Live Inspired!
Inspirational Color Quote of the Week: Color Yellow Engaging The Fear “Fear has nothing to do with cowardice. A fellow is only yellow when he lets his fear make him quit.” --Jerome Cady (actor) What do you think? Fear has nothing to do with cowardice? That’s a pretty powerful idea for me. It goes against my intuition and especially against what I believe I have long been taught. Even as I logically get it, emotionally It’s a hard one to internalize. How many times have you heard the opposite? If you have any doubts or hesitations, it’s best to keep them to yourself. It’s not ok to show your feelings, especially the negative ones including fear. Show fear (or any of its less extreme versions--anxiety, worry or trepidation), and people will indeed think less of you. Like the Nike shoes commercial, Just jump In and just do it. The quote is particularly poignant because Jerome Cady was an actor working in the 1940s; he was best known for his films surrounding the events of World War II. If any segment of the population should be given the message that fear isn’t ok, sometimes with good reason, it’s probably military personnel. There’s potentially the need to respond to extreme physical danger in split seconds. There’s the chance you’ll have to quickly come to the aide of comrades and friends, and there’s simply the ever-present concern that comes with spending extended time in hostile territory. The ultimate environment for a need to face difficult situations and also for a need perhaps to teach that fear isn’t ok (or at least not till after the danger has passed.) But in the end, “a fellow is only yellow when it makes him quit.” There’s important learning there, for soldiers as well as the rest of us. Coaches and psychologists alike teach us that it’s not just ok but actually a positive thing to feel fear or for that matter any other emotion. They say fear is a healthy thing and has a lot to teach us. Listen to it. Trust it. Maybe it’s letting you know that there is something (physically or emotionally) dangerous out there, and assessing the situation will give you a better response. You’re walking down a street at night and you get an intuition someone’s following you? Someone challenges you to do something (take a high dive you’re not trained for) and you’re not prepared or trained to do it? But of course it’s not just situations with the potential for physical danger. You’re nervous about asking your boss for a raise. You need help with a task you don’t quite know how to do, and you hesitate to ask out of concern for bothering a friend. You just feel anxious, and you don’t even know exactly how come. Instead of making ourselves wrong (we ought to be able to just go do these things), maybe there’s something that needs to be figured out before we ask for the raise, the help or the understanding of the anxiety. More preparation would be useful? More focus on deeply valuing our own needs would make things clearer? More time would help us formulate a better course of action? The color yellow may in our culture be associated with what is seen as unacceptable cowardice, but let’s not forget it’s even more often associated with joy and positivist. When we’re feeling afraid, it’s not always easy but, let’s respect the emotions and do our best to see them in a positive light. “And then let’s remember, A fellow is only yellow when he lets his fear make him quit.” How do these ideas resonate with you, and what are one or two actions you might want to take in the next day or so on that basis?
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Live Inspired!
Inspirational Color Quote of the Week: Color Yellow In that spirit, here’s the inspirational color quote for this week. Miles of Smiles “I made a circle with a smile for a mouth on yellow paper, because it was sunshiny and bright.” -- Harvey Ball (commercial artist) Ok so what’s the big deal? A commercial artist named Harvey Ball (1921-2001) took a couple of minutes to draw a circle for a smile on a piece of yellow paper. What’s so special? Couldn’t you or I or just about any little kid with a crayon have done the same thing? Well think about it , what’s so great about this is that it’s an image that simply makes you feel happy. For all we know, Harvey Ball had a lot of options. He could have drawn just about any image he wanted, choosing for starters to keep things neutral. He could have used some dark color to reflect pessimism, negativity or even downright evil. He could have taken an extra minute to work with a second color, going for a reflection of contrasting feelings. And yet by opting for an image that was “sunshiny and bright,” he wanted us to focus on something that would easily lift our spirits. Pretty awesome. All it takes is a smile. And it turns out that that simple image Harvey Ball created (in long ago 1963) has gone on to provide joy and wonder to enumerable people all around the world. Actually developed to boost morale at a Massachusetts insurance company, the drawing Harvey Ball created in 10 minutes became the forerunner of what has since become the internationally-accepted smiley!, The artist was paid $45 for the creation and refused throughout his life to apply for any form of copyright. What he did do was quite the reverse: he founded The World Smile Corporation, which licenses official smileys, raises money for children’s causes and promotes World Smile Day (first Friday in October) So let’s ask again: what in the end is such a big deal? Some fifty years ago, A commercial artist named Harvey Ball took a couple of minutes to draw a circle for a smile on a piece of yellow paper. That image has gone on to become a universal symbol. Just follow his lead to give it a smile. How do these ideas resonate with you, and what are one or two actions you might want to take in the next day or so on that basis? Live Inspired!
Inspirational Color Quote of the Week: Color Yellow In that spirit, here’s the inspirational color quote for this week. Road Trip! “Kanan is a big road through the Santa Monica Mountains. Between mid-March and mid-April, when you get over to the western side of the mountains, it's populated by Spanish broom - this beautiful, yellow, flowering weed that smells the way I imagine it smells along the Yellow Brick Road.” --John C. McGinley (actor/author) What do you think? Doesn’t the image catch your attention/call to you to drive through, Even if it takes you out of your way? What could be better? A mountain road! The wonderful surprise of eye-catching flowers! A smell that captivates your senses! And remember they’re not just any kind of flowers; they’re Yellow flowers to brighten the road and to give you a smile as you drive through. Interestingly as a side note, it turns out that it wasn’t just chance that brought those flowers to the area; they were purposely planted to beautify the highway, and the project is unique to the Las Angeles area. Sounds pretty wonderful and a complete sensory experience And L.A. resident and Actor John McGinley (Dr. Cox on Scrubs along with credentials dating over several decades of distinguished roles) asks us to travel even further. He loves the way his senses are engaged along this stretch of the Kanan Mountains , but he doesn’t just stop along the road side to take in the scene. He actively builds on the experience to stimulate his imagination. What might that yellow brick road smell like? What adventures might be encountered there? We know about the ones confronted by Dorothy and her friends from The Wizard of Oz. But what about for us? There must be some happy adventure waiting because those bricks are solid, and they’re a bright playful yellow. What about you? Where do you want to let your own imagination take you? To some exotic place? To a vision of what you want some part of your life to look like over the next few years? To provide a time and space to simply hang out with yourself and see what surprises come to the fore? John McKinley reminds us that physical road trips can be pretty wonderful, but he also urges us to cultivate an imagination that can take us to some pretty unexpected and equally satisfying places. All of which in this case means a double dose of a warm and happy yellow. How do these ideas resonate with you, and what are one or two actions you might want to take in the next day or so on that basis? |
AuthorI am a Life Coach, a Color Wisdom Card Practitioner, and yes, even a Professor (political science, State University of New York at Albany). I use the Color Wisdom Cards to support clients in exploring priorities and taking concrete actions to stay on track with the goals they set. Because in my own life I have overcome a lot of self-doubt, I want to work with people towards more confidence and self-empowerment. You can do it! What is it you want to do? Categories
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