Creative Life Center

Live Among Color
By Sharon Niman Lundgren
“How can you sleep in that room?!” my mother exclaimed on numerous occasions, not just when I was a kid, but into adulthood. My walls were blanketed in colorful posters (mostly Duran Duran), feathered Mardi Gras masks, and other bright and shiny oddities. Even today the walls of our house are covered with hippie tapestries, colorful artwork, fairy lights, and yes, even more shiny oddities. Scott has grown accustomed to our walls filled with color. To me color creates a safe fortress. It shields me from outside energy intrusions, either worldly or spiritual, and it empowers, inspires, and comforts me with its various energy frequencies. Despite my mother’s concern, I sleep incredible well in it.

October 22 is National Color Day when we explore the effects of color on our physical and mental health, attitude, and well-being. There are multiple excellent tomes written on color frequencies and how they affect us, so I will refrain from repeating them here. But I have found that the qualities and effects are not universal. Culture, belief, and personal preferences impact how color effects us. For example, many people love white and associate it with purity and grace. Since I experience White Coat Syndrome, I associate white with medical stuff and hospitals, so I do not care for that color in large quantities. Bare white walls are disturbing to me.

For others black elicits anxiety as it has been associated with the Shadow and darkness. However, it is a svelte, beautiful color which can enhance other colors with which it’s paired. Far from being evil, it’s believed to neutralize and extinguish negative energy. And, it’s associated with the mystical and magical. Our color preferences definitely influence how color makes us feel despite the ascribed qualities.

How do you harness the power of color? First, surround yourself with it. Live in it. Build a color fortress like I did. Second, wear your colors. I dress colorful and flashy because it helps me feel confident and playful. Find the colors that make you feel good and adorn yourself in them. And three, bathe in color. Use light therapy and colored candles to infuse your aura with the color.
May the Force of Color be with you!

Are You Bored? Good!
By Sharon Niman Lundgren
“I’m bored. There’s nothing to do!” Is that a statement you hear from your kids or grand kids? Did you say it a lot when you were a child? Maybe you still do. I grew up on a farm where my next door playmates were actually fields and farms away. Boredom threatened often, but I used my creativity and imagination to entertain myself. That’s what led me first into theater, and then into writing and inspirational speaking. Boredom and isolation in the boondocks brought out my talents and is one of the reasons I’m quite good at entertaining myself.

In our fast paced society we’re busy, busy, busy. We think boredom is bad. However constant busyness robs us of moments of pause. We do, do, do instead of just BE. Joanna Fortune, in her book, Why We Play: How to Find Joy & Meaning in Everyday Life, says, “Boredom is that free-floating state of reverie when, in the state of nothingness, something new emerges, such as an idea, a thought, a memory, or a feeling.”

Boredom offers self and world reflection. We process thoughts, feelings, and experience. When we rush through life, we may keep running straight into wrong decisions. We need the boring times to rethink and analyze our conditions and where we’re headed on this journey.

Dianna Fortune also says that creative people embrace boredom as an opportunity for new ideas and discover other sources of inspiration. Just as in my case, it pushed me to develop creative ways to occupy my time, which developed my creative skills, Plus, was loads of fun.

The power of the daydream arises from boredom. How often do you sit and allow your mind to wander and imagine new possibilities, alternate universes where you make other decisions, and entertain outlandish ideas? Daydreams lead us to solutions and to AHA Moments. The reason I possess strong imagination and visualization ability (which helped developed my clairvoyance used in psychic counseling) is due to long hours spent playing pretend when I was bored as a kid.

In a previous blog I wrote how lack of recess is dumbing down our kids. I also believe that lack of boredom is doing the same. We keep them so busy with tons of homework, soccer practice, and academic clubs and when they aren’t doing those, they are sitting in front of the computer screen or on their smart phone. Let’s give them time to just BE, to be BORED. That will facilitate greater imagination, creativity, and intelligence.

So if you find yourself in boredom---GOOD! Embrace it as an opportunity to improve yourself and expand your awareness. Even being bored with life is a call to reexamine it and make changes for the better. As Fortune says, if we can playfully push through boredom, we can come out the other side a new and improved version of ourselves.

Play To Get Smart!
By Sharon Niman Lundgren
Study. Study. Study. That’s how we’re told to get smart and learn more. Traditional learning is important to develop skills and abilities, but to really be good at them, to be really intelligent—we need to play. Playfulness is the key to mental acuity.

In The Science of Fun For Adults, Natalie Reed says that fun activities increase the neuroplasticity of the brain which is its ability to form new neural pathways and strengthen existing ones. The more of these pathways in our brain, the easier it is for us to learn new skills and retain information. So we need to pair our learning studies with fun, which was the original purpose of recess at school. With less and less recess and playtime allowed in modern education, we are dumbing down our students.

Reed cites research indicating that play also facilitates greater memory. Much self-help focus is devoted on increasing memory through various exercises and even supplements. And although those do help, enjoying ourselves and having fun fortifies the memory pathways in the brain.

I had a brilliant English teacher in junior high school who taught the rules of grammar through rhymes and games. I learned easily through this method and still retain all that knowledge. She made learning fun, and her students were much smarter than even high school level English class. In their book Professors at Play Playbook, Lisa Forbes and David Thomas fill the pages with examples of playful lesson plans to be used in schools, universities and workplaces. Plus they illustrate how these techniques increase knowledge in chosen areas of study. In Europe, The Playful University was created as an educational platform of playful learning. Their moto is, "Learning is created and nurtured through joy, engagement, and play. " Many higher education facilities are adopting their techniques.

So, if play increases brain health and memory, might it also be used to treat dementia? Research shows that elderly people who engage in regular fun activities have less incidence of mental decline and show improvement in existing brain disease. So if you want to get smarter, start playing. If you want to help others stay mentally fit, invite them to play. Play, fun, and laughter are good for our brains!