It’s been said that there is no sweeter sound than that of hearing our own name spoken aloud. Destiny Child nailed this intrinsic desire for us to hear our own name in their Grammy Award winning hit, “Say My Name.” Author Baron Greycastle agrees, but says our names also have colors, which can affect how others see us.

In his latest book, Your Name & Colors: Key to Your Beauty, Career, Personality, Romance & Success: A Revolutionary Philosophy for the Future, Greycastle makes some pretty grand claims about names. He claims that he can discern:

• What your best career choices are.
• Who your romantic soul mate should be.
• What colors to decorate your homes or work spaces to stimulate your seven centers and create the seven mood environments.
• What colors to wear to project the seven different image styles.
• What your positive and negative character traits and talents are of all their seven centers.
• How to cultivate your positive talents and break your negative habits.
• What key words to say to impress a person that you are trying to sell to or interviewing for a job.
• What colors to wear to stimulate a loved one romantically or sexually.

Greycastle’s theories are based on his belief that we receive subliminal color wavelength vibrations whenever someone calls us by our name. He says that our inner ear transfers these color wave vibrations to our thalamus gland in our brain, which then sends them to our seven endocrine gland centers, laying the character traits of the colors to these seven centers.

Frankly, Greycastle’s claims seem to border on the esoteric and could be said to have their roots in New Age chakra theology or just plain mysticism with a little science thrown in. However, Greycastle is in good company when it comes to being fascinated about how sound and color affect the human psyche.

Interest in colored names dates back to the Greek philosophers of antiquity, who were curious about the color, or timbre, of music and mused on whether it was a quantifiable quality. Isaac Newton also proposed that musical tones and color tones share common frequencies while Carl Jung refers to color hearing in his 1912 collected works, Symbols of Transformation.

Whether Greycastle’s color-name theory is based on science, the mystical or both, names are important to our identity. The God of the Christian Bible has multiple names for Himself, names that identify His specific character traits. Clearly, God believes names are so important that He often changed the names of people He had personal encounters with, such as changing Jacob’s name to Israel and Abram to Abraham. God also personally calls people by name throughout the Bible, such as when He called Samuel’s name several times in the book of Kings or when Jesus called to the apostle Paul after his death saying, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me.”

Although Greycastle’s claims seem grandiose in that you can manipulate your life by understanding your name and colors, and my bullshit radar will be fully engaged, it’s an intriguing enough topic that his book has been added to my reading wish list. If nothing else, perhaps I’ll finally understand the difference between how light and sound travel. Reign well.