You may have had a dream in which a ringing telephone urged you to pick up the receiver.
If this was the case, who was calling and what did they have to say to you? In both dreams and waking life, telephones are symbols of communication telling you that someone wants to communicate something to you, so perhaps your unconscious is trying to tell you something.
If you picked up the telephone and heard nothing but abuse, this signals guilt about some issue in your waking life.
If the phone rang in your dreams and you picked it up but no one was there, could your dreaming mind have been urging you to remember something or someone, as in ’ringing a bell’? Hearing a doorbell in your dream indicates something new coming into your life; this can be negative or positive, depending on the dream. It could also suggest the desire to hear from someone or make contact with them.
The ringing of an alarm clock in a dream indicates the need to get up and do something; it may also be a reminder of something or someone you have neglected. The ringing of a school bell, or the timer on a cooker, kettle or any kitchen appliance in a dream may also be prompting you to move forward with an idea or gain a new experience in the world. In real life, loud alarms—such as sirens, or fire, burglar, smoke or car alarms—warn us of impending threat and danger, and they do the same in dreamland. Perhaps your unconscious has noticed that your front door is not properly closed or that your car is vulnerable to theft. Alternatively, your unconscious may have been warning you about an overheated situation in your waking life, such as loss of control, invasion of privacy or an impending crisis.
Other sounds that are clear symbols of warning in your dreams include whistles blown by teachers, police officers or referees, the growling of angry dogs or the horns on cars, ships or trains. Such sounds may also indicate that you are defying authority figures in some way; there may have been an allusion to whistleblowing, drawing your attention to a transgression of some kind, either your own or someone you know? Alternatively, the growling of a dog could have suggested that you or someone you know are about to unleash their anger on the world in some way. Air-raid sirens are associated with the fear and pain of World War II and in dreams may express fear of the unknown or longing for old comradeship.
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