A Personal Success Story
In 10th grade I had a group of friends in marching band. Well, a group of friends and one boy who was not so friendly.
My Yellow soul hated it! I didn’t know what the Color Code was at the time, but even still I knew that being disliked was worse to me than running marching band drills on the hot pavement in middle of summer. I tried everything to get this guy in the friend group to like me.
I used what I thought was charm to tease him, I recognized that he was a natural leader, so I tried to be one too by being loud and bossy. When he criticized me I was offended and fought back emotionally, which furthered his frustrations with me, and thus furthering my frustrations with him. Why weren’t my efforts working?! He was impossible!
Then by divine inspiration I found an unused Color Code book on my mom’s bookshelf. Curiosity struck, and within 5 pages I was hooked.
With time I learned that this kid was a Red, and better yet, I found “The 10 Do’s and Don’ts of getting along with a Red” section and what would you know, I was doing every “Don’t” in the book and not one “Do.” No wonder he hated me!
With this new information, I made it my sole ambition to get this Red to like me. I switched up my behaviors and did exactly what my book said to do. (And of course incorporating my Yellow gifts into the mix!)
This went on for months, but with very slow and imperfect progress I noticed him coming around. Finally one day, I was sitting in the parking lot after band practice with him and two other friends and suddenly he turns to me and says, “Cassie. I judged you. I was mean to you and I realized that I’m wrong. You’re actually pretty cool. I’m sorry for how I treated you.” Very caught off guard I tried to say, “Oh no don’t worry about it! I was annoy-” “No. I was rude to you. And that was wrong of me.” “Oh, well, thank you.” A brief awkward but special silence was shared and with the next blink he was onto the next subject and acted like the exchange never even happened. But I was glowing! Before I would have just been excited about not being disliked anymore, but now it was even better knowing that I just witnessed a Red apologizing… to ME!!! This might sound silly but it is one of my most proud accomplishments.
After that we shared a great friendship of respect that lasted until we all graduated and everyone went their separate ways. His respect remained though, and even reached out to me years later seeking my thoughts on a piece of music he was writing. I was still amazed that someone who knew everything about music and played every instrument he could get his hands on was coming to me for feedback.
That’s how I know the Color Code works. Apply the principles and watch your relationships grow and flourish every time.
