I found this skeptical treatment of Bates from 1952 and I have to say it is far more fair and professional than, for example, the quackwatch articles. The author, Elwin Marg, seems to have actually investigated where success stories come from. He concludes that clear flashes are very real and can last for a minute or longer (as many of us know from personal experience) but are not actual changes in refractive power. Although he did not draw any conclusion as to what they are, apparently a 1982 study produced such clear flashes in subjects and concluded that they were the result of "tear-film changes" creating an "artificial contact lens". Although I had heard that suggested before, this is the first time I have seen that conclusion published.

Tears can cause flashes of clarity by cleaning the cornea, preventing dry eyes and acting as a natural contact lens.
I think tears also cleanse other areas of the eye, remove toxins in the eye/body and help normalize eye pressure, fluid flow, circulation.
Release of negative emotions by crying sometimes is healthy and reduces mental, emotional strain.
Tears are healthy for the eyes.
I know a homeless woman that has cataracts.
Practicing Bates method.
Shifting cleared the fog in her vision and she could see a lady on the bus beside her knitting.
She was almost blind as usual, heard a clinking sound beside her, kept shifting on objects toward the sound and the ladys hands, knitting needles became clear.
Her visual field became clear.
I paid her $20.00 to practice on a eye chart and see the letters clear at the railroad station while we waited for the train.
She shifted, used central fixation, relaxed, thought positive, happy things, blink, and remembered, imagined letters clear.
She saw larger letters and then could see 20/60, 40, 20 line 90% of the letters clear on each line.
She also mentioned that when she is upset about being homeless and crys her vision becomes clear.
Clear flashes due to shifting and other Bates activities occur more often, last longer and become permanent.

_________________
Mary I. Oliver - 38 years practice, teach Natural Eyesight Improvement.

Free on-line Better Eyesight Magazine with Translator, Speaker;
http://www.cleareyesight.info/naturalvisionimprovementoriginalandmodernbatesmethod/
http://www.cleareyesight.info

People have been proposing the tear film thing forever. Yes, myopic people can do that with heavy tears, but not hyperopic and astigmatic, who somehow also have clear flashes. Anyway, clear flashes are not the goal. Clear vision throughout the day is the goal, at least for most people. If you can get flashes of clear vision but over time they never lead to improved vision throughout the day, then that's a problem, and you should re-examine how those "clear flashes" are coming about. If you produce them at will by doing something to your eyes or by tearing up, then you need to re-examine how that is not in line with the approach of the Bates method, learning to use your eyes withou strain.

Dave

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Webmaster of http://www.iblindness.org

"I conceive that the great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by false estimates they have made of the value of things." - Benjamin Franklin

I think there are two viable explanations for clear flashes - 1. Tear film 2. Pinhole Effect.

Both these are easily possible and easy to mistaken them for temporary vision improvement when there is isn't any. The improved vision due to tears is very temporary and can often vanish with a blink. In any case it wont last beyond a few blinks. A hard blink can temporarily produce a clear flash but not useful in the longer scheme of things. The pinhole effect is due to variable luminosity in the room in which you are experiencing the flashes. Voltage fluctuations can easily cause the pupil diameter to change and change the visual acuity for the moment. Thougb people with normal vision do not experience drastic differences with lighting levels, myopes experience significant differences in their vision under different lighting conditions for this reason. It is also possible for Bates routines such as shifting to temporarily influence the pupil so make sure your clear flashes are not due to changes in the pupil.

If your clear flashes remain clear flashes for several weeks without causing your baseline vision to improve, it is likely that they were false clear flashes. A person who experiences frequent clear flashes must inevitably notice permanent changes in vision as time passes. Test your vision early morning after washing the face and a cup of tea. This vision is probably your baseline vision not influenced by any exercises, strain etc. If sleep itself is a strain for you, then test your vision 30 minutes after waking up. If this vision does not improve over time it probably means that you had only illusions of clear flashes.

Ok, the whole tear film and pinhole effect things have been blown way out of proportion and insult everyone's intelligence. They're just theories proposed by people who grasp at anything that would help them dismiss the Bates method. If anything, determining whether your clear flash is genuine just a matter of being honest with yourself.

You can tell if you have a buildup of tears on your eyes right away. It's not something that's a mystery. Any conscious person is aware when their eyes are watering.

Try to find someone with myopia who consistently sees 20/200 indoors and 20/40 in sunlight. I'd be surprised if you can. Pupil size can sometimes effect a small change in acuity, but if your pupils are contracting in sunlight, it would only make sense when they stay that way, not do it occasionally for a few seconds during your time outside.

As far as hard blinks that positively affect the focus for a myopic eye temporarily, which may be due to pressure on the cornea or elsewhere, again, it's a matter of being honest with yourself. Did you just squeeze your eyes shut? It's not that hard to figure out.

Dave

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Webmaster of http://www.iblindness.org

"I conceive that the great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by false estimates they have made of the value of things." - Benjamin Franklin

Watery Eyes are more likely to produce blurred vision rather than clear flashes. Anyone who has used any kind of eye drops ( such as artificial tears or steroid drops) will know that vision is quite blurred for the first few minutes when it should be producing clear flashes. So any explanation of clear flashes based on tear films rely only on a very little extra film which wont probably produce the sensation of watery eyes. In this case it is not possible to know if the clear flash is due to the film at all. In any case unusual clear flashes ( such as 20/30 vision for a person who has normally 20/200) frequently reported by Bates practitioners are not accounted for by tear films.

The pinhole effect is a more plausible explanation and can indeed produce dramatic increase in vision. Even I have a significant difference in vision in sunlight and roomlight conditions. Though my vision now is poor in either good light or poor light. I used to notice that when I was a beginner myope some twenty years ago my vision in sunlight was much better than room lighting ( something like 20/40 while indoor vision was 20/100). There are some people who need different glasses for the day and night because their pupil size varies considerably in response to light- I belong to that category as well though I always managed with the weaker glasses at night.

If we are honest with ourselves we should be able to rule out these possibilities. If the flashes last for longer durations then there could be no doubt at all that they were genuine flashes obtained due to relaxation.

Clear flashes from tears can be helpful because the person obtains clear visual pictures to store in the brain; clear mental pictures, memory of clear vision.
This helps the person use the memory, imagination; to remember, imagine a blurry object clear.
The brain has clear memory pictures to work with.
This helps the brain, eyes work together and produce clear vision when the eyes do and do not have the extra tear production.

_________________
Mary I. Oliver - 38 years practice, teach Natural Eyesight Improvement.

Free on-line Better Eyesight Magazine with Translator, Speaker;
http://www.cleareyesight.info/naturalvisionimprovementoriginalandmodernbatesmethod/
http://www.cleareyesight.info

The extra tear film due to water or any other cause simulates a contact lens. So any improved vision due to tears are similar to the improved vision through eye glasses. If the clear pictures obtained by wearing glasses can serve as an aid to improving the brain's memory, then the tears can help in a similar way. I dont think it is recommended to improve your visual memory by wearing glasses. On the contrary the more you wear glasses the lesser the chances of improved memory. Even though myopes see well through glasses it does not help to improve their brain's memory in anyway. It is better to work with the clear images of near objects as an aid to memory rather than glasses or tear film.

I agree with Ram. There's something often misunderstood about the whole memory thing. We're not trying to collect images to store so that we can use them to remember a clear image and improve our vision somehow by doing that. The point of the whole memory thing is to remember the experience of perfect vision, not the object. What you're remembering that is beneficial is the experience of seeing clearly. Most people with blurry vision can see pretty clearly at a certain distance. What ever that distance may be, the eyes are being used relatively correctly, and remembering something seen clearly from that time is remembering how to use your eyes correctly.

Dave

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Webmaster of http://www.iblindness.org

"I conceive that the great part of the miseries of mankind are brought upon them by false estimates they have made of the value of things." - Benjamin Franklin

Dear David,

Subject: Sun Snellen Versus Room Illumination Snellen

David, in reviewing this subject with one person, it turns out that the difference is more
like 20/25 in sun light, and about 20/70 in room illumination.



This is why I suggest that a person check his vision under BOTH conditions.

If the person has 20/25 vision -- then he can do everything he wishes (tennis, football, etc.) with
NO MINUS LENS AT ALL.

Further, if he is doing Bates work, then he should see his room-illumination Snellen
clear also.

When he verifies he read the 20/40 line (1/2 the letters correctly), he can pass
the most crucial test of all -- the DMV Snellen -- who WILL confirm this
success.

Enjoy,

Otis

I think the idea in using memory/imagination to improve vision is to be actually imagine how good vision would look like. To those who have been myopic for many years there wont even be a single good frame of good vision to aid in the cause. So the idea is to somehow visually imagine good vision ( like imaging dark pulsating Snellen letters with halos around them). But normally we cant imagine that since we can imagine only when we see. If however we can simulate an experience of good vision and if that gets recorded in the brain, such an image can be used. Every genuine flash of improved vision helps. But when we experience the flash we must be relaxed or else no memory recording takes place. Glasses produce perfect flashes but we are considerably strained when we wear them so they dont help. Moreover even though myopes see well with glasses, they normally dont experience the swing or the halos on them - glasses do not give us perfect qualitative vision, though one may pass a 20/20 test.

At distances close to the eyes myopes can experience good quality vision almost comparable to those with perfect vision. This is the best input for the memory. Pinhole glasses do not help to relax the eyes but the images produced by them is not of a strained state like glasses. Therefore, pinholes are not as useful as a genuine clear vision obtained from following Bates routines but they are still useful in improving the memory as one can see better through them. Fineprint reading is probably one of the best ways to visually imagine how the perfect eye sees the 20 line from twenty feet away. It is almost the same as how a myope sees the small sharp fineprint letters( that swing and have halos) at 6 inches away.