THE SYMBOLISM OF HOUSES IN DREAMS

“Home is where the heart is”

Our home is the place that we hold what is most precious to us - which can be both an internal concept of security and an external relationship with people, objects and possessions. For me, home is where my dog is...

My home is my refuge, a place where I feel safe and where I retreat from the world outside. It’s a private space where I can be completely true to myself. My house is somewhere I hold belongings and items of value to me, like my books, crystals and the magical tools I use in daily life. Sometimes I joke that if a thief ever broke in they wouldn’t find anything of value to steal. And yet everything in my home holds memory and value to me.

When other people have been in your home without your permission or even with your permission but have not respected your space - it can feel like a violation of your own body even. Where you can’t seem to settle back in. It feels alien and out of place. One day when I was at primary school, I returned home after school to find the door smashed in. At the time, I was panicked that my dogs had been harmed, 3 cavalier king charles spaniels, and so I went into the garage, found a crow bar and walked in. Thankfully they were shaken up but unharmed. And the burglars had left. The smell, feeling and sense of the house had changed and it can take days or weeks to feel like it’s your home again.

I mention this because in dream language, houses in dreams can represent the body and the rooms, different chambers of your psyche. Where do you feel safe in your subconscious life and where do you not...

Our earliest home is the womb, the dark space between this world and the next. And it is a temporary home until we separate from our mother and come into the family home. And that is only temporary until we separate from our parents once again and set up our own home or one with a partner. And so on… Home really is where our heart is and we carry that wherever we go in life. It’s actually a place inside of us that we project onto temporary brick and mortar.

HOUSE SYMBOLOGY some fun things to consider…

A house: our psyche and our body

A fence: boundaries and a reminder to look at your own boundaries

A small house: are you feeling stifled in some way or shrinking from a problem

A spacious house: a longing for space? If the house feels too big in the dream it could be that you are feeling overwhelmed or that you’re trying to grow into something.

An upstairs room: could be the intellect

A downstairs room: could represent instinct

The basement: could be where we hide secrets, the sub-conscious, where the shadows and skeletons and cobwebs lie. Where we feel trapped or in other scenarios safe, in the cases of hiding in the basement from intruders or tornados. It's where we store things of value, a wine cellar, where we store memories. It's the sub-level to our consciousness.

The front of a house: could be the face we project outwards to others

The back of a house: could be things we keep hidden from view or privacy

If the house is run down: are you feeling run down too? Are you neglecting yourself

A house from your past: what is your psyche revisiting for you?

Your present house: how do you feel about your home? Is it your safe space. What does it say about you?

If we think about the different rooms of our house we can relate these to different feelings and aspects of ourselves. The intimacy, nakedness and privacy of the bedroom, the safety of the bathroom where we can release, cleanse and eliminate. The hearth in the kitchen where we come together for sustenance, sociability and cheer. The relaxation and luxury of the lounge and the bridgeway of the hallway, linking us to all of these aspects with the different doors to the psyche. The tunnel we travel through from conception to birth and back to source again can also be the hallway in dreams. The parlour, a waiting place and where you put on a mask to greet others...

What does the house look like in your dreams? Was it symmetrical? Disproportionate, modern or old fashioned? Did it feel familiar or were you strangely displaced in it. Is the house spacious or do you feel pinched? What are the colours of the house inside and out? Whose house is it? And who are you with?

House of horrors.

As much as we idealise our house as a place of our projected self and safety. Houses also feature in some of the most iconic horror films. The Others with Nicole Kidman features an old mansion house full of ghosts. The House on Haunted Hill is another. Shut In is an interesting name for a horror and reminds us that a house can also feel like a prison. A place to run away from, from childhood trauma, or domestic abuse. The house in the film Inception, Mal’s childhood home, is depicted as grey and filled with memories she would rather forget. She never wants to return from the dream world that she and her husband Cobb have created together which becomes the hook for the whole film.

Pondering on the fairytale Hansel and Gretel and the gingerbread house, can tell you a lot about childhood wounds. Attachment styles, perhaps learned from parents…

“An English-man/woman’s home is their castle”, perhaps there is an actual castle featuring in your dream? A place of luxury and separation from the world. Representing sovereignty, authority and privilege.

Home can be the quest of epic odysseys, a longing to return home and to your true self.

And perhaps this is what our dreams help us with, a journey into the subconscious to find our way back home.

If you would like a Dream Therapy session, pop me a line and we can explore your dreams with the aid of the moon. Bringing clues to what your psyche is trying to communicate with you. We can track La Luna in your natal chart as well as consult The Tarot and Jungian dream theory. A Dream Session helps you to connect to your subconscious and unravel what wants to come to light and to be healed.

Email me on nicky@nickycrowe.com

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