When Dr. Sohail introduced me to the Green Zone model in 2001, I was personally intrigued and instantly aware of the potential for use in therapy. So for several months after I read the book, I discussed the concept with Sohail as well as other friends and colleagues and began using it in my own life. “It’s simple, like many brilliant concepts, just think of the traffic lights,” I thought, “Green means go forward, yellow means caution, slow down and red means stop.”

One of the first elements that stood out was the concept that while I could be feeling really good in the Green Zone the person next to me may be in distress in the Yellow or Red Zone. I became aware that checking for which Zone I was in first and then which Zone others were in was a wise first step in deciding when and how I would talk to a friend, family or colleague about a troubling or even a pleasant issue. I began more and more to use the Zones as a way of measuring the emotional temperature of a relationship or situation.

As I became more tuned into what Zone I or another person was in, I began to appreciate that a relationship can be in one of those Zones and as well, a system can be in either of the three Zones. The main systems that affect our lives are family, work and social. I was already aware that systems are often more powerful than the individual because, of course, there is power in numbers. This new awareness helped me be more realistic in approaching or working with Yellow or Red Zone systems. I also became more thorough in my planning to interact in those systems. It became my catchphrase that it is wise, not weak, to delay addressing a concern with a person or system that is temporarily in the Red Zone until the storm has passed. With a person or system that seemed to be permanently in the Yellow or Red, I was aware that it took some planning to decide how I would deal with them. I also began asking myself whether it was really necessary to deal with some of these persistently Red Zone situations, and if it wasn’t, I didn’t. I became increasingly more convinced that healthy communication is only possible only in the Green Zone.

As part of integrating it into my personal life I introduced it to my daughter Adriana one day while we were waiting at the traffic lights. Although she was only eleven years old at the time, her passion for driving anything with wheels and a motor had been developed a couple of years previously when she first sat on a ride-on lawn mower. So she was listening carefully when I started talking about the traffic lights and her interest did not wane when I introduced the concept of emotional zones. We both liked the respectful language of the model. Several days later at the end of a very long but Green day, we found ourselves talking about an unpleasant issue and realized that we were both tired. Adriana quickly took advantage of her newfound knowledge and said with a grin, “Mom, I think you’re going into the Yellow!” We both laughed and changed the subject but realized that we had discovered a non-escalating way to give each other feedback about the emotional temperature of our relationship.

Using the model made us more aware when a situation was becoming tense, and on those occasions we no longer wasted emotional energy, trying to find a sensitive way of saying that our interaction was off track. I believe that healthy families find ways of communicating in shorthand, ways of conveying a message quickly which can be discussed later when there is more time and I was realizing that the Green Zone Model was a type of shorthand. For example, when my daughter received a phone call from her friend, Kristen, when I called her to the phone, she said, “Mom, Kristen and I are in the Yellow. I’m not ready to talk to her yet.” Announcing that you’re in the Yellow or Red is a good way to put your loved ones on alert so that they can be more sensitive.

So as I became excited about the impact of the Green Zone philosophy on my daughter’s and my life, I was eager to introduce it to my clients. Their response was as enthusiastic as ours. I found many embraced the concept and were quickly able to apply it to their lives.

A while ago I had the privilege of offering a seminar over a six week period to senior high school students and was pleasantly surprised at the ease with which they began using the language and integrating it into their day-to-day experiences. Along with learning about their feelings they were able to have fun with it as well. I had made a comment and that some people are so familiar with living in the Red Zone that they often became permanent residents there and have a condominium, even a subdivision in the Red Zone.  When I asked one student who had a good sense of humor, what Zone he felt he lived in, he smiled mischievously and said that he had a house in the Green Zone but that he had a summer cottage in the Yellow!

Individuals who were dealing with boundary issues, such as survivors of childhood abuse or those from enmeshed families, embraced it quickly. Gradually they could see how certain situations, issues or people pushed them into the Yellow or Red. For them building their awareness of boundaries was significantly strengthened by the Green Zone model. Their awareness increased over time as they worked on becoming attentive to the boundaries between the Green Zone and the Yellow Zone as well as between the Yellow Zone and the Red Zone.

Around that time my daughter and I had an experience while on vacation which would become a metaphor for emphasizing those invisible boundaries that are important in all of our lives. When we arrived at the airport at the end of our vacation, Adriana, eager to get a cart for our luggage said her goodbyes quickly. After loading the cart she headed toward the door to the airport while I did my final goodbyes with our friends at the curb. She stopped about 10-15 feet from the door of the airport to wait for me. As she stood waiting, looking back in my direction she moved the luggage cart back and forth similar to the way one would rock a baby carriage. Unbeknownst to Adriana each time she moved the cart forward she would cross an invisible barrier which caused the door of the airport to open, when she wheeled it back the door would close. Of course, therapists love moments like this because they are familiar to many people and can be used to convey a psychological concept. So I now use this story to make the invisible boundaries between each of the emotional zones more visible.

Initially the boundary between Zones moves from an invisible boundary that is unknowingly crossed to a speed bump that gets a little more of our attention. And from a speed bump to a wall that increasingly gets higher so that crossing into the next Zone is more in our awareness and more in our control. As one of my clients said, “I know now when my little toe is in the Yellow and I’m choosing not to go there!”

After a couple of months using the Green Zone Model I was really excited about the awareness that I and others were developing.  Then the question was, “what to do with all that awareness?” The natural answer was to use it to address the issues that are pushing you out of the Green Zone. Obviously, awareness of the issues, people or situations that cause you distress is very valuable but real emotional strength comes from addressing these challenges.

As a therapist I find that people mainly need to learn awareness of their emotional zones and usually they need to gain clarity about challenging issues but they can often identify the challenges well. As the analogy goes they may have swept some of these issues under the rug and need prompting to drag them out but usually the awareness of the issue is there. Most people sweep troublesome issues under the rug because they have difficulty resolving them and it can be very stressful to keep reviewing unfinished problems. But what people don’t realize is that it requires emotional energy to keep these unresolved issues hidden or to repeatedly put them back in their place, when others push our buttons.  As well when these things that are unresolved rear their ugly heads, it is often to our embarrassment.

One of my favorite concepts in The Art of Living in Your Green Zone is the discussion around our choices in dealing with stressful, pushing-us-into-the-Red-Zone issues. We can either 1) resolve or 2) dissolve; that is we either address the issue so that it is no longer a problem or if that is not possible, you can dissolve the problem, in other words, end the relationship, change jobs, etc. I find that one of the biggest sources of ongoing stress for people is that they neither resolve nor dissolve problems but continue, some times for years, sitting on the fence between these two options. I jokingly say that sitting on the fence is very uncomfortable because we sit on those sharp pickets day after day. We work really hard in therapy to help people down off the fence and, of course, our first choice is always resolution of an issue rather than dissolving it by ending the relationship or job.

Let me give you a personal example of how I got down off the fence in one of the most important relationships in my life – with my mother. If you saw my Mom and me together these days you would think we had a relationship that was bright Green and yet we didn’t always look that way. It had occurred to me that we had issues that were in all three Zones. When we discussed those that were in the Green we were happy and enjoyed each other’s company but when we focused on Yellow Zone issues we quickly moved to the Red and felt frustrated and distressed. I began to look at all of these issues and realized that if we had 15 issues we regularly discussed, 7 of them were in the Red. 3 were in the Yellow and 5 in the Green. I approached my Mom and explained this. She had met Sohail many years ago and was very fond of his sense of humor and pleasant nature, so she was quite open to reading The Art of Living in Your Green Zone.  I said that clearly the issues in the Green Zone were good, and asked her if we could resolve the Yellow Zone issues to bring them to the Green. We were able to do that and even found a couple of Red Zone issues we could resolve. So now we have a number of issues that we feel really good about. If either of us gets into a Red Zone issue, we have three choices: 1) be quiet for a while to let the other person clue into what Zone they are in; 2) make a brief comment to correct the course such as “Let’s not get into that. I think that’s going to get us in to the Yellow.” or 3) if all else fails, gracefully end the conversation and reconnect when both are in the Green again.

I have derived so many benefits from using the Green Zone concept and I know a number of friends, family and clients have as well.  It is a well rounded concept that we use in our clinic in our professional interactions with each other as colleagues, and also it with our clients and in our personal lives.  At home we are a Green Zone family and at work we are a Green Zone clinic.  It has had a significant impact on my emotional growth enhancing my relationships and the ease with which I handle even difficult (Red Zone) situations.