If you’re feeling blue, this could put you in the pink

Lacking in energy? Get a bit more red or orange into you life. Low on self-esteem? You’re probably not wearing or eating enough green. According to colour therapists, every colour has an influence on us, and, once we understand which ones we need more or less of, we can use them to improve our health, enhance our creativity and achieve peace of mind.

The body, so the theory goes, absorbs electromagnetic wavelengths of light from the sun, and emits an aura of its own, the colours of which will reflect your current physical, emotional and physical health. When we are out of balance, there will be too much or too little of a colour in our aura and this will manifest itself as a disease.

Body auras are clearest around the head (clothes tend to obscure them), but, since you need psychic gifts to see them, many colour therapists make do with an equally mysterious “spine chart” (created by dowsing the spine with a pendulum) which, it is claimed, shows the colour energies in the body. What the therapist then purports to do is use colours to change the vibrations in the body to a more healthy, harmonious frequency.

This is done by shining light on the body through coloured glass, drinking liquids from coloured containers, eating appropriately coloured foods, wearing white clothing which is bathed in coloured light, or simply by meditating on the colour that you need more of. Another version, chromotherapy, treats specific ailments by using coloured lights on part of the body, while in aurasoma, coloured oils are rubbed into the skin. Some colour therapists simply drape you in different coloured scarves to see which ones reflect you inner vitality.

But be careful not to overdo it. A little orange, for example, will cheer you up, but too much could make you manic. In which case, reach quickly for the pink or blue.