Basement Downstairs

This part of the house is often used in dreams, and represents hidden motives, part of us that is barely known and so is often can the unconscious, so the unknown feelings, memories or past experiences, your biological past, and the place where your conscious mind contacts hidden powers, universal wisdom, and even other minds. Sometimes it means base deeds, low morals, underlying dislikes or traumas. It is from the basement, below, or within, that libido or life force arises. Fears and terrors sometimes come from downstairs. This is because it is the place we hide our old memories and hurts – in the unconscious. But it also holds the understanding of your wholeness. See Pandoras Box

It suggests what is unconscious or below ones usually level of awareness. Also may still have associations to do with ‘below stairs’ referring to what is beneath one or a lower class. Also in the cellar or basement one is near to the earth, the primordial forces of nature, what moves beneath ones ‘street level’ personality.

The basement can also link with what your present personality has been built upon, your past or family and cultural influences. If there are no walls to the cellar, or tunnels leading from it, it shows an openness or connection with influences beyond your own personality.

But it can be the power place, where so much of your life takes place – within you – in thinking, feeling and willing. It suggests what is unconscious or below ones usually level of awareness.

Also may still have associations to do with ‘below stairs’ referring to what is beneath one or a lower class. Also in the cellar or basement one is near to the earth, the primordial forces of nature, what moves beneath ones ‘street level’ personality.

Such a basement can in some dreams cause anxiety, but in others it offers a huge opportunity and many possibilities. It can be the place where hidden feelings can erupt such as anger, sexual longing, spiritual insight – anything because we are in the unconscious. See the unconscious and collective unconscious.

Example: It was a huge basement store, full of second-hand goods. My son bought some things, and pulled out four pound notes to pay. I asked him where he had got them from, and found he had stolen them. I was so angry I hit him with a poker, breaking his arm – or at least, I was frightened I had broken his arm. Having once hit him I wanted to go on and on hitting him, but struggled against this.

The spiritual can  be born here instead of in a stable.

Example: Was in a basement. My wife and a woman I was in love with was giving birth to a Baby, but I was somehow the one who gave birth to it, without a doctor being there. I remember my love chewed through the cord. I looked at the baby, it was a lovely boy. Its lower face was covered by a tight caul, but I pulled this off and it began to breathe. It opened its eyes and looked about, fully conscious. Then said something about Jesus, and, “It is gone!” The baby was then take an upstairs, and I felt it was a holy and wonderful baby. I was going to rest from the rigours of the birth, but on looking around saw how dusty and dirty the basement was. I began to clean it, and felt I would go upstairs and rest afterwards.

Example: What happened was that I seemed to go through the ground to what lies underneath. I don’t literally mean under the earth, but underneath people, underneath the events in life, what is usually hidden; only I felt it as like going into a vast place underneath everything. I understood that this was what is usually called the unconscious, or in past ages the underworld. In it I felt at the roots of all living things.

The first thing I saw was my youngest son. He was crouched just below the surface, unable to break through to the outside – what we call everyday life. This was a revelation because it explained so much about his behaviour. It showed me exactly what difficulties he was facing. Lots of people never get to even glimpse this hidden world of beings and energies, but my son had always known it and been held by it, almost like he had never been born from it. Seeing him at first deeply concerned me. But I understood that this was his life. Although it was difficult he would learn things denied to most people. He would know them instinctively because he was a native to this underneath world, the place inside us. So I stored the memory and moved on.

I found that I could think of anyone I knew and gain insights into what they were like inside. This was because this place, or condition I was in was like a space underneath a town. From here you could get into anyone’s house. You could touch the roots of trees and all living things, because they all emerged from here. My own sense of myself was different too. I knew without doubt that I had existed throughout all time. If I asked a question about the past, I knew just what had happened then, the whole struggle of humanity to grow, to meet itself. I knew because my central self had been a part of it all.

Then I came to what I called the Temple of The Animals. Again I have to describe it as a picture, a scene, but it was more like a direct knowing or experience. Here all that lived was gathered together. Not only as rank upon rank of animals in a great amphitheatre, but gathered in being linked as one mind, one spirit, knowing each other. So that when I walked into the temple I met this vast spirit which was as ancient as life, and had experienced all that life had done on this planet, and knew all the wisdom of its immense experience. And this Great Spirit looked upon me and knew me. It entered my own spirit looking to see if I knew how to love my mate and care for my children. It did this, as I understood it, because central to all that life had done in its many forms, was this great theme of self giving in caring for offspring and mate. It had learned how to love, and if I had not learned that lesson, I couldn’t receive the blessing it could give. As it was, it judged I had sufficiently learned the lesson of giving myself. Then I received the blessing of sharing a small part of its wisdom and ancient love.

A snake in the cellar or cave: Our psycho-biological drive; the energy behind our growth and motivation which includes sex drive. Often experienced as our emotional or feeling drive or zest for life. This connects us with awareness of our evolution as a person. See Snake.

Bad smell: Negative emotions which could cause depression or illness. See: house.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Am I harbouring unknown motives, fears or perhaps anger?

Are there things I am not letting myself think or feel?

Am I finding wonders or tragedy in the basement?

It is important to know how to work with what you find in the unconscious, so please read Important to Understand This and also Nothing Can Hurt You in Your Dreams – Super Heroes and Mythical Creatures