Colors reveal more about you than you think. One personality quiz I often give friends, even equates a person’s description of their favorite color with how they view themselves. I don’t know if the personality quiz is approved by the scientific community, but the answers I receive, usually fit the person.

A quick peruse through your closet can reveal quite a bit about your color preferences too. Think about what colors get you the most flattering comments. Most people feel their best in a home that reflects colors that compliment them.

When you’re deciding on color for your home, you need to go beyond just picking colors that you love. You need to think about the properties of color. Did you know that warm colors such as red, orange and yellow advance toward you and cool colors like blue, green and purple recede? By using the correct colors, you can make the walls or ceiling in your room seem closer or further away. By combining complimentary or contrasting colors, you can create excitement and drama. Conversely, by combining related or more similar colors, you can create a more harmonious relaxing effect.

Did you know that red is an emotionally intense color that is associated with passion, power, energy, danger, warmth, coziness and love? This color is highly visible with the ability to raise your blood pressure and increase your respiration rate.

Orange is a hot color that combines the energy of red with the happy in yellow and it’s associated with enthusiasm, creativity, stimulation and sunshine. This color is known to stimulate mental activity, increase oxygen supply to the brain and enhance your appetite.

Yellow is sunshine and happiness, usually associated with cheerful pleasant feelings and is known to generate muscle energy. But, if bright yellow is overused, it can create a disturbing effect on young children and cause fighting among spouses.

Green evokes feelings of nature, growth, safety and money. This color is considered the easiest color to mix with other hues of itself and people find this color the most restful.

Blue is a favorite of men and this color says sky blue and ocean. Common associations with this color are stability, loyalty, trust, depth and heaven. This color tends to produce calmness and tranquility in the body and mind.

Purple is an extremely popular color for children, combining the energy of red with the stability of blue. This color evokes feelings of royalty, luxury, power, wealth and extravagance.

And white, the color of purity in the U.S. is associated with cleanliness, goodness and faith. Black, conversely, has a negative connotation with fear, grief and death. However, this color can also denote prestige, elegance, authority and strength.

When you begin to think about selecting color for your home, pick one color to use in varying degrees of shade or tone in each room to create unity throughout the house. Then, pick one color to dominate a room by repeating that color, so the other colors won’t compete. Try not to use more than three different colors in the major areas of a room.

Once you’ve selected colors, normally you would place the most neutral hues or graduation of color, on the largest areas of the room, such as the walls and floor. For your larger upholstered pieces, you can increase the intensity of the color, saving the most intense hues for your accessories. But, if you want to add some drama, try a medium hue color on your walls and a lighter hue in upholstery.

Now that you have a glimpse of color’s power in your life, why not take control and color your world with everything that you love?

Designer’s Eye column was written by Karen Mills of Interiors by Design, Inc. and host, Living Large.