I've been experimenting with an alternative way to dodge and burn that I saw in a photoshop video that preserves raw data. In this picture, I started with my usual lightroom adjustments then sent the file as a smart object to photoshop. The smart object allows one to double click to re-open and edit in adobe camera raw at any time. If you duplicate the smart object any change to one will transfer to the duplicate, but if you right click and select 'new smart object via copy' you get an unlinked copy. So the light rays were already there but I wanted to lighten and accentuate them. So I did new smart object via copy, re-opened ACR and severely lightened the whole image using the exposure slider, then alt-clicked the new layer mask button at the bottom. (Alt-clicking turns the mask into a 'hide all' mask, where regular clicking turns it into a reveal all mask). I then clicked the mask and used the brush tool at very low flow to paint the light rays, gradually revealing more of the over-exposed layer below. Finally dialing in the opacity a little.

The final image is below, your critique and recommendations for improving the method are welcome. I'd rather you used your own photos though.