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+--- Thread: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to school? (/showthread.php?tid=2066)
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-25-2012
Sean_Augensicht Wrote:I have a job requiring heavy computer use and attendance of presentations in meeting rooms. I also drive a moderate amount, including at night. None of this would be possible without my 20/40 lenses. Yet I've managed to make progress gradually, and my 20/40 lenses have gotten weaker over time.You drive at night with only 20/40 correction? That tends to be frowned on. Sure, it's legal (in some places), but it could be compared to driving while you're just below the alcohol limit.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-25-2012
Sean_Augensicht Wrote:Vision improvement is all about not trying to bite off more than you can chew. Gradual improvement is the key. If you did something radical like drop out of school, you'd get depressed, you'd compromise your future, and thereby increase your stress levels. And we all know that bad vision is linked to emotions.I'm sure that for many people, it's depressing to spend hours every day wearing glasses, knowing that that is working against their goal of improving eyesight.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Sean_Augensicht - 07-25-2012
Daniel Wrote:Sean_Augensicht Wrote:I have a job requiring heavy computer use and attendance of presentations in meeting rooms. I also drive a moderate amount, including at night. None of this would be possible without my 20/40 lenses. Yet I've managed to make progress gradually, and my 20/40 lenses have gotten weaker over time.You drive at night with only 20/40 correction? That tends to be frowned on. Sure, it's legal (in some places), but it could be compared to driving while you're just below the alcohol limit.
I'm not sure if they're exactly 20/40. Bottom line: wear lenses that are strong enough that you can drive safely and see what you need to see. If this means 20/20, that is fine, given how relatively little of our time most of us spend night driving anyway.
The problem with setting aside an entire chunk of your life to practice vision while postponing school and other important things is that it might cultivate the wrong thought that more is always better, when the truth is that only practicing the RIGHT way leads to any improvement.
What if you stopped going to school and spent months or years of your life practicing the wrong way? In your frustration, you might resolve to practice even harder to "get over that hump" so that you can go back to school and "get on" with your life. Resolving to "practice even harder" is counterproductive, and you will have wasted a huge chunk of your life for nothing.
Ideally, we should be practicing at all times in our everyday life by paying attention to how we use our eyes. There is no "getting on with life later," because life happens now, and the time to use your eyes correctly is both now and later. Of course, we're not perfect (otherwise our vision would be perfect) and we're bound to slip up often. The key is to notice that you did the wrong thing, laugh it off, and have a sense of humor about it.
I know that when I first started practicing Bates, I tried thousands of different things, and for most of things I tried, I would have made zero progress even after a decade. If you try something and it doesn't result in at least a little improvement right away, you must stop and do something else, or you're wasting your time. If I had resolved to set aside some important thing like school or work until I could throw away my glasses, I would have ended up banging my head against the wall trying to improve my vision the wrong way.
The key to improvement is definitely daily and frequent practice, but the idea of "practice now and get on with life later" is a wrong thought that will lead to frustration.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-27-2012
What would you recommend for a young person who doesn't have glasses yet but is becoming nearsighted and having trouble in school as a result? Getting glasses when you don't yet have them goes completely against the Bates method, and yet by your logic such a person probably should.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-28-2012
I'm now seeing more clearly than ever why vision improvement has not caught on. When nearsightedness is mild enough that it doesn't cause you any trouble, chances are that you won't be motivated to do anything about it, even if you are aware that you have it. Once it gets to the point where it does cause you problems, daily life is working against you.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Pikachu - 07-30-2012
@Daniel: Preaching to the choir. Vision improvement would probably be most efficient in a school setting or with motivated parents teaching children at a young age. I think Bates had good results with NVI in schools. I wonder why that it didn't stick.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - arocarty - 07-31-2012
Pikachu Wrote:I think Bates had good results with NVI in schools. I wonder why that it didn't stick.
Liability issues. School boards/superintendents did not want to be held responsible for the vision of students, especially if it involved a controversial treatment. Teachers themselves didn't want to be held responsible for it. A shame, given the outstanding results, but today, a school wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-31-2012
arocarty Wrote:I agree about today, but as long as they were getting good results, it's hard to see why schools would have been concerned with liability. More likely, there just weren't many Bates teachers talented enough to get it to work in a school setting.Pikachu Wrote:I think Bates had good results with NVI in schools. I wonder why that it didn't stick.
Liability issues. School boards/superintendents did not want to be held responsible for the vision of students, especially if it involved a controversial treatment. Teachers themselves didn't want to be held responsible for it. A shame, given the outstanding results, but today, a school wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Pikachu - 07-31-2012
@Daniel: I don't think it had much to do with competence of teachers. If I recall correctly, I think that the teachers were instructed to encourage the students to use the eyechart and practice some very basic things. Perhaps some student's parent was an optometrist or something and threatened to do something if the schools didn't drop the program entirely.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 07-31-2012
Pikachu Wrote:@Daniel: I don't think it had much to do with competence of teachers. If I recall correctly, I think that the teachers were instructed to encourage the students to use the eyechart and practice some very basic things. Perhaps some student's parent was an optometrist or something and threatened to do something if the schools didn't drop the program entirely.I don't think that by itself would have stopped it. If they were getting good results, going to court would not be a big problem. The only tenable explanation imo is that it stopped working. From Bates' chapter on treatment in schools:
Quote:A certain amount of supervision is absolutely necessary. At least once a year some one who understands the method should visit each classroom for the purpose of answering questions, encouraging the teachers to continue the use of the method, and making some kind of a report to the proper authorities. It is not necessary that either the supervisor, the teachers or the children, should understand anything about the physiology of the eye.If there wasn't such a person available, that would put a damper on it.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 08-01-2012
I should say, if there wasn't someone available who understood the method well enough to get results in a classroom setting, and who could instill a sufficient understanding in teachers and students.
I just remembered that in the same chapter, Bates wrote this:
Quote:In fact, the effect upon the children of a teacher who wears glasses is so detrimental that no such person should be allowed to be a teacher, and since errors of refraction are curable, such a ruling would work no hardship on anyone.This was doubtless part of the problem.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 08-04-2012
Getting back to the dilemma that started this thread, I guess maybe there is no good answer for people who are more than mildly nearsighted. This probably explains why there seem to be so few cases of significant lasting improvement.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - arocarty - 08-05-2012
Daniel Wrote:If there wasn't such a person available, that would put a damper on it.
Daniel Wrote:I should say, if there wasn't someone available who understood the method well enough to get results in a classroom setting, and who could instill a sufficient understanding in teachers and students.
These are both good points. There is NO indication that it was a failure of the method, and EVERY indication that it was a success when delivered competently and consistently. All the records, many independently verified, showed great success. The schools of New York City were the main arena where Bates focused bringing his method into the classrooms. In spite of all the irrefutable evidence that it was quite successful when delivered properly, there was still a strong prejudice against it by the Board of Education, the Board of Health, and by all the health professionals they consulted on the matter. Why? Because they were still stuck in the conventional mindset, and because they didn't want to be responsible for any benefit children may have gotten from it. The schools were ordered by the Board of Education to stop using the method. Some teachers, convinced of the effectiveness of it, continued to use it at risk to their own jobs. It is easy to see what Bates was up against, and no matter how successful it might have been, was not going to be embraced by the minds of the educators and vision specialists of his day. They didn't understand it, didn't want to understand it. And it was they who controlled what went on in the classrooms, not Bates. The August magazines were dedicated to school children, and there's a wealth of information on the success of the method in schools, and the resistance. Some quotes:
Aug 1920:
"But unfortunately the method was contrary to the teachings of a hundred years, and hence was condemned without trial by every eye specialist consulted by the Board of Education. And thus the children, not only of New York, but of the whole country, have been deprived for years of the blessing of perfect sight, for if New York had led the way, the whole country would have followed.
Through the efforts of this magazine, however, a few schools here and there have introduced the system, and we hope that before another year has elapsed there will be many more of them. An interesting report from one of these schools appears on page 14"
Aug 1923:
"Many boards of education hesitate to be responsible for any benefit that may be derived from the Snellen cards in the schools."
"There are teachers in the city of New York still using my method for the prevention of imperfect sight in children who have obtained so much benefit from its use that they are continuing to practice it although they were ordered by the Board of Education more than ten years ago to stop using my method."
Aug 1929:
"All attempts to benefit the eyes of school children so that they will not need glasses have been suppressed by the Board of Education and the Board of Health. Many principals of large schools have encouraged to the best of their ability the work that can be done to cure or prevent imperfect sight in school children. It in difficult to understand why there should be so much opposition to this work."
Sept. 1921:
"After this the Board of Education condemned my method as "unscientific and erroneous," and forbade the use of the Snellen test card in the schools, except for the usual purpose of testing the children's sight. Thus my pleasant visits to the classrooms came to an end. Some years later, however, I called on the teacher of the freckle-faced boy to ask about him. She met me smiling and without glasses, and I noted that the Snellen test card was still on the wall. In response to my inquiry as to why it should be there after the Board of Education had forbidden its use, she replied:
"The Board of Education has not the power to make me take that card down.""
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - arocarty - 08-05-2012
Daniel Wrote:Getting back to the dilemma that started this thread, I guess maybe there is no good answer for people who are more than mildly nearsighted. This probably explains why there seem to be so few cases of significant lasting improvement.
A good start is a positive outlook. Negative thinking will always bring negative results. Do what you can regardless of what situation you are in; there are always things that can be done. You find ways if you really want it. Time and circumstances never seem ideal.
Re: I'm not skeptical - but how can I do it if I go to schoo - Daniel - 08-07-2012
arocarty Wrote:Daniel Wrote:Getting back to the dilemma that started this thread, I guess maybe there is no good answer for people who are more than mildly nearsighted. This probably explains why there seem to be so few cases of significant lasting improvement.
A good start is a positive outlook. Negative thinking will always bring negative results. Do what you can regardless of what situation you are in; there are always things that can be done. You find ways if you really want it. Time and circumstances never seem ideal.
There is a difference between circumstances being less than ideal and circumstances being stacked against you. People with mild-to-moderate nearsightedness might have to wear glasses sometimes, but probably not most of the time. However, when you're to the point where you need to wear glasses/squint/hunch forward to do pretty much anything, you are constantly doing things which work against the goal of improving eyesight. Even if a good attitude could make some amount of difference, it's difficult to maintain a good attitude under such circumstances.