What is Colour Therapy?

Colour therapy is a technique of restoring any imbalance of energy in the body. This is done by identifying what is deficient in our bodies and relating the deficiency to its respective colour. The body is then exposed to the specific colour that the body needs to restore its energy balance. The energy of the vibration of the colour that you need, at any time, improves and balances your emotional and physical state. This uplifts the body, mind and spirit because the psychological, physiological, and biochemical effects cannot be separated. When the human body is exposed to a corrective colour over a period of a few days, this can literally and permanently cause positive molecular changes to occur in the body.

The Rainbow of Colours - Here are the details of the attributes of each of the seven basic colours.

Colour Therapy was developed when it was discovered that human physiological functions respond to specific colours. This occurs as follows. Light is focused through the Cornea, the lens of the eye, onto the Retina at the back of the eye. Sight can be defined as the mediating means for perceiving objects that are illuminated by light. When the reflected light from an object stimulates our eyes, we perceive and recognize the light as a colour. The eye reacts to the three primary colours of Red, Green, and Blue. The cells in the Retina absorb the light waves of these colours. These cells convert the light waves into neural signals and these signals are transmitted to the visual centre of the brain via the Optic Nerve. The pineal glands, which control the daily rhythms of life, are situated at the back of the brain and are connected to the brain. The pineal glands control the biochemical system of our bodies and they trigger hormone production, which in turn influences the entire complex biochemical system of the body.

The Universe is a magnetic field of positive and negative charges that vibrate and produce electro-magnetic waves. The speed of vibration of each of these waves is called the frequency of the wave and each has a different wavelength. Together, all these waves of energy make up the electromagnetic spectrum.

Light is a narrow band of energy in the middle of the electromagnetic spectrum. This is called the visible light spectrum and the wavelength of visible light is between 380nm to 780nm. The visible light spectrum consists of the seven basic colours of the rainbow: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet. We are constantly surrounded by electromagnetic waves of energy of which colour is just a small part. Colour is simply light of different wavelengths and frequencies.

  

Organisms respond to specific narrow bands of wavelengths, and not just to the difference between light and dark. When specific wavelengths are missing from an artificial light source, the biological receptor responds as if it were in total darkness, even though other wavelengths are present. Thus, if a particular ailment can be treated with certain wavelengths of light, we might logically assume that living under an artificial light source that lacks these wavelengths can contribute to causing the ailment in the first place. This phenomenon makes sense if you realize that humans evolved while being exposed to all of the electromagnetic wavelengths emitted by the sun, which all have specific properties.

Regular incandescent bulbs contain more of the yellow and red colours emitted by the sun, and most fluorescents have a strong bluish tint. A study showed that school children who learned under normal blue-white fluorescent bulbs exhibited considerably more behavioral, emotional and learning problems than when the classrooms were installed with full spectrum fluorescent lighting. The students’ aggression levels decreased; they become more cooperative and peaceful. Even their blood pressure dropped an average of 20 points, when they were underneath the full spectrum lights. Significantly, even the behavior and attitudes of the blind students improved, indicating the nourishing aspect of electromagnetic radiation in the visible wavelength band.

Red light is stimulating: it increases muscular strength, eliciting 5.8% more electrical activity in the arm muscles compared to other colours. Pink calms the nerves, inducing effects that are not only psychological but physical too. For instance, Liberman reports that in prision inmates placed in small holding cells painted bubble-gum pink, “a reduction of muscle strength happened within 2.7 seconds.” This particular pink “has been proven to calm the most jangled nerves within minutes. Where brute force or sedative drugs were once the only treatment option, now pink holding cells are used to significantly reduce the incidence of violent and aggressive behavior. It is reasonable to suppose that violent individuals, for whatever reason, might suffer from a deficit of that particular electromagnetic radiation, which is visually perceived as pink light.

So the bright red, orange and yellow of a sunrise heralding the energy of a new day, and the blue, indigo and violet appearing at nighttime as we ready ourselves for sleep, are more than just pretty poetic metaphors. Visible coloured light appears in Nature at specific times for a reason. It has recently been re-discovered that blue wavelengths stimulate melatonin production. Just as our moods are affected by specific wavelengths of visible light, so are our vital functions, and even activity on a cellular level. Plants exposed to various colours of light have either orderly or chaotic patterns of chloroplasts (cellular components containing chlorophyll).