When I was around 5-7 yrs old I lived in an apartment building which had a big basement with a room for laundry where me and my mom used to go to do the laundry. When I lived there I had the same dream almost every night, I was in the basement, it was dark and by the stairs there was a silhouette of a hooded person standing there, when I saw them I would run at full speed towards the end of the hallway where the laundry area was.

Some of our earliest remembered dreams can have a long-lasting effect on the dreamer. A remembered dream from a young age can sometimes foretell the life of the dreamer. This is a repeated dream which means that it is trying to tell you something important.

Although this dream was undoubtedly stressful, it may be a positive dream. Why do I say this? In this particular dream, I believe that the dreamer may have actually been visited by a spirit. Seeing a “ghost” in a dream can certainly be a stressful experience for anyone – but especially for a young child.
• It is likely that the spirit was a deceased relative or some other deceased person – probably recently deceased.
• If he (?) is not there to harm the dreamer, there are, at least, three possible reasons for its appearance: (1) It just wants to meet the dreamer, (2) it has a message for the dreamer, such as asking for help, or (3) last, but not least, it may be that the spirit is offering to help the dreamer as a guide to the underworld.
• But what is this “underworld”? I am not 100% sure, but I have a couple of ideas, which are not necessarily mutually exclusive: (1) This may be the lower realm of the shaman or (2) it could be the collective unconscious as defined by Carl Jung.
• If this is a shamanic dream, it may be that the dreamer has been “called” or there is some other indication of shamanism.
• For a Jungian, the collective unconscious is that part of the psyche (aka mind) that is not consciously knowable. It is the source of various archetypes that we see in our dreams.

The darkness of the basement and the nearby stairway suggest that the dreamer was in the underworld, which is inhabited by dead souls and other spirits. Traveling to this realm in our dreams is often very positive. It indicates that the dreamer has reached a level of development where such travel is possible.

I do not believe that the hooded person means to harm the dreamer. There are a few things that hint that this hooded person is not malevolent.
1. The hooded figure made no attempt to attack the dreamer.
2. The hooded person did not, apparently, block the dreamer’s exit up the stairs.
3. The nearby laundry area hints that this is a “clean” dream.

Hope this helps,
Lugus