On Improving Eyesight Naturally

By Robert Lichtman

All quotes in this essay come from actual students' written letters.


Intro
Glasses Do Not Correct Poor Eyesight
The History Of Eyesight Improvement
Dr. William H. Bates, MD
Times Have Changed
Outlook Insight
Eyesight and Aging
Vision Is Not Just Seeing Clearly
The Benefits Of Studying With A Teacher
In Summary

Intro

Have you ever noticed your vision fluctuate? Many people assume eyesight just gets worse as we get older. But if you think about it, almost all of us have experienced changes in our eyesight for better as well as for worse. It might get worse after staying up late to catch up on a lot of reading, but improve to status quo upon waking up. It might get worse during a period of intense stress, but improve after two weeks on a vacation where you forgot to bring your glasses. It's important to understand these fluctuations are normal. They are your body's way of telling you that you are straining and relaxing.

Most of us got glasses only after this strain became chronic and more or less unconscious. For many, but by no means all, the blur developed as a response to a very stressful, if not traumatic, period of their lives. For example, one of my students moved between third and fourth grade. When the school year started, she had trouble seeing the blackboard in her new school. Another of my students had excellent eyesight for 53 years. Upon getting a promotion that involved assuming a lot more responsibility and therefore the need to pay much closer attention to the details of written reports, he started to have difficulty reading fine print.

Before the first class, I conduct a twenty-minute phone interview with each student. This gives me a chance to get to know the student and the student's vision issues before class, and gives the student a chance to see their vision history in perspective. In this interview, I explain that the blur is the body's way of making you aware of strain, not a genetic flaw. This shift in perception can have a profound impact. As one of my students explains:

This student's vision started to improve after she realized that stress is an individual's response to the environment, and not so much the environment itself. And further, that she could choose how to physically and mentally react to that environment.

Glasses Do Not Correct Poor Eyesight

Although commonly referred to as "corrective lenses", they obviously do not correct anything. Rather, they compensate for poor vision. Proof: Have you ever heard of someone improving their eyesight through wearing strong glasses?

In fact, the opposite seems to be true. Eyeglasses can worsen vision. This student's experience is perhaps all too familiar:

This is because glasses, contacts, and even LASIK force one to strain just to see through them. Most everyone who has put on a pair of glasses for the first time has felt the strain, but was told, "You'll get used to it". This is true, people do get used to the strain to the point where they may not even notice it anymore. But even if it is not felt, it is still there. Similarly, a painkiller does not heal a pain. It just deadens the nervous system so the person who took the painkiller doesn't feel it. If painkillers did heal, people with cancer would just take morphine and be cured. If glasses healed, people would wear them until their vision improved, and then discard them the way people discard crutches when a broken leg heals. In fact, the strain of eyeglasses never goes away until vision improves. And it may manifest itself in other ways, like headaches, poor posture, or a changed mental outlook on the world.

The History Of Eyesight Improvement

All of this was known in the pre-modern world. For example, in Psalm 6 the psalmist writes, "My eyes were dimmed by anger". An 18th century book on ethics and spirituality states that, "There is no difference between natural blindness and self-inflicted blindness, the shutting of one's eyes as an act of will and desire".

Eyeglasses were invented around the time of the Renaissance. An inscription at the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Florence credits one Salvino degli Armati with the invention. Curiously, Renaissance art used eyeglasses to denote people who were supposedly spiritually blind.

In the 19th century, a German scientist named Helmholtz propagated the view that eyesight could only get worse, and was the result of a genetic flaw in the shape of the eyeball. This view was, and is, widely accepted. However, the first paragraph of this essay demonstrates that Helmholtz's theories are not in accord with our daily experience of reality. Why they continue to be so widely accepted is an interesting question.

Dr. William H. Bates, MD

The first modern ophthalmologist to reject Helmholtz's theories was Dr. William H. Bates (1860-1931) of New York City. Bates began to doubt what he himself had taught at the New York Post-Graduate school of Ophthalmology after observing that all people with normal eyesight use their eyes a certain way, and all people with imperfect eyesight depart from these good habits. For some, strain induces farsightedness, others nearsightedness, and still others develop cross-eyes. While the causes are different, the correction for all of them is essentially the same: Seeing is supposed to be an effortless activity, and any effort to see causes strain and blur. This may sound counterintuitive, but is easily demonstrated in class. For example, feel the fabric of your pants. How much effort do you put into your fingertips? Take a deep breath. How much effort does your nose use to smell? Your ears to hear? Your tongue to taste? Vision is the same as the other senses, except that it is easy to mistakenly add effort to vision.

Bates's research, though in-depth and rigorous, was rejected by the medical establishment of the time. Even today, few eye doctors have heard of Bates and most of those who have reject his findings without ever having read or researched them. One prominent New York ophthalmologist insisted to me the Bates Method was a form of hypnosis, despite the fact that Bates explicitly mentions hypnosis as ineffective for improving eyesight.

Why was Bates rejected? His main discovery was that, surprisingly, vision is primarily a mental process and very little of it happens in the eyes. In fact, Bates would say that every cell in the body affects vision. Eye doctors are specialists in the function of the eye, and are not trained to consider the impact stress, strain, psychology, nutrition, posture, and other factors have on our ability to see clearly.

Even Bates's followers often did not get it. Bates said that the key to good vision was relaxation. That was hard to explain to a public who could not imagine improving something by leaving it alone. As a result, many of those who came after him made up "eye exercises" and came up with cornpone theories that poor vision is the result of weak muscles. In fact, the muscles involved have the ability to handle 50-100 times more weight than they will ever have to. But when these exercises naturally failed to relax the visual system and bring good, long-term results, Bates was further discredited. In fact, Bates never mentions any kind of exercises in his voluminous writings. Today, a new generation that is more comfortable with holistic approaches is going back to Dr. Bates's original writings and observations, and the results are stunning. After 100 years, we are starting to catch up to this man a century and a half ahead of his time.

Times Have Changed

Today, in the age of athletes on steroids and eighty hour work weeks, our culture is more aware than ever before that the harder and harder we strain to do something, we eventually get exhausted and performance suffers. However, the answer to our increasingly hectic lifestyles is not to lower our expectations and be held captive by our limitations. Rather, we can transcend our limitations by first accepting them. By not trying to see, we actually see more clearl. At first thought, this sounds like an invitation to laziness. But think about how effortless a great dancer or athlete looks, how the greatest compliment one can give an actor is that "he doesn't look like he's acting at all". You might have noticed glimpses of your own effortlessness when you have been "in the zone", working on something you have a passion for. The fact is, to do anything well requires effortlessness. Through effortlessness - the efficient use of our minds and bodies - the most demanding task becomes child's play. We save tremendous amounts of energy for thinking, working, playing, digesting, strengthening our immune systems, and just plain living. Effortlessness is a birthright many of us lose as we go through life, yet it is also something we can recover.

Outlook Insight

Outlook Insight is part of a growing movement of enthusiasts who are going back to the original Bates Method and getting amazing results. Using Dr. Bates as a guide, I integrate modern techniques that encourage the relaxation and release that Dr. Bates describes as being necessary for clear vision and sound mind. Unlike some other practices that compartmentalize relaxation, such as yoga and meditation, these techniques gradually become unconscious and therefore available to you twenty-four hours a day.

Rather than learn eye exercises, students in an Outlook Insight class learn the good habits of proper eyesight. These are habits that eventually become second nature and can be practiced anywhere any time.

Students also learn some basic eye care, little things everyone should know about relaxing the eyes and reducing strain. For starters, when working close up it is helpful to every so often look into the distance, noticing the color, depth, and space that is usually missing on a black and white page.

Has anyone ever told you "you just need to let it go"? It's great advice, but would be more helpful if we were told how to let it go. Since blur is often produced by an unconscious "holding on", students are not just advised to "let it go". They are also taught how to let it go, and these techniques not only help to clear vision. They have helped many students to clear the mind and live more in the present. In fact, the mind and body are linked such that one is likely to be very frustrated in "trying to let go" of something mental without letting go of something physical. If you have poor eyesight, one of those things that require letting go is strain around the eyes. This can have profound implications. As one student writes,

Anther important topic we discuss is reading. It is often strange for an adult to discover they don't read well, but many of us strain to read. In addition to causing blur, this strain tends to reduce comprehension and make attention drift. Learning the correct way to read restores much of the pleasure of reading. One student, a college professor, reported:

There is an interesting link between vision, imagination, and memory. The more we improve one, the more the others are improved. Students are encouraged to remember as vividly as possible relaxing places from memory, especially scenes from a time when they had clear eyesight. For me, who started wearing glasses at age three, a memory of a midsummer hay ride does the trick. Not only do the eyes relax, but the whole body follows suit. While this is not as simple as it sounds, it does work. A student relates:

Another student tells of her sense of wonder when she started to experience, at age 60, clear vision during a train ride to New York City as she passed, of all places, Newark, NJ:

Eyesight and Aging

You may have been told losing clear vision is an inevitable part of getting older. Some doctors even prescribe reading glasses for people who do not need them, just because they are over forty.

In fact, though, it is not inevitable. Many people over forty do not need reading glasses. In addition to people with clear vision, most nearsighted people can continue to read up close throughout their lives. Some contact lens wearers can correct their near point vision and avoid reading glasses simply by switching from contacts to a slightly weaker pair of glasses. And for those who have lost clarity in the near point:

For some, losing the ability to read fine print after age forty seems like the first foot in the grave, and it is understandable that people would be angry about it. Imagine how that anger would feel if transformed into joy:

Vision Is Not Just Seeing Clearly

So natural eyesight is not only seeing clearly. It is also:
· Reading books and computer screens all day long without blur or strain.
· Relief from fatigue.
· Relief from many chronic headaches and neck pain.
· More relaxed appearance (the five-minute facelift).
· Being comfortable in your body.
· Relief from anxiety and tension
· Improved posture
· Proper depth perceptions.
· More vibrant color perceptions
· Relaxed concentration.
· Sharper memory and imagination.
· Increased efficiency and focus.
· More energy for living.
· Reduced risk for eye conditions such as glaucoma, cataracts, detached retina, and macular degeneration.

From the above list, you can see why many students say that clearer vision is only one of the benefits of taking Outlook Insight. Many people with poor eyesight do not realize that even with glasses, the world seems flatter. Colors seem duller, less vibrant. One student, an Alexander Technique teacher, relates the effect that Outlook Insight had:

Another student wrote:

A college professor relates:

The Benefits Of Studying With A Teacher

There are countless books on the market, and even some rather expensive videotapes that promise to improve your eyesight. The question arises whether it is necessary to take a class at all if the information is widely available. Some people can improve their sight just by reading a book. A few have even improved their eyesight without ever hearing about natural eyesight improvement. But most people will get the most benefit from an experienced, qualified teacher.

Sometimes, a trusted teacher can help people take the first steps towards changing a belief system:

Another student adds:

A teacher who has already gone through the process can encourage his students.

The following student works with very young children, and was concerned that changing her vision habits might make it harder to keep track of her kids. What she discovered was that changing her vision habits improved her peripheral vision, actually making her feel like she was keeping a better eye on the kids than before.

I encourage folks to study one on one. However, the class setting has its benefits as well.

Since this is in many respects a class in relaxation, much care is taken to make sure the learning environment is casual.

The most important reason why most people will require an experienced teacher, though, is because so much of this process is counter-intuitive. For best results, you need someone who knows how to observe eye movements and not only correct them in real time, but correct the "wrong thoughts" that led to the strain. This is crucial because these bad habits feel so natural that most people would never on their own realize what they were doing actually a strain. Beware courses and teachers who do not provide real-time feedback of eye movements! They may not be able to do more for you than provide an introduction to Bates.

In Summary

It is not only possible to improve eyesight and end dependency on glasses. It is desirable for reasons that transcend the eyes themselves. A man once approached Dr. Bates and told the good doctor that he found his writings childish. Dr. Bates replied, "Precisely!" 99% of children are born with normal eyesight, yet 70% of American adults today have blur. In parts of Asia where they are racing to catch up with the more developed countries, the rates are 80 to 90%.

Young children are by nature effortless explorers, curious discoverers, and enthusiastic investigators of the world. They are free with their emotions. They are generous of spirit, loving easily and expressing themselves naturally. When a child learning to walk falls down, the child gets right back up. It never occurs to the child to give up, because the child intuitively understands the reward of the process is the process itself.

We do not outgrow these qualities. Rather, we react to our environments in ways that constrict and conceal them. Outlook Insight is a means whereby we can free ourselves from strain and fully open up to the world.