How many of you run your own business?
How many of you have children? How much time, effort and money have you invested in their future?
How many of you have invested in your skills, passion and purpose in life?
Do you believe you are worth investing in? Do you see yourself as self-confident?
I am assuming that as you are all here attending a conference on light, sound and Color that you believe in the efficacy of these mediums as a healing tool. BUT how many of you use them to present and promote your skills and business? Are you truly standing in your true Colors?
COLOR IS LIFE! Have you ever tried to imagine what it would be like living in a world with no Color? I believe it would be fairly monotonous and uninspiring! The more Color added to life the more vibrancy, vitality and depth we are likely to experience in our third dimensional reality.
All of our lives are touched by some aspect of the electromagnetic spectrum. We use it to make our life styles more comfortable. The lowest frequency we use regularly is the telephone. Electricity dominates our lives that it is now the driving force behind just about everything. We use radio, television and photographic rays for pleasure and memories. We nuke our food with microwaves. We use radars to guide travelling planes and boats. In health care we use x-rays and radium.
Our reliance on the electromagnetic spectrum isn't in question it's a fact! Yet the most common and universal aspect of the spectrum to all cultures has only recently started to be investigated by modern science within the last hundred years. It could be said that the reason for this is because it is life itself! David Bohm, the famous physicist stated "all matter is frozen light" I am of course referring to visible light and its subsidiaries of Colors. Color is the stuff of emotion, magic and religion.
Every society on earth has used Color to give meaning to life. Today society uses Color as a large part of its commercial communication. Microcomputers have become the multi-national communication of the global village “Gaia” and Color has become cheaper to manufacture. These two aspects have brought Color under the control of designers for all aspects of manufacturing and graphic art . The net effect of this has been to make Color the first choice for design requirements rather than the last resort solution.
Color sends signals that are both subtle and complex and we respond to its messages viscerally. Color can be stimulating, arresting, enticing, seductive, soothing or jarring. We all use Color to inform, convince, persuade and sell through its emotive and symbolic characteristics. Because Color can help you communicate with anyone it is important that you understand the characteristics of your own “package” and what it says about you and what you are about. People of the 21st Century will become their own designer and image consultant with this knowledge.
Color used to support your personal packaging is reflective of what is on “the inside”. As people interested in light, Color and sound as a medium for healing, I would perhaps suggest that you should be as passionate about light, Color and sound as a medium through which you package yourself and your work so that others can “buy into” what you are trying to do for a living, your purpose for service and your own internal personal and professional development.
There are several areas if Color communication that we need to look at in order to ensure our personal advertisement is a true reflection of who we are and what we are about.
And to enhance all of these aspects good communication skills are needed to be able to express the values and qualities of the characteristics. Research has shown that people tend to fall into three categories when dealing with Color.
Manufacturers and advertising have known for some time now that Colors can be used to influence people’s behaviour, likes, dislikes and decisions. People generally gravitate towards one palette or another because the range of Colors represents how they see themselves and therefore feel comfortable and secure. On another level they react to others based on their Color palettes and whether they provide them with a level of comfort or not. For effective Color communication you need to apply the following principles:-
Color Characteristics
You have no doubt heard the phrase “Dress for success”. Many people have heard it but how many of you truly understand how this works? The business world refers to it as “power dressing” but consider this … what happens if the power dressing and the Colors of the outer packaging of the business are not congruent? Appearing off Color can effect the message you are communicating.
Most of us don’t like standing out from the crowd, but in today’s society there is a movement towards embracing and nurturing individual creativity and skills whilst at the same time encouraging people to become a team player. It’s a paradoxical situation but it requires a new set of skills … and these can be made more effective by becoming Color Smart.
Let’s liken smart Color communication to money. In order to make money you need to have some! When you have some you save and invest it in order for it to make you more money. The fact is that the majority of us don’t have the skills or know how in terms of investing our money and so have two options open to us. Either hire a financial management consultant or learn the rules ourself.
BUT the truth is – the majority of us will never invest in our personal growth by hiring a skilled person to help us because we as people are constantly made to feel worthless and to have no intrinsic value. Because we feel we have no value, no say, no impact we are not prepared to invest in ourselves.