Spiritual Lessons from Backdoors
When I went in to watch Backrooms, I went in blind. I really had no idea what it was about. What I found interesting is the spiritual lessons that were embedded in the storyline. Just to warn you, if you haven’t seen it and you hate spoilers, this article will have spoilers.
The first lesson is, if you go through a spiritual door or portal and on the other side is creepy lighting and objects or furniture stacked in chaotic ways, it’s probably not a good spirit or entity and it’s probably time to exit.
The second lesson I laughed at in the film was when the assistant manager Katherine begged the two men (Clark and Bobbie) to not go through the door. And then after they all went through the door, she begged them to turn around and not go further. Of course, she was continuously ignored. And then when they got to a big scary tunnel hole, she begged them to not go down it. Something felt wrong in her body. So, what do the two men do? They go through the door, they go deeper into the world, and they go down the deep, dark, scary tunnel. And what ends up happening? Well, his two employees Bobbie and Katherine end up getting killed by the creature in the dark, scary tunnel.
How many times have we seen this same story play out in mythology, folk tales, or just within our own battles of ego and intuition? We have Cassandra the Trojan princess who tries to first warn her brother Paris not to go to Sparta. He goes and it starts a war. Then, she tries to warn her people that the Trojan horse is filled with Greek soldiers, and she is ignored which ends in the fall of Troy. Then, we have Circe and Odysseus. Circe tries to warn Odysseus to not fight Scylla. What does he do? He fights Scylla and loses six men. This is a common theme you will see throughout mythology, folk, and fairy tales. The women who symbolize intuition and inner wisdom try to warn the men who symbolize ego and when the men ignore them, horrible things happen.
But what does this teach us about our own internal battles with ego and intuition? Because we have both within all of us. How many times have you ignored a gut feeling because you wanted to prove something or impress someone or you wanted to win? What can these tales and films like Backrooms show us about listening to our intuition? There is a time and place to be curious and learn about the Otherworld and spirits. I always teach my reiki students to approach fear in spiritual situations with curiosity. But, that doesn’t mean to walk through the world with blind curiosity ignoring all the warning signs (especially intuitive hits) that something is unsafe or just not right.
The third lesson was when Clark, the main character, gets trapped down in the tunnel after Katherine and Bobby get killed. We don’t really know what happens to him until later when his therapist goes to his furniture store to check on him. She of course walks through the portal door and seeks him out. Even though, she finally finds him, he seems off or different. Well, what do you know, she was right. He ends up choke holding her and forcing her to have dinner with him and a few warped beings who are described as fragments of memories from past visitors to the realm. Excitedly, he shows her that he can stab and eat these beings. In scientific or therapy terms, he’s clearly had a psychotic mental breakdown. Or, is it something deeper? Let’s explore.
In the beginning of the film, Clark has a session with his therapist and he’s working through a fallout with his wife and how she kicked him out of the house for being an angry, aggressive, drunk. He shows a lot of anger in this session, never truly taking accountability for his part in the collapse of his marriage. Always having an excuse to justify his behavior, the therapist realizes they will get nowhere in the session. So, how does this translate later in the film? Well, if we look at it from a shadow work perspective, he never truly faces his shadows or takes accountability for his toxic patterns and behavior. This eventually translates into this dark world and his shadow self consuming him. And I literally mean it consumes him. There is a scene where this giant pirate being in the world picks him up and bites into him and eats him. This pirate character has his face but it has crazy, enlarged eyes and teeth, the physical representation of his dark persona. All of his dark, shadow bits became so large and transform into this creature that is pure darkness and eats what is left of his human body. So, how does this translate into real life? Well, when we don’t face our shadows, the ugliest bits of ourselves, they can grow and transform into something bigger that takes over your life and your health. They will eventually consume you by causing disease in your body or sabotaging your relationships, jobs and everything else to fall apart.
And let’s talk about the world itself. At the end, a scientist saves the therapist from the pirate man and she gets out. He states that they don’t know how or why these worlds keep being created but they are all connected and it keeps growing. Well, sir, let me tell you why these worlds might keep popping up. They are probably popping up where there are low vibrations and heavy dense energy for long periods of time, where people are functioning only in their lower chakras, and living purely in a survival, scarcity mindset. This unprocessed energy builds and builds and becomes a portal. If you want to learn more about portals you can listen to my podcast Episode #6 Are you opening portals? 9 Everyday spiritual practices that unlock spiritual gateways. But the thing about portals is they can open up during moments of intense energy or energy that builds up over time. This can be within our bodies or out in the world. Portals can open from good emotions too, not just negative ones. For example, raves, church singing, dancing, etc. But, if we don’t process the heavier, lower frequency emotions, they can also build and transform into a portal that welcomes in dark entities.
Also, everything in this other world that Clark found was spooky and deformed. Very similar to our experience in the Spirit world, how we perceive entities or spirits on the other side is a reflection of the amount of inner work we have done and how much of our wounded parts we have integrated into our spirit. For example, if you’ve never truly faced yourself and taken ownership of your wounds, then everything in the Spirit world will look scary and evil. Because you haven’t faced the evil with yourself. How can you expect to see the goodness in others or the Otherworld if you can’t even find it within yourself first? It goes the other way, too. If you do a ton of inner work, talk to your demons, and now now you no longer see them as evil or a hinderance, then when you start opening your third eye and experiencing things in other realms, they won’t look so scary. You will have strengthened your intuition and your discernment and you now know what is truly a danger, and what is just a reflection of your shadow.
All this to say, these doorways were being created all over the world by people who weren’t processing their emotions, facing their shadows, or functioning from a place of balance and alignment.
At the very end we see a version of the therapist in the other world but she’s fragmented and disfigured. She experienced fear and anger in that world and it took those memories and created a warped, broken version of her.
All of these thoughts are just my own opinion of the movie and how I perceived it. I think there are lessons in every story and this one inspired me.
If you want to learn more about shadow work or my lessons in energy work and reiki, check out my website Bellaruna.com. I hope you enjoyed!