Just like each note of music or alphabets, there is something else that has a deep association with our emotions – the colors. A whole range of experiences and emotions can be related to colors and there’s more than just a vague, generic meaning to it when we say “I still got the blues” or “golden days of our lives”. Now, many of us might have associations to colors that are particular to us such as associating red to an old roof of a house at the street we grew up in or the brown boots that laid untouched in the attic for years. However, colors do have emotional connections beyond personal associations which are universal to all of us. Let’s find our more.

Red – The color of adventure and then, power and passion

The color that flows through our veins, the color of life force, red is what we associate with physical needs, our basic human instincts and our strive to survive. The sight of the color energizes us, entices us and even seduces us. We associate intense passion with dark red, the kind of passion that dilutes the demarcation between virtue and sin. We romanticize overstepping restrictions, which is also symbolized by red, and submitting into pleasures of guilt.

But then again, red triggers caution in our head. Some of us may be drawn to the danger while others may think better. The color provokes our emotions in many ways. It demands attention, turns heads, ignites fervent emotions. However, it also reminds us of blood war and no one puts it better than Wilfred Owen when he writes, “Red lips are not so red as the stained stones kissed by the English dead.”

Blue – The color of clarity

We associate blue with clear perception. After days of vagueness, agonizing doubts and the grey scale of gloom brought upon by hopelessness, we suddenly, sometimes in serendipity and sometimes with effort, start seeings things as clear as the bright blue sky. On a clear day, as we look up at the blue sky, the pale, serene bluish dome which almost transcends to the white tufts of cloud, seems almost benign. Yet, it’s not indifference we see in that sublimity.

We perceive acceptance, wisdom and and calm resilience. However, in such quiescence, we tend to think of old times, get a little nostalgic and that’s perhaps where the ‘blues’ comes in. Then again, ‘the blues ‘ is not irritable, inconsolable depression. It still has perspective and most of the blues musicians and songwriters are extremely insightful in their art.