All of our names begin with Good. That’s how obsessed she is. In third grade, for a birthday party I got to throw, where all my classmates would be invited, Mom ordered these pens with customized messages written on them for party favors. She wrote on the pens: “Be good so that your soul can always find the light.” Something to that effect, which raised more than one eyebrow. For Pete’s sake, Mom, it’s a birthday bash for nine year olds. In suburban New York and it’s the 80s. Ease up with the fire and brimstone multiple underworlds damnation speech.

Dreamworking, as defined by someone who is not a practitioner of dreamwork but just a lifelong observer of it, is when your astral body or consciousness (or something) journeys to other nonphysical realms where spirit entities to the effect of either angels or demons reside, using the terms “angels” and “demons” quite loosely and broadly here. It’s premised on a belief system or cosmology of a whole hierarchy of spirit realms, some celestial and some more in line with what we might think of as underworlds, hell, Hades, or purgatory. Mom’s primary journeying is into the underworlds or purgatory and meeting departed souls there. Her connection to the celestial realms and Light is only when she acquires knowledge that a soul has transitioned on into that Light.

Mom doesn’t love to talk about this stuff, kind of the way–I noticed–Asian elders who’ve lived through one of the major wars don’t like to talk about that period of their lives. They talk enthusiastically about their childhoods before that war, discretely skip over that block of time, then talk about their life experiences after that block. Or like how when you, the grandkid, are young, before meeting Grandpa, Mom and Dad will stoop down to your level, look you dead in the eyes, and say sternly, “Whatever you do, do NOT ask Grandpa about the war. (or “the famine,” or “the Cultural Revolution”…take your pick based on region of Asia)”

The way she can recount descriptions of these underworld landscapes is also incredible. The way she does it reminds me of me returning from a vacay visiting the Grand Canyon, or Macchu Picchu, and telling a friend about the scenery and experiences.

From my observations, people who do dreamwork don’t want to do dreamwork (or do it reluctantly) and can’t wrap their minds around why others would go out of their way trying to learn how to. That being said, once the ability that is there is recognized, it’s better to study up and get yourself armed with knowledge so you know how to navigate that terrain.

Talismans can be crafted, kept under the bed, slipped into the pillow cover, or worn as a necklace, or kept in the pocket of a nightgown. Why should you keep one on you when you dreamwork? Being a living soul in a world of the dead (or undead?) is a bit like walking down an alleyway of a dangerous neighborhood in the middle of the night blinged out with loads of gold jewelry and designer wear. You’d be drawing too much attention to yourself. A living spirit in that realm is going to be like you walking down that alleyway blinged out. So talismans help to keep you lowkey, kind of like cloaking mechanisms.

The above is my digital illustration of a sample dreamworker’s protection talisman. I go a bit into using the I Ching for spell-crafting in my “I Ching and the Practitioner” course. If you’re enrolled in that course, then you’ll have the background information you need for that center hexagram. This would be a double-sided medallion that has been enchanted by a practitioner (so it’s much more than just doodling that and calling it a talisman). As for what those three vertical lines of calligraphy say, that’s actually explained in detail in my book, The Tao of Craft. I address those three specific lines and the meaning in one of the passages in that book.

Dreamworking means you’re fast asleep. So it’s after nighty-night time, often late in the night. Actual dreamworking takes place by the practitioner around 2 am, 3 am, 4 am, around there, while the practitioner is fast asleep. Those born with dreamworking abilities but who haven’t yet actualized those abilities might find themselves chronically jolted awake or plagued with insomnia through those hours, due to their own subconscious mind’s defense mechanism of keeping you awake so you don’t inadvertently go to those underworlds, where your mind knows can be dangerous. They’re also typically plagued with night terrors and nightmares, which sounds bad but are actually another one of your mind’s defense mechanisms. Better a silly nightmare to keep you pinned to this physical world than your mind entering that other world. Night terrors might also be those from the underworlds sensing out that you can sense them, and reaching out to try to get your attention. So those are just some common indications that one might be a born dreamworker.

The cute thing about being the child of a dreamworker is when you as a child say you’re scared of the dark, rather than get an adoring but patronizing nod with a “now, now, there are no monsters under your bed, go to sleep, child,” your mother will take it seriously and drill you with a dozen questions to try to figure out whether you’re just being a kid or whether it could be something else.

A key purpose for dreamworkers is to help those who have died and are not in a good place to get the deceased’s loved ones to engage in liturgical or ritualistic measures Mom’s peeps believe will help purify that soul’s karma and clear a path toward the light for that soul. (So by extension, along with the actual fast-asleep-dreamworking, dreamworkers also know all the things about purifying karma and helping souls move into the light and all that hullabaloo they do while they’re fully-awake.) Dreamworkers help end the suffering of recently departed souls who have found themselves in the underworld. Those who die with unfinished business and can’t seem to let go of their physical lives end up in an underworld or purgatory of sorts. She helps them to connect with those in the living world to help get that unfinished business finished, so that the soul can finally feel a sense of resolution, and move on. Dreamworkers also handle ghosts who are haunting the physical realm, or who are stuck in the physical realm.

In Taiwanese culture, routine dreamworking might be left to the “professionals,” but to an extent, everyone does it, especially after the passing of a close loved one. Within the culture, you often hear about someone who has dreamt that her recently departed parent’s soul is seen somewhere dark, cold, and that parent is hungry, begging the dreamer to bring food and warmth. That person then wakes up and immediately tells everybody to burn more incense and offerings at the ancestor altar. Or if she feels at a loss for what to do, a priest, priestess, witch doctor, or shaman is called in.

Now, to the Westerner, perhaps one thing should be made clear. This underworld isn’t hell from the Abrahamic standpoint. It’s not evil and it’s not always terrible, even though sure, oftentimes those trapped there are suffering and some serious dangers lurk there. People in this physical form also suffer here on earth. But what can be said is when the dreamworker is called in to intervene, it’s usually because a soul is stuck somewhere that soul “shouldn’t” be. I put “shouldn’t” in quotes because it’s complicated. The underworld, or underworlds, represent part of an afterlife belief system that’s found in the culture I’m from. To be clear, it’s an ancient belief system that only those who still hold on to the old religions believe in. Your common 21st-century city dweller in Taipei, Taiwan is not going to know anything about dreamwork, demons, or underworlds.

I told my mother that someone had asked a question about Chinese dreamworking and since she does it, it only made sense to get a quote from her, right? I asked her if she had any tips, advice, insights, anecdotes, anything at all she’d like to voluntarily contribute.

Her exact words: “Why anyone want to know that?”

Me: “Mom, they’re interested. So, what would you say to someone who is interested in learning more?”

Mom: [long pause] “Don’t do it. And don’t learn about it. It’s not for you.”

Alrightey then. See? I told you she and I have totally different personal energies and vibes.