26 | March | 2012 | SpilledCookies

I took some time off from all the moving, painting chaos on Friday night and went to see “Hunger Games” with Lindsey. So, I thought I would do a brief review.

First, I will say that the movie is visually amazing. We did not go see the 3D version, but I wouldn’t mind going back and seeing it in 3D. The concept while, I admit, is a bit disturbing to have children ages 12-18 years, picked two from each of the twelve districts to compete and fight to the death until there is one lone survivor, is not so far-fetched.

I think the author did an excellent job of reminding us of our humanity and that if we are not careful it can quickly become sadistic and mean all in course of what is considered good entertainment. In fact, we as humans have run down these trails before. I thought of this all day on Saturday parts and pieces of that movie and storyline haunted me.

Think of the first Olympics – created first to honor the 12 Olympian Gods, combining tests of mind, body, spirit and the victors being treated like heroes with a crown of olive branches placed on their heads. Those Olympic games all but went away when Rome conquered Greece and Roman Emperor Theodosius banned them in 393 AD saying they were pagan cults.

With the Romans came the Gladiators entertaining audiences in bloody battles against other Gladiators, wild animals, condemned criminals and finally Christians. These games were celebrated in high and low art forms and were considered great entertainment in their day. It was a way to entertain the masses and to enforce governmental control as if you were convicted you could wind up in the arena.

Then you had Germany who tried to instill the Aryan Games as a replacement for the Olympics. Hitler had decided that once Germany conquered the world, they would have no choice but to send their athletes to Deutsch’s Stadion which was to hold 400,000 spectators.

All this aside, as disturbing as Hunger Games is in its story line with children fighting elements and each other, and a government taking wagers on who would survive, taking steps to control the game by adding fires and tweaking the elements to make it more interesting, or bring different contestants together, and above all keep the peace by using fear to control the different districts, it still serves as a fictionalized reminder of how close we’ve come to this very thing in the past and may perhaps prevent us traveling down this road in reality in the future.

Cherry Coley ©

Finally!! I forced myself to finish cleaning and moving out of the old house on Sunday. So we finally have everything all in one place. Our new house currently looks like a storage unit. Dang. There is so much to do, unpack, put up and put together.

After moving (again) all weekend, I’ve come to the conclusion that we still have too much “stuff.” So, I’ve given myself some deadlines on getting things done. I’m not the most organized person in the world, so it’s become very important for me to set goals, deadlines and rewards when they are met to keep motivated and moving towards where I want to be.

This whole ordeal has been good for me in that it has forced me back into making sure I work on a single thing until it’s finished. I am bad about scattering my interests and projects and having too many things going at once and not really prioritizing like I should. Somehow everything went off kilter when I lost mom and dad. It just seemed to have blown me out of the water completely.

Somehow the grieving shock threw me way off balance. I lost most habits, both good and bad. For weeks I was just barely going on automatic and in a fog at that. If you are experiencing something like this, just make sure you take care of yourself. Things like eating well, sleeping long enough, and exercising were real challenges for me. I was in such a fog that I was forgetful, didn’t eat well or on any sort of schedule, so I didn’t feel good and had been averaging about 3-4 hours of sleep per night for a few months, neither of which is healthy. I felt lethargic and kept thinking I needed to be doing more, doing something, anything, but lacked the “want too.” I wasn’t what I would consider majorly depressed, I just simply didn’t want to do much.

However, I know now that the change of atmosphere has been a major uplifting for me. Even if we hadn’t moved, I think repainting, redecorating and adding more color to our lives would have made a huge difference. I have been reading about color therapy and how much the color we surround ourselves with affect how we feel, how we act and our outlook. The color we choose to wear, look at, affects so many areas in our lives it’s incredible!

The best thing to do is find a base color and then use the other colors as accents to make the most of them. For instance:

Red – thought to boost physical energy, strengthen willpower, increase circulation, clear congestion and promote passion. Use sparingly though, too much red may promote aggressiveness or anger.

Orange – encourages joy, optimism and socializing. Too much orange can lead to tiredness, and pessimism.

Yellow – Associated with the intellect, mental processes, can be uplifting. Too much yellow can lead to poor concentration and may promote fear.

Green – thought to encourage growth, stability, calmness and healing, love and trust. Too much green can be associated with mistrust, feelings of jealousy and isolation.

Blue – thought to enhance verbal expression, communication and artistic gifts. This color is also supposed to help with migraines and insomnia. Too much blue may be associated with lethargic feelings.

Purple – thought to encourage spirituality, intuition, wisdom, mental strength and focus. Too much purple may promote pride and arrogance.

I find the idea of this to be interesting and psychologically sound. Though there is a bit of difference of opinion on some things it’s worth reading in too if you are interested.

Here are a few links on the subject I found interesting:

http://altmedicine.about.com/cs/chakras/a/ChakraSounds.htm

http://psychology.about.com/od/sensationandperception/a/colorpsych.htm

www.therapycolor.com/

http://www.colourtherapyhealing.com/colour/colour_history.php

I enjoy finding out the history of why we do some of the things we do which is why I loved the last link because it walks through history to modern times. Add some color and enhance your surroundings, it could make a difference in how you feel and your outlook.