Isn't colour amazing - it can lift our spirits, brighten our home and wardrobe, make us stop to stare and maybe even make us smile.

As a creative I've always loved colour and seem to have an eclectic style which lends itself to mixing obscure patterns and colours together. And of course I have a favourite colour - green. In fact MY colour "green" has just inspired me to write yet another blog:
http://www.goodnessgraciousgreen.blogspot.com/
So colour has certainly lifted my spirits of late.

Today it is well known and accepted that colour can also provide therapy for people, i.e. chromotherapy more commonly known as colour therapy.

But something I personally subscribe to is the simple pleasure of sitting down to colour in (either with or without my two year old). There's nothing like the meditative rhythm created by the eye/hand coordination  - before you know it the page almost becomes a blur and you find yourself suspended in some mystical place where there is no sense of time and no stress - ah bliss. It's possibly the best stress buster I've found.

Strangely enough I owe my new found therapy not to my two year old but to my mother, who not long after my daughter was born bought me a fabulous gift to help me relax - a special Mandala colouring in book. Having spent much time with pencils in hand, I now carry fond memories and a visual gallery of those early months, sitting at the kitchen table colouring in as my daughter lay in her bassinet only a few feet away.

So what are Mandalas?
Mandalas are concentric diagrams that have spiritual and ritual significance in many cultures. They are said to aid meditation and trance induction and bring about a sense of oneness.

Colouring mandalas really is a lovely thing to do for yourself.


To whet your appetite there are websites where you can learn more about mandalas and download free colouring in pages, like the one below:
http://www.mandala-4u.com/en/start.html

There is also an interesting online gallery where you can submit your mandala artwork and be part of a worldwide creative collective:
http://www.mandalaproject.org/What/Index.html

So I encourage you all to pull out your old crayons and get scribbling...don't forget to stay between the lines. Or if you're an out of the box kind of person like me, go crazy...and let the rhythm set you free.