I have always been fond of the color red. I am not a big fan of “Hallmark” holidays such as Valentines’ Day, but anything cheery in February, is a welcome thing. Instead of writing about the holiday, I decided to write about the color red.
Like most things, red has many different and varying definitions and associations attached to it. Red is the color of energy, passion and action. Other words associated with it are leadership, ambition, confidence, physical movement, sexuality, cravings, good luck, purity, stimulating, and pioneer.
Red represents the root/base chakra. It pulses and swells with radiant heat. It is a place of blasts of raw creation. It is a spark of action.
The color red is one of the three primary colors. It is the color of blood cells. It is found in nature in places such as the Grand Canyon. Mars is considered the red planet. It is one of the colors associated with flowers and the changing leaves in the fall. Red is a color used in many flags (about 77% of all flags use red). It is used to get our attention as in STOP (actually is it the international color for stop). It is believed to be a magical and religious color.
There are many really “good” meanings and associations to the color red. But red is also the color of extremes. It is associated with violence, danger, anger, sacrifice and primitive power.
What Red Means to Me
Red is personal to me. Most of my clothes were red when I was a kid. I am drawn to red in paintings. It warms me when I see it. Interestingly, you would think that red would be the color I would use for our wedding. Nope. It was blue.
Remember Our Story? I am a healing rescuer. I always thought it was my job to keep everyone happy. Much of our wedding was designed and planned to keep others happy. Dan likes blue (it is the most popular favorite color of people). Keeping people happy… and, so, I went with blue. I didn’t insist my sister, my maid of honor, wear some crazy bridesmaid dress. I simply asked her to pick out something she liked in blue. She picked a red dress. I remember being a little irritated, but keeping everyone happy … I changed the color to red (with the exception of the invitations because they were already printed in blue).
This turned out to be a good thing. I don’t know if my sister was consciously looking out for me and giving me a reason to have the color red, that I loved as our wedding color but as I look back on it, I am grateful that she picked that red dress. She also posted this on my Facebook page for my birthday.
“May your shoes always match your poncho (or something like that).” ~Tina Marie
