Love colors for what they are - the bounty of colors!

 

Imagine our world without colors! Imagine if the flora and fauna, our houses, the cars, and the clothes were all plain white! What if there were no rainbows? What if the captivating classics like a peacock’s brilliant plumage, the sky in twilight hours, a freshly cut piece of ripe watermelon, and the rosy pink cheeks of children in cold highlands were devoid of any colors?

Yes, the colors are central to the splendor of our world; they make this world worth living in. We have our preferences. If one likes blue, someone else loves pink. If John likes Green, Sanjana may loath it insisting only on purple. Her best friend may accept nothing but light yellow. Our chemistry with colors is not easy to explain since our perceptions and preferences vary wildly. I love blue in all its shades. A friend of mine keeps anything blue at arm’s length. I can’t understand. How can a man not like blue? Pass it on to individuality. Just the way we have our preferences for food, friends, cars, and hairstyles, let there be the personalization of colors to suit everyone.

Even deities have their preferences. If Lord Shiva prefers deep blue, the Sun loves red. While performing a religious ritual, I used to always keep aside a red Hibiscus for the ultimate offering to Surya Devta. 

However, our fixations with colors transcend fundamental personal likes and dislikes. We let them pervade the world of our feelings, emotions, and relationships. Colors start representing, symbolizing, and influencing our state of mind. This is where conventional wisdom loses; tradition and collective behavior take over.

Many years back, a close friend saw me in a restaurant dining with a stunner. He came to me and whispered, “Hey, I am all green.” I looked at him and found no trace of green in him. He was wearing blue jeans and a white shirt! I thought he was out of his mind and I let it pass with a smile. I could not figure it out till someone told me later that it was a metaphor for envy! Poor green! What has the color done to earn that curse? 

I love the song titled ‘Any Day Now’ by Elvis Presley, sung by various artistes over the years. When I heard the lyrics carefully for the first time, I wondered why should ‘the blue shadow fall all over town’ when his love’s ‘restless eyes meet someone new’. I was enlightened by a friend that blue is associated with sadness. My heart cried out for my favorite color. How on earth did blue, a hue full of freshness and sobriety, get linked up with melancholy? Then why don’t we all wear blue in a funeral?

We say the man is in pink of his health! What has pink got to do with sound health? If the intention is to reflect vibrancy, youth, agility, and strength, there could have been other true representatives from the fascinating array of colors that we are blessed with.

Red does evoke a sense of aggression, power, boldness, and flamboyance. Even the bulls love it! But, why does a company go red when it loses money? Why associate despondency with a color that elsewhere symbolizes aggression and bravado? Why does it turn black when it starts making profits again? Isn’t black the color we chose to mourn? How come we celebrate black in our corporate life?

Not to forget the lovely white color; a color that is so serene, soothing, fresh, peaceful, and non-controversial! It makes a whole lot of sense that white flags symbolize truce. Warring factions use flags of this color to depute representatives for discussions and negotiations. Even in the days of Mahabharata, it was an absolute taboo to attack anyone galloping in with a white flag. Then, why do we call the vanquished whitewashed even in innocuous games between nations? Why do we say the Australians were whitewashed when they last played test cricket in India? Are we being fair to this sober color when we misuse it to depict an absolute triumph over a hapless opposition? Looking from where the vanquished stand, the white must be looking blood red!

Colors are blessings in our lives. They are best relished and celebrated for what they are. When we relate them to the complex world of the human mind, they lose their character, get confusing and lose the very purpose for which they exist. Let us enjoy the joie de vivre in each color. Let the shades of green in our paddy fields inspire us with that unique freshness without reminding us of our worst enemy, the envy. Let us enjoy the divine beauty of a clear blue sky without a trace of sadness. For all of us with corporate responsibilities, let us enjoy the boldness of red without remembering our worst professional nightmare. Let us wear black when we want without being reminded that mourning is a part of our life we can never avoid.

Let us indulge ourselves in the bounty of colors that nature has blessed us with. Let us love them for the exquisite beauty that they are. Let us not give them any other name.