Watercolor without "color" is just "Water"...
and you can't paint with that unless you're making an invisible painting.
Color is vital, it can help a painting to express seasons, mood, and atmosphere
But people often overthink about color. They try to follow formula and recipes when they paint. If you approach color mixing like:
20% of color A + 30% of color B + 50% of water = color C
You probably get very stressful when you paint.

So stop looking at the color swatches and the name of the colors,

and start to think of the color like this:

So what's the difference? Look at color as a spectrum, not individual swatches!
Think of the color as a simple warm and cool!

All the color is mixed from the primary colors, Red, Yellow and Blue. Besides white and black, all the other colors are just the different variations in saturation and lightness. Old master John Singer Sargent has about 5 colors in his watercolor palette. You should think of all the colors that's out in the stores "short cut" colors. They are "pre-mixed" color from nature and chemists.

If you approach color mixing like a formula, it will be like driving a car and have your eyes on the speedometer 80% of the time. That's not only inefficient, but very dangerous! My guess is people don't drive like that. They rely on their sense of speed and glance at the speedometer for a fraction of a second and they immediately know if they are too fast, slow or just right. Same for color mixing. After you picked up the colors you like for your pallete, get familiar with them, and think of them as warm and cool.

In the next post I will be talking about my pallet and how I mix the colors. So stay tune!