new article / site update

[David]

I did a site update and wrote a new article based on what I've been saying in the "looking at details" thread (<!-- l --><a class="postlink-local" href="http://www.iblindness.org/community/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1801">viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1801</a><!-- l -->).

Feedback is welcome.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.iblindness.org/intro/method.html">http://www.iblindness.org/intro/method.html</a><!-- m -->

I updated a few other articles too, and rewrote the site's main page. There have been a few things discussed in this thread that I didn't put in the article, so I expect to add more later or write supplementary articles to help fill things out. Hopefully this clarifies things for some new people. I think it's a clearer and less ambiguous presentation. Before, it was basically a daunting "Ok, here's some ideas, here's some exercises, be sure to relax, now have at it and figure it out."

The site is getting about 500 visitors per day now, so this is the start of routing people in the right direction so they aren't so lost by the volume of material on the site and can get going on improving their vision without having to even read Bates's book or anything. I have an idea in mind in adjusting the organization of this forum just a little to help in that regard too. Google really likes site updates, so I wouldn't be surprised to see traffic go up more within the next month.

[Nancy]

Dave,
This is wonderful. It's a great place to point new people, as well as being very helpful to folks who have been doing this work for a while but not seen steady forward progress (like me). One thing I particularly like is that right up front you said there is one right way to see, no matter what your condition -- you happen to have just found a very particular way of doing it wrong. I've encountered so many people, some of them on this forum, who say "Oh, but I have astigmatism (or beginning cataracts, or presbyopia, or dry eye, or ....)! My case is special, so I need special help!". Then they stop fully listening, because I'm "only" nearsighted, so can't possibly understand their situation! Personally, I hear this most from people who wear reading glasses and are astonished that I can read small print, even though my distance vision still varies a lot, so again, they think they're "different" and what I've learned won't apply to them. I have helped several of them (despite themselves), but this post gives me a much simpler way to approach that work. Thank you!

A minor typo in your otherwise perfect post: under "COMMON SENSE - THE WHOLE PICTURE", 2nd section, 2nd sentence,

You just can't see all parts at the same time...

You omitted the word "see".

Thanks again, so much. This is great, so simple and clear!

[Deliverance]

First of all, thanks David for doing it simple to understand.

Well, I've been practicing the method these days, and I'm surprised with the sensations I'm experimenting, but some doubts come to me also and I hope you can answer me.

1. It's normal to feel tension in the eyes/sorrounding area and even pain while doing the method?. also i've noticed that feeling you said of like everything on the periphery seems to dissapear or become blur while looking on the small point, (?) interesting...

2. If I go near to the chart I can appreciate that there are more of a point in the big letters, so now I understand why there is no blur, only details, but If I go down to small letters, well, they're completely blurry but I can notice a small point then I look at it, what is supposed to do now? keep looking at this small point or imagine another smaller point next to the previous point?? you could clarify these statements becouse I don't understand what do you mean exactly.
"imagine what detail could be within that. Think of even smaller details. Don't be complacent with the size of the detail you perceive so far. You want to get down to even smaller pieces."

Thanks in advanced.

[sean]

Dave

Can I add my thanks too.

This all seems straightforward and uncomplicated. I'll come back if anything occurs to me.

[David]

1. It's normal to feel tension in the eyes/sorrounding area and even pain while doing the method?. also i've noticed that feeling you said of like everything on the periphery seems to dissapear or become blur while looking on the small point, (?) interesting...

2. If I go near to the chart I can appreciate that there are more of a point in the big letters, so now I understand why there is no blur, only details, but If I go down to small letters, well, they're completely blurry but I can notice a small point then I look at it, what is supposed to do now? keep looking at this small point or imagine another smaller point next to the previous point?? you could clarify these statements becouse I don't understand what do you mean exactly.
"imagine what detail could be within that. Think of even smaller details. Don't be complacent with the size of the detail you perceive so far. You want to get down to even smaller pieces."

Feeling tension is normal. And noticing it is good. But the tension is there because you're continually creating it by using your eyes wrong. The tension might become more obvious for a while when you start doing the right thing. You can massage it or mentally stop it if you can, but otherwise just keep breathing and remember to blink. It will only go away and stop being created when you keep doing the right thing.

When you notice a small point, whether it's clear or not, look for an even smaller one within or as part of that, even if you don't expect to see it. You can look for as small a detail as someone with better vision than you. If you look for a small enough one, it should elude you. You won't be able to keep looking at a small enough detail because it will seem to disappear or move every time you think you might have found it. Then when you lose it, you look for the same one or a different one. Ok, so that was an excellent question. I can see I should add this to the article, perhaps as like step 4 and 5.

The nice part is you've almost certainly done this before at times when you're trying to find something, maybe something that someone else pointed out to you, but you gave up after a quick moment when deciding you couldn't see it, and you didn't continue looking at other things in that searching way once you looked away. But you may have been doing it just fine for a moment there without even knowing it. It just takes some time to get it going and cause some real results when you aren't in the habit of it and your visual system isn't used to it.

[David]

Dave,
This is wonderful. It's a great place to point new people, as well as being very helpful to folks who have been doing this work for a while but not seen steady forward progress (like me). One thing I particularly like is that right up front you said there is one right way to see, no matter what your condition -- you happen to have just found a very particular way of doing it wrong. I've encountered so many people, some of them on this forum, who say "Oh, but I have astigmatism (or beginning cataracts, or presbyopia, or dry eye, or ....)! My case is special, so I need special help!". Then they stop fully listening, because I'm "only" nearsighted, so can't possibly understand their situation! Personally, I hear this most from people who wear reading glasses and are astonished that I can read small print, even though my distance vision still varies a lot, so again, they think they're "different" and what I've learned won't apply to them. I have helped several of them (despite themselves), but this post gives me a much simpler way to approach that work. Thank you!

A minor typo in your otherwise perfect post: under "COMMON SENSE - THE WHOLE PICTURE", 2nd section, 2nd sentence,

You just can't see all parts at the same time...

You omitted the word "see".

Thanks again, so much. This is great, so simple and clear!

Typo fixed!

So let us know how it goes with them! At least the ones who are willing to do it.

Dave

[David]

I just added a step 4 to the article about what to do when you think you've found a small enough detail. I think that helps.

Dave

[Deliverance]

Ok, thanks again for clarify.
I'll keep you informed on how it's been.

[Andrea Major]

Hi Dave,

I think I preferred your welcome page the way it was before. Mysterious and encouraging people to read the original Bates material... Now, I guess I understand, you want to keep people interested, let them demonstrate to themselves in a matter of minutes that this thing will work (since it should shock anyone with a bit of understanding of their own conditions how the blur begins to change...) However, I don't think Bates was wrong about emphasizing palming as the main method. (and this is coming from someone who could not even palm for the first 6 months of her self-treatment and only began to be able to start it recently....) Anyhow to relieve eye-strain, it should be emphasized that palming, looking away/shifting, swinging are the most important methods of the Bates method.
I thought a lot about responding to your Notes on Looking at Details and Changing post while it was being created but I never did. I thought first that well as in your own cookie-dough analysis, this is a two part process, therefore the looking-for-details is advanced stuff: a person first should relax (as in mixing the dough) then bake the stuff (as in looking for details.) As I progress more and more and read more and more, I can only say that for me, I am getting results with just the relaxation, the other stuff just gives me strain. Everything else, the mind sorts out when it is relaxed enough. The good habits are in my opinion subconcious and the only reason why we do them conciously is to demonstrate to the mind so that it can relax more. But I would have never got anywhere without palming.
Also, you tell a person with very bad eyesight to remove the glasses and stare at the Snellen for an hour, the results may not be very good. The person may even go into convulsion and throw up! :-) Palming and flashing is the key in my opinion and should get front page attention on your otherwise awesome website!

[David]

Hi Dave,

I think I preferred your welcome page the way it was before. Mysterious and encouraging people to read the original Bates material... Now, I guess I understand, you want to keep people interested, let them demonstrate to themselves in a matter of minutes that this thing will work (since it should shock anyone with a bit of understanding of their own conditions how the blur begins to change...) However, I don't think Bates was wrong about emphasizing palming as the main method. (and this is coming from someone who could not even palm for the first 6 months of her self-treatment and only began to be able to start it recently....) Anyhow to relieve eye-strain, it should be emphasized that palming, looking away/shifting, swinging are the most important methods of the Bates method.
I thought a lot about responding to your Notes on Looking at Details and Changing post while it was being created but I never did. I thought first that well as in your own cookie-dough analysis, this is a two part process, therefore the looking-for-details is advanced stuff: a person first should relax (as in mixing the dough) then bake the stuff (as in looking for details.) As I progress more and more and read more and more, I can only say that for me, I am getting results with just the relaxation, the other stuff just gives me strain. Everything else, the mind sorts out when it is relaxed enough. The good habits are in my opinion subconcious and the only reason why we do them conciously is to demonstrate to the mind so that it can relax more. But I would have never got anywhere without palming.
Also, you tell a person with very bad eyesight to remove the glasses and stare at the Snellen for an hour, the results may not be very good. The person may even go into convulsion and throw up! :-) Palming and flashing is the key in my opinion and should get front page attention on your otherwise awesome website!

I'm confused about a few things you mention here -

Why couldn't you palm for the first 6 months?

Why would someone with very bad eyesight go into convulsions and throw up doing this? Do you mean that they're straining their eyes to the absolute limit and doing this will push them over the edge? Maybe that's what needs to happen. I've had some feelings of anxiousness/restlessness doing things like this, but there's a point where you do it for long enough that you get over the hump and feel different. I think what people interpret as "strain" when doing something like this is really a consequence of what they've been doing and not just a result of trying to use their eyes in a different (correct) way. The thing is, they're going to do things a little wrong at first no matter what, because they're used to using their eyes in that wrong way, and it's uncomfortable, but it's only through practicing the right way, with enough specific and unambiguous instruction on what that right way is, that they will be able to learn it. In the beginning it requires conscious and focused attention to it, but being as it's the way the visual system is supposed to work, it will be relatively easy for it to get reprogrammed such that people less and less frequently need to consciously do anything about it because the programming takes over.

As a weak analogy, it's like starting to use a limb that's been immobilized for a very long time. It hurts and feels weird. But if you never use it and try to just keep relaxing it, it won't get better. It's like that line in The Matrix: "Why do my eyes hurt?" "Because you've never used them before." With the eyes it's partly subconscious reprogramming and not just a matter of moving a limb, but there has to be something to force the reprogramming, through actively attempting to use the eyes correctly in a specific way, and as the visual system struggles it is being forced to reprogram.

So I guess what I'm saying is that even though it may be uncomfortable, change isn't supposed to be comfortable and people need to keep doing it, but it will go away. And it might be very surprising when it starts to go away as a result of this, because people are used to using their eyes in a particular (wrong) way because they have been convinced that it is the best way. So even when intellectually they can understand that their old way isn't the best way and that relaxed and perfectly comfortable vision makes sense and sounds so appealing, the process of getting there isn't by just trying to be relaxed, because it's a functional disorder that's causing everything to be all wound up and out of whack. So on the surface it appears to be a matter of strain and relaxation, but strain and relaxation are mostly just the effect, not the cause. I say "mostly" because I do recognize there's a certain amount of calming the mind and stopping any consciously identified tension, but it seems to me that one of the most effective ways to do that is by focusing on breath and avoiding thought. Thoughts of the mind reinforce the current programming, and if thinking can be avoided for as much as possible for several minutes or longer while doing this, I think that's the best that can be done as far as 'relaxing'.

But I'm not sure if I want to get into the whole mind thing, because I was hoping to keep the instructions as unambiguous as possible with the terminology, as simple as possible in giving a couple instructions on focusing on breath and avoiding all extraneous thought, and as concrete as possible in connecting the method to the way that people with normal vision see.

But for what it's worth, I think it would be useful to have several people to do several sessions of looking for details, with and without palming (or anything else) first, to be able to tell for sure whether it's actually helping, hurting or nothing.

Dave

[footballman]

I practiced this for a while yesterday. One thing that happened was that I kind of stopped interpreting what I was seeing or doing.

Like I started off for a while, calling out the letters in my head...for example..'o', 'p', 'k'...but when I could see more clearly, I stopped doing this and simply looked at the 'o' then looked at another letter, no need to call out the letters in my mind, or analyze what I was seeing. Then I stopped because I had to go out

[sean]

David, as for comparing doing looking for detail with and without palming or whatever (which is a good idea in theory), in my case, as I do regular imagination exercise, the relaxation is never that far away in the first place. Even if it were, I suspect that comparing 'with' relaxation and 'without', at least in my case, would be like comparing one crazy graph with hills and troughs all over the place with another one as bad or nearly as bad (you'd need a computer to calculate any correlation), or (to change the analogy) comparing playing the piano while wearing 2 pairs of gloves to using 3 pairs.

[Pikachu]

For some reason, I think that relaxation and looking for details go hand in hand. I believe that either could work by itself, but they work much better together. Knowing how to relax can make the looking for details part easier and possibly the opposite is true. Am I wrong to say that results vary from person to person? Is it possible that some people are equally good at the two, some are better at relaxation technique, and some are better at looking for details? Maybe it's all a matter of what works best for the individual. What do you guys think?

[David]

For some reason, I think that relaxation and looking for details go hand in hand. I believe that either could work by itself, but they work much better together. Knowing how to relax can make the looking for details part easier and possibly the opposite is true. Am I wrong to say that results vary from person to person? Is it possible that some people are equally good at the two, some are better at relaxation technique, and some are better at looking for details? Maybe it's all a matter of what works best for the individual. What do you guys think?

It shouldn't be a choice between relaxation and looking for details. There's a place for both. But the idea of relaxation is so vague that people find ways to justify just about any activity or exercise, and if only they can get relaxed enough, they will have perfect vision. I can't think of a single other task in any area of life (except maybe going to sleep?) where relaxation by itself is all that's needed to accomplish it. To some degree or another it can have its place, but there's always something else you need to do. So it just doesn't make any sense the way people obsess over a kind of almost spiritual idea of perfect relaxation as if vision is somehow different from everything else. I understand that some literature suggests this, and it's misleading. And I think it probably turns a lot of people away from the get-go because they know it doesn't make any sense.

When people have flashes of clear vision without knowing what they did, one mistake is they assume they didn't do anything at all, and they tie it in with the idea of relaxation of the eye muscles (which is true at least in part) and draw a sweeping conclusion that relaxation is what's needed. But if something doesn't work consistently, something isn't right. It's like a broken clock being right twice a day, or hitting a lucky shot in tennis without having any skill in playing.

Dave

[David]

David, as for comparing doing looking for detail with and without palming or whatever (which is a good idea in theory), in my case, as I do regular imagination exercise, the relaxation is never that far away in the first place. Even if it were, I suspect that comparing 'with' relaxation and 'without', at least in my case, would be like comparing one crazy graph with hills and troughs all over the place with another one as bad or nearly as bad (you'd need a computer to calculate any correlation), or (to change the analogy) comparing playing the piano while wearing 2 pairs of gloves to using 3 pairs.

Yeah, it's hard for one person by themselves to be able to judge it, especially over a short period of time.

Dave