What Is True Colors?

What Is True Colors?

 

True Colors is a simple model of personality identification for people of all ages that improves communication through recognition of a person’s true character. Utilizing the colors of orange, green, blue and gold to differentiate four basic personality types, True Colors becomes an uncomplicated language for every individual to convey complex ideas very simply.

 

True Colors’ lively and interactive programs are the easiest and most convenient way of discovering one’s strengths, and understanding human behavior.

 

Since 1978 our mission has been to enhance the way we live, work, communicate and interact with those around us at work and in our personal lives.

 

Over the last 30 years, hundreds of thousands of individuals have experienced the True Colors methodology, which is widely used in the United States, Canada, Latin America, the United Kingdom and parts of Asia, and is available in multiple languages.

 

A distinguishing quality of the True Colors programs is the artful blending of education and entertainment into programs that combine audience interaction with insightful materials that inform and delight participants because they are easy to understand, to apply on a daily basis and to retain over a lifetime.

 

True Colors is used in schools, businesses, corporations, government and nonprofit organizations, and in people’s personal, family and social interactions.

 

 

 

True Colors Beginnings

 

In 1978 founder Don Lowry became interested in the work of clinical psychologist David Keirsey. Keirsey, author of the best-selling self-help book Please Understand Me, (Click Here) studied the work of psychologists Carl Jung, Katherine Briggs and Isabel Myers who theorized that all people fit into one of four broad categories of personality.

 

The concepts instantly rang true with Lowry, who quickly recognized their potential to improve people’s lives, careers and relationships. So he set about developing a fundamental and universal way to package the information into practical guidelines that could be understood and easily applied by both children and adults alike.

 

The result is the True Colors methodology, which expands upon Keirsey’s four temperament types, and translates complicated personality and learning theory into “one of the easiest, most convenient ways of understanding and appreciating human behavior.”

 

The True Colors methodology asks participants to identify their True Colors Color Spectrum using four cards that represent key personality types: Blue, Gold, Green or Orange. Each color has particular strengths and each analyzes, conceptualizes, understands, interacts and learns differently. But these differences, if not acknowledged and understood, can become barriers to interpersonal communication, making understanding between people of different types difficult.

 

Lowry believed that entertainment offers the most broadly appealing and universal context for communicating messages; so he specifically designed the program to be as entertaining and fun as possible. When people are entertained and relaxed, Lowry realized, their resistance to new ideas diminishes, allowing them to fully experience and become aware of their own True Colors Color Spectrum, and those of the people around them.

 

The company’s first guidebook, The Keys to Personal Success, was published in 1979. Sales took off, and seminars and shows ensued. Before long, devotees were clamoring to become certified True Colors trainers.

 

 

 

Theory Behind True Colors

 

The theory behind True Colors is not new. It can be traced back to Hippocrates, who identified four different types of human beings; the Sanguine (buoyant, cheerful, hopeful, optimistic, sunny), the Choleric (angry, cantankerous, peevish, irate, testy), the Phlegmatic (languid, lethargic, listless, indifferent, passive), and the Melancholic (dejected, despondent, gloomy, morose). While these definitions are derived from Webster’s Thesaurus rather than from Hippocrates, you can see that each refers to very different personality or temperament characteristics.

 

In more recent years, Carl Jung described personality or temperament differences as a fundamental basis for understanding human beings. When his work, Psychological Type, was translated into English in 1923, it had a profound effect on Katherine C. Briggs, who had been studying differences in people for years. As a result, Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs-Myers, developed the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), which is used worldwide. Their theory states that much of the random variation in human behavior is actually quite orderly. In their work, they identified and characterized sixteen (16) different types of people.

 

During the past thirty-five years, David Keirsey has refined the work of Myers-Briggs. In his publication, Please Understand Me, (Click Here) he returned to classifying personality and/or temperament into four types. According to Keirsey, these four different types are different in fundamental ways. They want different things. They have different motives, needs, and drives. They analyze, conceptualize, understand, and learn differently. These differences create natural barriers to interpersonal communication, making understanding between people of different types difficult.

 

The True Colors methodology has been developed from the work of Keirsey. Don Lowry’s book, Keys to Personal Success, translates his theory into simple and practically applied information. It brings complex ideas out of both academia and psychotherapy and sets them in clear, real-life applications.

 

A considerable body of information supports the theory that there are four patterns of habitual human behavior or temperament: Adickes, 1907; Spranger, 1920; Kreschmar, 1920, 1960; Fromm, 1947; Keirsey, 1967, 1978.

 

A growing body of knowledge also supports the theory that these four patterns of behavior are the key to individual self-esteem and its growth: Jung, 1920; Hillman, 1979; Keirsey, 1973; Lawrence, 1979, 1980; Provost, 1987.

 

 

 

Validity Reports

 

Over the years, since the inception of the True Colors methodology, there have been numerous studies and research conducted, along with analysis of program results. You may click on the following links to PDF files (Adobe Acrobat required) of those reports.

 

                                  MBTI Validity Report | Reliability and Validity Study | Academic Success Study

                                                     Positive Attitudes in Tennessee Schools (PATS)

 

 

Meaning Behind The Colors

 

 

Color has been used to shape and describe our lives, our habits, our values, and our feelings throughout the ages. Research into the physiological effects of color has shown that it truly has an impact on our lives, often in unconscious and mysterious ways. Color can relieve tension and stress. Blue, for instance, is associated with tranquil surroundings. Thus, it is fitting that color provides the “association” between a temperament type and learning tools. How much better it is to refer to and connect with color than with the highly technical formulas, symbols, words, and numbers generally associated with temperament/personality/learning theory.

 

After reviewing the research data, colors for True Colors were chosen for their direct association with the psychological and physiological needs of people.

 

                       

Blue represents calm. Contemplation of this color pacifies the central nervous system. It creates physiological tranquility and psychological contentment. Those with Blue as a Primary Color value balance and harmony. They prefer lives free from tension... settled, united, and secure.   Blue represents loyalty and a sense of belonging, and yet, when friends are involved, a vulnerability. Blue corresponds to depth in feeling and a relaxed sensitivity. It is characterized by empathy, aesthetic experiences, and reflective awareness.   Blue is the color of inspiration, sincerity and spirituality. Blue is often the chosen color by conservative people. Using Blue to relax will encourage feelings of communication and peace.

 

        

Gold is the body's natural perceptions. It represents a need to be responsible, to fulfill duties and obligations, to organize and structure our life and that of others. Those with Gold as a Primary Color value being practical and sensible; they believe that people should earn their way in life through work and service to others. Gold reflects a need to belong through carrying a share of the load in all areas of living. It represents stability, maintenance of the culture and the organization, efficiency, planning and dependability. It embraces the concepts of home and family with fierce loyalty and faithfulness.

 

 

 

 

Green expresses itself psychologically as human will in operation: as persistence and determination. Green is an expression of firmness and consistency. Its strength can lead to a resistance to change if it is not proven that the change will work or is warranted. Those with Green as a Primary Color value their intellect and capabilities above all else. Comfort in these areas creates a sense of personal security and self-esteem.   Green characteristics seek to increase the certainty of their own values through being assertive and requiring differences from others in intellectual areas. They are rarely settled in their countenance, since they depend upon information rather than feelings to create a sense of well-being. Green expresses the grounding of theory and data in its practical applications and creative constructs.

 

 

                         

Orange represents energy, action, consuming physiological potency, power, and strength. Orange is the expression of vital force, of nervous and glandular activity. Thus, it has the meaning of desire and all forms of appetite and craving. Those with Orange as a Primary Color feel the will to achieve results, to win, to be successful. They desire all things that offer intense living and full experience.   Orange generates an impulse toward active doing: sport, struggle, competition and enterprising productivity. It stimulates enthusiasm and creativity. Orange means vitality with endurance .In temporal terms, Orange is the present.