It’s that time of the year again! Spring is in the air and much of India is celebrating in the color-filled streets for Holi festival. Known to the Western world as the Festival of Colors, this ancient festival represents rejuvenation and celebration for the beginning of joyously warmer days to come. As the seasons change our bodies subtly transform. Accumulated Kapha (phlegm) from the winter months begins to disperse, leading to dreaded spring allergies that are a result of thriving bacteria from the increase in precipitation. Still, we joyously shed our layers, hats, and scarves to embrace the warmth of the sun.
It’s the time of year that we come together in large numbers to partake in some of the rituals of Holi festival. We gather together around fire to perform “Parikrama,” which means to move around fire. This act helps the body to balance Kapha, and in turn, prevent diseases associated to excess liquified Kapha. Even though Parikarma touts major health benefits, it isn’t as widely known as the act of throwing of colored powders during Holi. These colored powders are so much more than just for looks, they’re actually medicinal powders made from Ayurvedic herbs. These include: neem and henna to produce green; kumkum and raktachandan to make vibrant red powder; haldi for yellow; and lovely jacaranda flowers produce blue.
Did you know that these colored powders are also liquefied into Abeer (dye) and loaded into water guns to spray all over one another?! This act is not only fun, unifying, and a total stress release, but biologists also believe that the colors themselves strengthen the ions in the body when absorbed through the pores of the skin. Colors have powerful healing abilities that have been celebrated for thousands of years. From the dawn of mankind, humans have associated colors to certain symbolism across the many cultures of the world. Something about color itself prompted emotional responses that led to this symbolism that many colors represent today. It’s been argued that our physiological responses to colors are an involuntary, primal response to the electromagnetic radiation that colors give off. It’s truly amazing when you think about the fact that colors are just a wavelength of radiation that we can actually see, and radiation is energy. So when it comes down to it: we’re SEEING energy!
COLOR AS THERAPY
Even the director of the American Institute for Biosocial Research, Alexander Schauss, believes that the colors we see can have a profound affect on our physical bodies. Schauss argues that the energy of color itself interacts with the several regions deep within the brain that control physical and emotional responses. Western scientists are just beginning to realize the extent that light and color impact health and behavior. Color therapy or ‘Chromotherapy’ started off pretty rocky due to the once popularized Victorian works of a few western charlatans. However, in recent times, Chromotherapy has been further legitimized in the western world and renamed to Photobiology, dedicated to studying the effects of light and non-ionizing visible light responsible for color. Fact: 16 Nobel Prizes have been awarded in Photobiology.
Colors have been shown to affect blood pressure, heart and respiration rates, brain activity, and even your circadian clock. It’s no wonder that the colors of art, flowers, fabrics, foods, spices, and rooms can make us all feel such deep, almost primal, emotions that tend to dramatically affect our behavior. While many colors are now used in the treatment of a variety of diseases, they also have a deep association with the seven chakras. Each chakra possesses its own color, or energy, that helps to restore balance to the three doshas.
Red: Root Chakra
Orange: Sacral Chakra
Yellow: Solar Plexus Chakra
Green: Heart Chakra
Blue: Throat Chakra
Indigo & Violet: Third Eye Chakra & Crown Chakra
Skeptical about the actual impact of color? A study recently took place at a school in Edmonton, Alberta to compare the physiological reaction of 2 blind children to that of 7 children with full sight based on changes in the color of their classroom. The walls were changed from orange and white to royal and light blue, which resulted in all of the children’s systolic blood pressure dropping nearly 17%. According to teachers, the children become less fidgety and better behaved. When the colors were changed back the behavior also reverted back. This physiological reaction is believed to be a result of the minute amounts of electromagnetic energy from light that seem to affect the brain’s neurotransmitters that carry messages from nerve to nerve and nerve to muscle. It’s clear to many researchers, Psychologists, and Photobiologists that many hormones, including melatonin and serotonin, can be directly affected by color themselves.
INTEGRATING COLOR FOR GOOD
Using color strategically can be a useful tool in your wellness routine to very passively obtain mental and emotional balance without a lot of effort or additional changes to your daily routine. This color therapy guide will help you self diagnose and reflect on your current mood to select the colors to surround yourself with for balance. We recommend experimenting and recording the effects you experience from the colors you’ve chosen to focus on in any particular day in order to reassess your reactions and further optimize your routine. Always start by asking yourself how you’re feeling before choosing a color to surround yourself with. Start by taking a scrap piece of paper and write down a list of 2 things you’re currently feeling or want to feel like today and 2 things that you’ve been feeling for a longer period of time (over a month) or would like to feel. Next, let’s assess the ways you could incorporate these color changes with a list of things that we find fairly easy to change based on your assessment.
Daily
These are things you can change daily
Clothes, jewelry, purse, and other accessories
Computer, phone, and tablet backgrounds
Color of the pens & paper you use
Surrounding environment
Foods
Long-term
Things that you’ll want to change based on your long-term challenges like adding an accent color consistently throughout specific rooms of your home
Curtains, placemats, and table runners
Rugs,sheets, and blankets
Flowers & plants
Painting a room or adding a feature color wall
WARM COLORS
Let’s start with the warmer toned colors of red, orange, and yellow which are represented by Pitta (fire) dosha. These shades help to alleviate Kapha phlegm and we recommend wearing a few of these warmer tones for a healthier transition between the seasons.
RED – STIMULATING
Abeer (dye) ‘bath’
Agni (fire) element
Associated with love, warmth, and comfort
Considered an intense, or even angry, color that creates feelings of excitement or intensity
Red is stimulating, energetic, and exciting
Increases blood pressure, respiration, heartbeat, and pulse rate
The autonomic Nervous System takes over and reactions become automatic
The taste buds become more sensitive, the appetite improves, and sense of smell heightens
Use for
Increasing athletic performance
Making food taste better
Increasing appetite
Drawing the eye’s attention
Increasing enthusiasm and energy
Going on romantic dates to make them more exciting
Fun Fact: Red is the first color you lose sight of at twilight.
Try Pure Energy Wellness Oil for a similar energizing affect from ginger and peppermint.
ORANGE – ALERT
Appetite elevates and increases
Relaxation is induced and the potential for sleep increases
The rates of blood flow slow down
Stimulates activity & appetite
Encourages socialization
Use for
Wearing to workout
Increasing appetite
Recommended for asthma
Increasing enthusiasm
If you’re shy in social situations
Possibly aids in treating menstrual cramps
Fun Fact: Orange increases oxygen supply to the brain, produces an energizing effect, and stimulates brain activity.
If you’re feeling a little less than confident in social situations we recommend Pure Bliss Wellness Oil as confidence in a bottle.
YELLOW – ENERGY
Prithvi (Earth)
Increases metabolism and enhances digestion
Enthusiasm, confidence, optimism
Stimulates mental processes
Activates memory
Encourages communication
Can add to stress by preparing a person for flight to fight
Yellow surroundings cause allergies to flare more frequently
Use for
Increasing creativity
Increasing social communication (collaboration)
Improving memory (Ever wonder why sticky notes are yellow?!)
Enhancing dieting goals
Fun Fact: It is the most difficult color for the eye to take in. People are more likely to lose their tempers in yellow rooms while babies tend to cry.
The rosemary in Pure Energy Wellness Oil is wonderful for improving memory similar to the color yellow.
COOL COLORS
Pitta Dosha, or the Fire Body Humor, can be relieved by the use of cool colors, such as green, blue, and violet.
GREEN – NATURALLY HEALING
Ganges or River Ganga is the holy river of Hindus, which is worshipped as a Goddess.
Vayu (Air)
Can decrease VataDosha, or the Air Body Humor
Relieves stress
Increases healing
Reduces stomachaches
Aids in combating skin diseases
Relaxes mentally, as well as physically
Helps alleviate depression, nervousness, and anxiety
Offers a sense of renewal, self-control, and harmony
Balances metabolism & stabilizes weight
Use for
Increasing healing from physical ailments, sickness, and inflammation
Soothing tense nerves and stress
Achieving metabolic balance
Preventing nightmares
Unwinding and resetting your mind
Healing inflammatory skin conditions
Fun Fact: Green is the color used for night-vision goggles because the human eye is the most sensitive to and able to discern the most shades of that color. People waiting to appear on TV sit in “green rooms” to relax.
Try our Deep Nourish Extreme Dryness Treatment to heal inflammation based skin conditions like eczema.
BLUE – CALMING
Jala (Water)
Relieves stress and anxiety
Increases productivity
Lowers pulse rate, body temperature, perspiration
Calms and sedates: Slows down the pulse rate and deepens the breathing
Aids intuition, independent thinking, and spirituality
Reduces violence and anger
Reduces the appetite
Regulates sleep
Use for
To appear reliable, loyal, and stable
Calm and relax tense nerves or get over something you’re angry about
For mediation
When you need to be more productive or stop stressing about the many things you have to do
Post workout cool-down
To prevent overheating
Decrease excessive appetite
Reduce fevers
Neutralize anger
Help you sleep better
Fun Fact: Humans didn’t see blue till modern times according to recent research.
Can’t seem to find you calm place still? Try Pure Calm Wellness Oil for the ultimate relaxation experience.
VIOLET – ENLIGHTENMENT
Indian Hindu widows play with colored powder as part of Holi celebrations at the Pagal Baba Ashram in Vrindavan, India, Tuesday, March 3, 2015. The widows, many of whom at times have lived desperate lives in the streets of the temple town, celebrated the Hindu festival of colors at the ashram. (AP Photo/Tsering Topgyal) ORG XMIT: DEL106
Encourages creativity
Promotes confidence
Eases joint stiffness
Immune-boosting
Use for
Increasing consciousness
Uplifting spirituality
Bringing awareness to your mediation
Fun Fact: Violet is the strongest electromagnetic wavelength color, being just a few wavelengths up from x-rays and gamma rays.
Try pairing Gorgeous for Good Wellness Oil in your routine for an indulgent and uplifting mediation that really opens up the third eye chakra.
THOUGHT FOR MEDITATION
“Should your glance on mornings lovely
Lift to drink the heaven’s blue
Or when sun, veiled by sirocco,
Royal red sinks out of view –
Give to Nature praise and honor.
Blithe of heart and sound of eye,
Knowing for the world of colour
Where its broad foundations lie.”
— Goethe