Lately I've been getting confused about what the bates method is all about. Since reading some books on it (relearning to see and perfect eyesight without glasses) I always had the idea that the bates method aims at relaxing the eye muscles in order to improve sight ...
Since starting to read david's posts though, Ive been geared more toward thinking that the brain got lazy and doesn't want me to see clearly ... Can anyone explain to me the right perspective ?
Good question. I would like to see what the more experienced people say about this as well.
I'm a beginner, and the way I understand it is that the brain needs to relax the eye muscles. To do that it needs to get the lungs to breathe, blink the eyes, shift the eyes, and centralize the eyes.
Peter Grunwald (Eyebody) taught us that attention/intention leads, then brain, eyes, and body follow, in that order. All the "relaxation work" (oxymoron!) you do won't be of much use if you don't really want to see and connect with what you're looking at.
If so then it means that it all starts with looking at things and thus CF would be the base of everything ? if so , what would the best way of enhancing CF be in your opinion ? i take it then that cf will relax the brain or is it the other way around ?
I read statistics which show that poor vision especially myopia or nearsightedness, usually occur in childhood or puberty. Usually it is because there is something you literally 'did not want to see' during that vulnerable/ sensitive stage of your life...it could have been anything, even something which may seem silly or trivial to you right now. We need to figure out which event triggered our poor eyesight and start working on reversing that.
By the way, the idea of 'events' triggering negative reactions in our lives is a concept that I understood more clearly by studying the Lefkoe Method by Morty Lefkoe. I guess I'll post more about it on the Off Topic Forum. However, in a nutshell, I'm thinking once we find out the 'event' that triggered our eyes to react negatively by inducing myopia etc, we can reverse the event using the Lefkoe Method.
Hi,
In A. Huxleys book (based on Bates method), you find his explanation how the eyes can lose their natural way of functioning:
Quote:Mal-functioning and strain tend to appear whenever the conscious 'I' interferes
with instinctively acquired habits of proper use, either by trying too hard to do well,
or by feeling unduly anxious about possible mistakes. (P.9)
... - by being too anxious to achieve the desired end. But in seeing, as in all other
psycho-physical skills, the anxious effort to do well defeats its own object; for this
anxiety produces psychological and physiological strains, and strain is
incompatible with the proper means for achieving our end, namely normal and
natural functioning. (P. 9/10)
This inhibition of the movement of the eyesâa movement of
which we are mainly unconsciousâis brought about by a too greedy desire to see.
In our over-eagerness we unconsciously immobilize the eyes, in the same way as
we have immobilized the other parts of the body. The result is that we begin to stare
at that part of the sense-field which we are trying to perceive. But a stare always
defeats its own object; for, instead of seeing more, a person who has immobilized
his sensing-apparatus (an act which also immobilizes the closely correlated
attention) thereby automatically lowers his power of seeing, which depends, as we
have learnt, upon the uninterrupted mobility of the sensing eyes and of the
attending, selecting and perceiving mind associated with the eyes.
Moreover, the act of staring (since it represents an effort to repress movements
which are normal and habitual) is always accompanied by excessive and
continuous tension, and this, in its turn, produces a sense of psychological strain.
But where there is excessive and continuous tension, normal functioning becomes
impossible, circulation is reduced, the tissues lose their resistance and their powers
of recovery. To overcome the effects of impaired functioning, the victim of bad
seeing habits stares yet harder, and consequently sees less with greater strain. And
so on, in a descending spiral. (P. 20/1)
To get back to the natural functioning with effortless movement, relaxation is necessary, passive relaxation but, even more important, also 'dynamic relaxation':
Quote:To speak of combining activity with relaxation may seem paradoxical ; but in fact
it is not. For relaxation is of two kinds, passive and dynamic. Passive relaxation is
achieved in a state of complete repose, by a process of consciously ' letting go.' As
an antidote to fatigue, as a method of temporarily relieving excessive muscular
tensions, together with the psychological tensions that always accompany them,
passive relaxation is excellent. But it can never, in the nature of things, be enough.
We cannot spend our whole lives at rest, consequently cannot be always passively
relaxing. But there is also something to which it is legitimate to give the name of
dynamic relaxation. Dynamic relaxation is that state of the body and mind which is
associated with normal and natural functioning. In the case of what I have called
the fundamental or primary psycho-physical skills, normal and natural functioning
of the organs involved may sometimes be lost. But having been lost, it may
subsequently be consciously re-acquired by anyone who has learnt the suitable
techniques. When it has been re-acquired, the strain associated with impaired
functioning disappears and the organs involved do their work in a condition of
dynamic relaxation. (P. 9)
If you are looking at something, attention is always necessary - but here also there is a difference between the natural, spontaneous attention, which leads to effortless 'functioning' and voluntary attention, which is brought about by 'external pressure' to do something you don't really want to and which leads to strain and fatigue:
Quote:Spontaneous attention is the kind of attention we share with the higher
animalsâthe unforced act of selective awareness which is determined by the
biological necessities of keeping alive and reproducing the species, or by the
exigencies of our second nature, in other words, of our habits and established
patterns of thought, feeling and behaviour. This kind of attention involves no effort
when it is shifting and transitory and not much effort when it is prolonged. (P. 18/9)
Voluntary attention is, so to speak, the cultivated variety of the wild, spontaneous
growth. It is found only in man, and in animals subjected by human beings to some
form of training. It is the attention associated with intrinsically difficult tasks, or
with tasks which we have to perform, even though we don't particularly want to. A
small boy studying algebra exhibits voluntary attentionâthat is, if he exhibits any
attention at all. The same boy playing a game exhibits spontaneous attention.
Voluntary attention is always associated with effort, and tends more or less rapidly
to produce fatigue. (P.19)
( <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.skaidrus.lt/uploads/Aldous%20Huxley%20-%20The%20Art%20Of%20Seeing.pdf">http://www.skaidrus.lt/uploads/Aldous%2 ... Seeing.pdf</a><!-- m --> )
