Varaaz Arts — Blog

Varna — Your Colors Choose You

By Varalakshmi Bharanidharan  |  Mandala Artist & Art Therapist  |  August 2026

Have you ever noticed you keep reaching for the same color, session after session — without ever deciding to?

We don't usually think of color as biology. We think of it as decoration — the "pretty" part that comes after the real work of drawing the pattern. But in the Varna session of Mandala Fridays, we looked at color from a completely different angle: not as decoration, but as color therapy — a direct mirror of what's already alive inside the body.

Why a Mandala Calms You Before You Even Think About It

Color reaches the emotional brain before it reaches the thinking brain. Long before you consciously register "this is red" or "this is blue," your nervous system has already responded to it. That's why a mandala can shift your state before you've analyzed a single shape in it — the color is doing its work first, the pattern second.

This is also why the colors you're drawn to are rarely random. They're intuitive — and intuition, here, is really just your body recognizing itself.

The VIBGYOR Code — What Mandala Colors Actually Mean

Every color in the rainbow — VIBGYOR — maps to a chakra, an element, and a physical part of the body. When you pick up that color intuitively, you're not just making an aesthetic choice. You're drawing a part of yourself. Here's how these chakra colors and the body connect:

Coloring Techniques That Shape How You Feel

Once you know what a color means, how you lay it down changes the feeling again. A gradient shift feels like transformation in motion. A watercolor wash feels soft, unguarded. Layering translucent color feels like depth being built, one honest layer at a time. Staying monochrome, in a single color's family, feels like focus — one part of the body, fully listened to.

None of these techniques are "correct" or "incorrect." They're simply different ways of asking the same color to speak a little louder, or a little softer.

So Which Colors Are Choosing You?

Next time you sit down to draw an intuitive mandala, notice which color your hand reaches for first — before you decide anything. It's rarely an accident. It's usually your body, already telling you where its attention wants to go.

Varalakshmi Bharanidharan is a Mandala Artist, Art Therapist, and Mandala Researcher from Chennai. She holds a Wonder Book of Record for India's largest hand-drawn Sacred Geometry Mandala and is certified from California State University (ICPEM). She teaches through Varaaz Arts — Experience Your Mandala.