Create your own mandala!

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What is a mandala?

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    A mandala is a complex abstract design that is usually circular in form. In fact, "mandala" is a Sanskrit word that means "circle." Mandalas generally have one identifiable center point, from which emanates an array of symbols, shapes, and forms.

    Mandalas can contain both geometric and organic forms. They can also contain recognizable images that carry meaning for the person who is creating it.

In essence, mandalas represent the connection between our inner selves and outer reality. Designing your own mandalas can be both inspirational and therapeutic.

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Shapes and colors symbolism

 

There are also commonly noted psychological effects of color as it relates to two main categories: warm and cool. Warm colors – such as red, yellow, and orange – can spark a variety of emotions ranging from comfort and warmth to hostility and anger. Cool colors – such as green, blue, and purple – often spark feelings of calmness as well as sadness.

 

There are four psychological primary colours - red, blue, yellow and green. They relate respectively to the body, the mind, the emotions, and the essential balance between these three. The psychological properties of the eleven basic colours are as follows:

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Personality Based on Colour:

 

Red

• Associated with energy, war, danger, strength, power, determination as well as passion, desire, and love.

•   Enhances human metabolism, increases respiration rate, and raises blood pressure.

• Attracts attention more than any other color, at times also signifying danger.

Orange

• Combines the energy of red and the happiness of yellow.

• Associated with joy, sunshine, and the tropics.

• Represents enthusiasm, fascination, happiness, creativity, determination, attraction, success,
  encouragement, and stimulation.

Yellow

• Associated with joy, happiness, intellect, and energy.

• Produces a warming effect, arouses cheerfulness, stimulates mental activity, and generates
  muscle energy.

• Bright, pure yellow is an attention getter, which is why taxicabs are painted this color.

• When overused, yellow may have a disturbing effect.

• It is known that babies cry more in yellow rooms.

• Yellow indicates honor and loyalty. Later, the meaning of yellow was connected with cowardice.

Green

• The color of nature. It symbolizes growth, harmony, freshness, and fertility.

• Strong emotional correspondence with safety.

• Dark green is also commonly associated with money.

• Has great healing power.

• Green suggests stability and endurance.

• Color of the sea. It is often associated with depth and stability.

• Symbolizes trust, loyalty, wisdom, confidence, intelligence, faith, truth, and heaven.

• Considered beneficial to the mind and body.

• Slows human metabolism and produces a calming effect.

• Strongly associated with tranquility and calmness.

• Used to symbolize piety and sincerity.

Purple

• Combines the stability of blue and the energy of red.

• Associated with royalty. It symbolizes power, nobility, luxury, and ambition.

• Conveys wealth and extravagance.

• Associated with wisdom, dignity, independence, creativity, mystery, and magic.

White

• Associated with light, goodness, innocence, purity, and virginity.

• Considered to be the color of perfection.

• Signifies safety, purity, and cleanliness.

• Usually has a positive connotation.

• Can represent a successful beginning.

• Depicts faith and purity.

Black

• Associated with power, elegance, formality, death, evil, and mystery.

• A mysterious color associated with fear and the unknown (black holes).

• Usually has a negative connotation (blacklist, black humor, ‘black death’).

• Denotes strength and authority; it is considered to be a very formal, elegant, and prestigious color.

• A symbol of grief.

 

Observe shapes in your mandalas and think about what they are saying to you, what they make you feel, what they are communicating. Do they enhance or hinder the message of the colours you see?

 

Circles have no beginning or end. They are warm, comforting and give a sense of sensuality and love. Their movement suggests energy and power. Their completeness suggests the infinite, unity, and harmony. Circles suggest community, integrity, and perfection.

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Squares and rectangles are stable. They suggest conformity, peacefulness, solidity, security, and equality. Their familiarity and stability, along with their commonness, can seem boring.

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Spirals are expressions of creativity. Spirals convey ideas of fertility, birth, death, expansion, and transformation. Spirals move in either direction and represent returning to the same point on life’s journey with new levels of understanding.

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Crosses symbolize spirituality and healing. They represent relationships and synthesis and a need for connection to something, whether that something is a group, an individual, one‘s self, or project related...

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Curved shapes offer rhythm and movement, happiness, pleasure, and generosity. They are seen as more feminine than

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Sharp shapes which offer energy, violence, and anger. And which are lively, youthful, and seen as more masculine.

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