Abstract and Summary Information for Personal Encounter With Paranormal Dreaming

I originally titled this essay "Personal Encounter with Paranormal Dreaming." In February of 2007 I submitted a shorter version of this essay to the journal "Humanism and Anthropology" with the title "Psi Dreaming and Its Relationship to Santeria In Puerto Rico." Below is an abstract.

Abstract

This essay discusses the need for assessment techniques that identify authentic psi/ spirit experiences from mental illness and lying. The author’s experience of psi dreaming is juxtaposed with the self-disclosed accounts of a Santeria practitioner in Puerto Rico. One of the many hypotheses this essay raises inviting additional investigation from Humanistic Anthropologists is that practitioners of Santeria appear to enter a state of communitas when they are engaged in performing their healing rituals.
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On October 2, 2006, I exchanged some thoughts about this essay with Bob Krumhansl during the 5th Annual PsiberDreaming conference. Since 1989 I had wondered about the meaning of the word "Gia," and finally Krumhansl had the answer I was searching for. It was not Gia, but "Guia," and as you will read below "is the word for Guide in the sense of a spirit guide." I have yet to revise the version of the essay posted on this site, which is why I'm including the Notes below from my more recent essay. My writing is a labor of love, still it is labor nontheless and so pardon my failure to update the essay I've posted here. Actually each essay named above contain slightly different information, whereas the one I have posted here includes a more general introduction.
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Note #8 from the revised essay. During a discussion of Krumhansl’s (2006) essay “Language in Dreams,” I sent a draft of my essay to him asking about the correct spelling of Gia; Krumhansl replied:
The word Maria is trying to express is Guia . . . which is the word for Guide in the sense of Spirit Guide. . . . I was active in Puerto Rico in various “psychic” and metaphysical groups in the San Juan Metropolitan area for many years. The Santeria tradition in Puerto Rico is really a small fringe subculture with roots in the black slave traditions, and voodoo type rituals imported from Cuba and Haiti. . . . In a 99% Catholic country when I grew up, these things were absolute taboo, but everyone knew someone who knew someone who could help find a potion or a candle to help resolve some economic, health or romantic problem. It is common knowledge that all those candles to saints in the food markets are attempts to mask voodoo traditions in terms acceptable to the church. Instead of praying to a Spirit of good luck represented by an elephant-like icon a la Ganesh in India, they pray to a particular saint painted on a candle holder glass—like a Saint for Lost items, or a Saint for True Love. These Saints are really metaphors for special Santeria spirits; there is a native arts and crafts business in carved Santeria figures (October 2, 2006).
Note #9 from the revised essay. Communitas describes Carrera’s experience; CF #11 Schroll 2005b, on communitas. The word "communitas" comes from the work of Victor Turner, and does indeed refer to a sense of group communion. Victor Turner died before I could meet him, but I have lectured twice with his wife Edith Turner. Edith was also kind enough to quote from another of my essays in some of her recent work--which I'll say more about at another time.
Note #10 from the revised essay. Krumhansl adds to this point:
The shaman types in Puerto Rico are called curanderos. Folks with no medical training but who did have [psi abilities that] helped “cure” the sick or rid folks of evil spirits—the “black clouds” that I heard them say many times surrounded the ill or the evil or the vulnerable. As in most cultures, the commercial operation ones were mostly con artists, but my [Puerto Rican] mother-in-law Olga, 90 years old next week has many stories of a famous seer and healer that operated on donations and conducted some of her “operations” remotely with success. . . . Olga also participated and knew of groups that conducted “seances” where unusual things would happen. The true healers were few and far between (October 2, 2006).