In Defense of the Color Orange

“What’s your least favorite color?” I asked in between bites of my cheese pizza.

Devin leaned forward in the cafeteria booth. “That’s a hard question. I’ve never thought about that before.” He slouched back into his seat.

“Think about one that bothers you, makes you annoyed to see.” I took a sip of my mango smoothie.

Shooting up out of the booth he answered, “Orange!”

I ask this question frequently. It catches people off guard, and I like to see the reactions I can get. Everyone has a favorite color, so it’s interesting to see what comes up when asking for the opposite. Over time I have started to notice a trend in the answers, with orange coming up as the least favorite color of them all.

I used to share a similar opinion; I thought orange was a detestable, annoying color that didn’t go with anything. I couldn’t get it to work with any of my outfits, it clashed on all of my graphic designs, and it was just a big eyesore for me to look at. This was before I found the shade that worked for me, and started figuring out what contexts I liked orange in. I started to apply orange to more color palettes, until I found combinations of colors that looked good next to each other, and different shades of orange that I found appealing.

I talked to one of my graphic design professors at Union College, Bruce Forbes, and he echoed this same idea: colors are subjective, and everyone has their own taste in what they find appealing. Interestingly, his least favorite color is purple!

This caused me to come up with a simple theory: there are no “bad” colors. I just need to find my shade.

This theory is equally applicable to my experience of worship. I used to aimlessly read the Bible, with no direction, and would end up frustrated when the verses I was reading had no bearing on my life. I got bitter. I started despising my worship periods altogether, seeing no progression in my spiritual journey. I was completely turned off from the idea of reading the Bible.

Then I started looking into different methods, which included quiet time, and reflections on short patches of text. This allowed me to find what worked best for me, my “shade.”

Next time you are stumped with your worship habits, don’t throw it out all together; take a step back, and find what works best for your life. Find your shade of orange.

Max Lassel is a junior at Union College studying public relations.