Random musings: commitments, some lessons, and more

[Pikachu]

There is some debate as to what should be done when one must juggle other commitments like education or work with vision improvement. What follows is my own opinion and experiences on the topic, but it should be noted that every person needs to figure out for him or herself just what the right choice is. Very few things apply to everyone universally.

Might as well get it out of the way. I think that you should find a way to integrate vision improvement into your lifestyle, and not push everything to the side to focus solely on vision improvement. Why? Well, first of all, the point of obtaining better vision is to live a better life and enjoy it more (I presume), so it seems self-defeating to be robbing yourself of everything important in your life for the purpose of obtaining better vision, even if it is only temporary.

Now, the main point of my mini-rant here, and a very strong argument against my point of view is that vision will not ever get better and will actually get worse if the vision improvement student tries to practice the Bates method while doing things like: go to college, work in front of a computer in a full-time job, etc.

To provide a counterargument against this point, I would like to cite my own experience, and though it is only a single experience, I am sure there are others (even on this forum perhaps!) who have had similar experiences. I am currently a first-year college student slaving away at the computer day and night (I'm a computer science major after all). I estimate that I spend about 9 hours a day on the computer, including on weekends. It is also a common phenomenon for me to feel that my eyes are strained at various points throughout the day. Sometimes, it is because I am just mentally exhausted from needing to meet deadlines. Sometimes, it is because I have foolishly spent well over an hour on the computer without giving my eyes a rest. Sometimes, it's both. And forget eye exercises. I just haven't had time for those at all.

Does this mean I have abandoned the Bates method? It does not. My goal is still to improve my vision to 20/20, but I personally consider my education to be of more importance than spending several more hours a day on trying to improve my vision. But let's get back to my story. So my eyes feel strained quite often, and I am noticing some rather terrible habits that I cannot shake. Five months of this, and what would you expect of my vision? If you're like me, you expect a fairly noticeable decline. Heck, you expect *some* decline. But I tested my eyes, using the same method I always use (I'm measuring difference, not absolute acuity, so no need to worry about whether I'm doing it exactly by the book), and I found that my vision had not changed -- not one bit! What a surprise!

And now I get to the moral of my little story: as long as you have vision improvement in your heart and you work towards it earnestly, you will find a way to get there. There are no guarantees obviously, but I learned a couple of things from this that may be of help to my fellow forum-dwellers who have not seen much success so far.

1. Everything counts. Don't think that visual acuity has to be the be all end all. If you feel healthier, if you feel happier, even if you just feel like you have a sense of purpose, then that is a reason to keep going!

2. Strain does not necessarily mean your eyes are getting worse. Strain is an indicator that you are using your eyes incorrectly to some extent. And you would be surprised how much it helps just to realize that the strain is there to begin with! Bonus points if you can feel the pain. I might be going just a bit overboard with this, but I am starting to get the feeling that the pain you feel when you strain is a *good* thing. Think about it. Pain deters you from potentially harmful things. If you ignore it, you run the risk of getting harmed by those things. I think this is the number one reason that my vision has not gotten any worse in spite of my rather adverse situation. Because I recognize the strain and feel the pain, a message is being sent to my brain that what I am doing is wrong, and at some point, I probably stop before it does permanent damage. Just a guess. That's the power of awareness.

3. Don't compare. This one I learned from several members on these forums. I had trouble with this. I found it necessary to compare myself with others to see where I "should be" on my vision improvement journey. I compared my vision with what it was a day ago, to see how much better I was (and was invariably disappointed when it was no different). But much of the Bates method is about the here and now. What am I doing *now* that will promote good vision habits? What am I doing now that will minimize strain? Don't get me wrong. It's worth paying attention to what you've done previously so you know what works for you and what doesn't (i.e. if it works, you should see an improvement relatively quickly), but there's no use in dwelling on failures, or in my case, any period of time where I stare and put myself in a state of horrific strain. Turn the page. Start over. And practice good vision habits. Now.

I think that's all I have for now. Feel free to comment and throw in your own experiences. As always, I am probably right on some points, misguided on some points, and completely wrong on the rest. Take everything I say with a grain of salt. Thanks for reading.

[ted]

I have recently been tending to err on the side of being a little obsessive about vision improvement, and then when I "give up" on it, for half a day or so, I do so a bit too wholeheartedly. It is true, bits and pieces count, and add up. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

For me, today, a little one was,.....just push the text a little bit further away. Just a little bit. Just remind yourself somewhat. Keeping things not so absolutist helps bring you around and be a little more common-sensical about things and keeps things in perspective and a bit more realistic. I like to say be a "realistic dreamer."

[Daniel]

Interesting that you didn't actually mention glasses at all.

Now, the main point of my mini-rant here, and a very strong argument against my point of view is that vision will not ever get better and will actually get worse if the vision improvement student tries to practice the Bates method while doing things like: go to college, work in front of a computer in a full-time job, etc.

There's nothing inherently incompatible between the Bates method and those things - unless your eyesight is bad enough that you need glasses to do them.

[Pikachu]

Daniel: Strange that I should forget. It should be noted that I wear glasses, even for computer work (otherwise, I would have to lean in much too closely), so I am wearing glasses upwards of nine or ten hours a day. Far from ideal, but it is a choice I have made.

[Daniel]

Daniel: Strange that I should forget. It should be noted that I wear glasses, even for computer work (otherwise, I would have to lean in much too closely), so I am wearing glasses upwards of nine or ten hours a day. Far from ideal, but it is a choice I have made.

Any possibility of getting personal lessons from a Bates teacher? It sounds like that's the only way to improve when you're wearing glasses that much.

[Pikachu]

Daniel, that's good advice. I've been thinking about it, but I am still undecided. Maybe at some point in the future.

[Tsukiomi]

Good point. The moments I stopped obsessing about seeing well is when I started to exhibit my understanding that I developed during practice easily, and thus getting improvements became even easier. Vision isn't supposed to be hard after all. Seeing it as a mental process rather than a series of exercises really helps out on this bit, keeps you from obsessing.

[ted]

What you can do is get a lower prescription . Because the computer is so close, you really don't need much of a correction. Things don't have to be perfectly clear to see them and you can usually see more than you initially think if you just give it a few minutes and keep blinking. To me the pros of working with vision improvement have outweighed the cons. I think, as your vision improves, so will your mental faculties. And I think I've begun to notice this happening.

I've been thinking about this idea recently:

There's an optimal way to use your eyes in most situations that will promote and lead to better vision.


You can use work at the computer as a situation in which to practice better vision. If you can get comfortable using lower strength glasses, you can practice backing up very gradually from the screen and notice how you can't see what is there unless you look directly at it. Like....find that distance away from the computer where things are blurry and you can't make out what's there very well unless you look at small things directly, like single letters or parts of letters.

[arocarty]

You can use work at the computer as a situation in which to practice better vision.

I concur with that. When I first started with vision improvement, I was working on computers 8 hrs. a day, with add'l time added for personal usage. That was several years ago, and I may even use my eyes for the nearpoint even more now. It did not hamper improvement. But I had to learn ways to keep excessive strain at bay at the nearpoint. And there are many things one can do/learn. Some of these things have already been covered by others, such as directing attention to smaller and smaller areas, parts of letters, spaces between and inside letters; also learning to see/imagining halos. In the beginning I was inspired by Robin Parson's theory of myopia, and used the slotcard for reading quite a bit (the Aldus Huxley slot card). There's even one for computer reading. At a certain point I started to realize the optical swing - on the computer and on other reading material - the slight involuntary motion of letters, and that spilled over onto other stationary objects. I practiced and practiced with reading fine print, and that taught me an even deeper level of relaxed seeing at near. While not perfect 100 percent of the time, I feel I'm pretty much in control of how I use my eyes at near now, and can use them as much as I need, with no impact on distant vision. To the contrary, I feel what I have learned at near has positive impact on distance vision. I can't explain how or why, other than that it just seems like a lessening of all around strain.